Elottery...Again..

[JayBeeUK]

Hello all.

I have a few friends involved with the Elottery s(cam/cheme) and I'm pretty convinced its a bad idea. However, I need firm arguments that I can use to get them to pull out of the s(cam/cheme). And I suppose a simple explanation of what it claims to do, and what it actually does would be a great help too.

Thanks,

Jon.

Edit: Just for clarification, it's the scheme from http://www.v-w-d.com/<member ID link removed by DrMoriarty>

 

[DrMoriarty]

See this recently closed thread and the links contained therein — or maybe you already have, since you say 'again...' in your title?
That wouldn't happen to be your own member ID that you posted there, would it, Jon?

Either way, I've removed that part of the link. You may be banned, some time soon...

 

[Shem]

I think the doctor and some of the guys here need to do a little bit more research on e-lottery before bashing it like that. I have read the post on the other thread about e-lotto and looked at the links proving that it is a scam but they are all misleading. There's nothing dodgy about virtual world direct. In fact a member of the Lotteries Council is an affiliate of e-lottery and is enjoying recruiting members and playing for free and earning commissions. No scam there.

Anyway, happy days.

 

[Guest109]

im sure syndicates formed by neighbours,work groups etc have a greater chance than the single punter ,but these very large syndicates stink to high heaven

 

[DrMoriarty]

Actually, I didn't 'bash' eLottery, or Virtual World Direct, other than to point out what happens when you enter their names + the word 'scam' into a Google search.

What does emerge from that thread is three first-time posters singing the praises of those MLM schemes and telling big pork pies about their involvement/vested interest, or masquerading under different AAM usernames. And of course Jon's post above is another example of, ehm, less-than-total transparency...

So — welcome to AAM, Shem. Do you mind me asking whether you have any direct experience of/connection to either of these schemes? If there's 'nothing dodgy' about them, why do so many of their members seem to resort to these kinds of tactics?

 

[Shem]

I see what you mean. Maybe they are just trying to recruit new members....I don't know why they would do that.

Virtual World Direct is the company name and e-Lottery is the syndicate system created by VWD. They now also have e-Lotbidder which is a lowest unique bid competittion for a big prize.

Anyway, there are some major football clubs like celtic FC, Bolton Wanderers, cricket clubs like yorkshire cricket club and a few more big names out there who are e-lottery affiliates and gladly advertise it on their sites. There are also many charity organisations who use this as a fundraiser as well.

And with Virtual World Direct e-lottery, anyone in the world now has a chance to participate in the euromillions and uk lotto - I recently had a member in my group for a while from Iran of all places who wanted to play the euromillions. The lotteries council approve it and as mentioned earlier, one of the big guys who works there is an actual e-lotto affiliate himself.

And yes, I'm an e-lotto affiliate myself and have no problems with being part of VWD e-lotto/e-lotbidder and enjoy earning commissions and playing both lottos for free week in week out.

 

[DrMoriarty]

Maybe they are just trying to recruit new members....I don't know why they would do that.
[....]
And yes, I'm an e-lotto affiliate myself and [...] enjoy earning commissions and playing both lottos for free week in week out.

I'm trying hard to reconcile these two. Maybe others will draw their own conclusions...

I think MagicMoose's posts in the thread I linked to above (here and here) expose the maths of the scheme fairly clearly.

Affiliates' commissions and 'free' entries — not to mention the profits accruing to those higher up — are dependent on drawing in ever more lower-level 'members' while artfully concealing from them that a sizeable share of their own stake and/or any hypothetical winnings is being siphoned off to fund the process. It may not be illegal, but I consider it dishonest and exploitative. The fact that their affiliates include sporting clubs and a 'big guy' from the UK Lotteries council, or that they can recruit suckers (sorry, members!) from Iran does nothing to change that view — which is purely a personal one, of course.

 

[Shem]

I see what you mean. Everyone has to have their opinion, which is what makes this world in essence.

I think the £5 you pay a week for one lotto is money well spent. I fail to see how it is a rip-off of any kind.

Ok, the company divides your weekly subscription fee this way. You pay £5 to play in one lottery e.g the UK Lotto. There's 49 players in a syndicate. £5 times 49 players = £245 minus the 88 lines( at £1 per line) that syndicate gets a week remains £157, minus the 50%(of total cost £245) the company pays out in commissions £157-£122.50 remains £34.50 for the company to pay for it's staff, infinity bonuses to members, Company meetings, etc. As you can see, it's not really a money spinner for the company.

So the calculations on the other thread by magic moose were incorrect.

Plus in essence, with the uk lotto alone, you are getting 702% greater chance of winning as each syndicate has 49 players making that number 1-49 guaranteed bonus ball numbers. So you just need to match 5 to scoop the jackpot. About three saturdays ago, 3 different syndicates matched 4 numbers each. They only needed to match one more number each to scoop the jackpot. Now that would have created very good media coverage for the company.

