The thai lotto, or slaakkinaebng as it’s known locally in Thailand, is run by the Government Lottery Office (GLO) and draws take place twice a month on the first and 16th. The televised drawing is aired from 3:00 PM to 4:00 PM local time and is the only legal form of gambling in the country.
The GLO is a state-run entity that adheres to strict legislative standards as to how the lottery operates and what percentage of ticket sales will go towards supporting national causes. From the printing press to a buyer’s hand, tickets are distributed through a chain of wholesalers and brokers before they arrive at 14,700 authorized retail venues throughout the country. These vendors, which include street vendors and those with wooden ticket briefcases at the front of their shops, sell them to the public.
In order to prevent counterfeiting, each ticket is printed on special yellow, thin, smooth paper that features a watermark of the mythical bird Wayupak and is coated with chemicals that will show stains under bleach. The paper is also printed with a security strip that contains the six-digit winning number and a barcode. The barcode on the top is encoded with a special secret code that only the GLO knows and which can be decoded using a scanning machine at the ticket booths.
A thai lotto ticket costs 40 baht, and players must purchase two tickets to be eligible for any prize. The odds of winning vary depending on the size of the jackpot and the total number of tickets sold. In addition, the winning numbers are chosen through a random process; the numbering system is not sequential and there are no pre-printed numbers.
There are two types of thai lotto tickets: government lottery (TGL) and Thai charity lottery (TCL). TGL tickets offer a maximum prize of Six million baht and the bonus prize is thirty million baht. TCL tickets have a higher chance of winning, but only one prize is awarded per draw.
Although a lottery is a game of chance, many people try to improve their chances of winning by following certain strategies. In fact, regular winners do a great deal of research on their chosen numbers and the probabilities of those numbers appearing in each draw. Some even attend religious services to seek divine help and guidance from the spirits.
While the thai lotto is not as popular as its European and American counterparts, it still has a significant following in the nation. People visit temples, shrines and monks for hints as to which digits will produce favorable results. When a monk passes away, many will not only pay their respects but also head to the temple in the hopes of receiving a sign from him on which numbers are good or bad. Other people go to fortune tellers in search of a winning combination. While most of these people are merely hoping to win a small amount, there are those who have won the grand prize, which can be worth up to 30 million baht.