 

[DrMoriarty]

You'll have to forgive me if I remain unconvinced, shem. Granted, when it comes to lotteries, I'm firmly of the 'proportional tax on stupidity' persuasion. If people want to sign up to MLM 'systems' like these which take a further top-slice out of their remittance, so that their recruiters can play for free, then I guess they're entitled to do so, within the letter of the law.

...it's not really a money spinner for the company.

Aww, really? Take heart — what's that other old amalgamated misquote from Henry Louis Mencken and Scott Adams about 'nobody ever went broke... [etc.]'?

 

[Shem]

Well, I certainly forgive you Dr Moriarty. I guess your views are pretty solid on this one. I still don't see anything wrong with recruiters or the company making a little bit of money from this. Same thing happens when you go to a recruitment agency looking for a job, or buying a bar of soap, or even working 9-5 until you retire. In the end, someone has to make money. Your boss suddenly benefits from you working there, and if your the boss, you definitely benefit from your employees, even though they do most of the work (in most jobs anyway.) So don't think about it too much. It's just a way to make money and it's completely legitimate, legal and honest.

I think I'll have to leave it at that.

Shem.

 

[RainyDay]

The lotteries council approve it

Got any independent verification of this - I don't see any mention of elottery on [broken link removed]

as mentioned earlier, one of the big guys who works there is an actual e-lotto affiliate himself.

What do you mean by 'big guys'? How big is the Lotteries Council? I don't suppose by any wild chance that you can identify this person, or will this be one of those unprovable claims that seem to pepper discussions about these schemes?

I think the £5 you pay a week for one lotto is money well spent. I fail to see how it is a rip-off of any kind.

Ok, the company divides your weekly subscription fee this way. You pay £5 to play in one lottery e.g the UK Lotto. There's 49 players in a syndicate. £5 times 49 players = £245 minus the 88 lines( at £1 per line) that syndicate gets a week remains £157, minus the 50%(of total cost £245) the company pays out in commissions £157-£122.50 remains £34.50 for the company to pay for it's staff, infinity bonuses to members,

Sorry - I'm lost now. Please confirm how much of the the £5 actually goes into the lottery, and how much is taken in fees/expenses/other?

 

[Shem]

Click on the tab 'info' then click on 'member associations.' It's there (Virtual World Direct,) or, you can e-mail the lotteries council if you think i'm telling a lie.

'Big-Guy' is just an expression i used - i'm pretty sure you know what i mean. Anyway, It's Peter Jones, He's also listed there under 'info' then 'Executive of the Council'

And you just need to read the calculations again. It's pretty straight forward. When you join, you are placed in a 49 player syndicate, each member paying £5 = £245, 50% of that goes towards paying commissions to e-lotto members. That leaves £122.50. Each syndicate of 49 players gets 88 lines a week. A line for the UK Lotto costs £1 that's £88. So you subtract that from £122.50 left after deducting commissions and the company is left £34.50 from those 49 players, to cover expenses incurred by the company like wages for the staff, company meetings etc.

 

[RainyDay]

And you just need to read the calculations again. It's pretty straight forward. When you join, you are placed in a 49 player syndicate, each member paying £5 = £245, 50% of that goes towards paying commissions to e-lotto members. That leaves £122.50. Each syndicate of 49 players gets 88 lines a week. A line for the UK Lotto costs £1 that's £88. So you subtract that from £122.50 left after deducting commissions and the company is left £34.50 from those 49 players, to cover expenses incurred by the company like wages for the staff, company meetings etc.

Wow - this is much, much worse than I thought - so 50% of the player's money gets 'redirected'. Why on earth would this make sense for the player? Let's be very clear - this immediately reduces by 50% the chance of winning. Why on earth would any player do this? Why wouldn't the play just put 100% of their money in the lottery and have an improved chance of winning? Or form a simple, local syndicate with family or friends and have double the chance of winning compared to eLottery?

 

[Shem]

I see your argument there, but and a BIG BUT, for £5, you get 88 lines a week. That's 44 on Wednesday and 44 on Saturday. Now, you only need to match 5 numbers to win the jackpot with e-lottery. say the jackpot is £1 million. that will be divided amongst 49 players making approximately £20,000 for each of the 49 players. If you matched 5 numbers on your own on the uk lotto, you would win aproximately £1,000. See the difference.

The company also gives you two free goes every week. Match five on the free go and you get £1,000.

You also don't have to queu up in the shops, plus you get results in your mailbox plus they also let you know of any winnings. You can also get to play for free by introducing five people to play. Say you are playing the uk lotto and you get five people to play the uk lotto there, you are automatically playing for free.

So, it's clearly the better way to play. And as you can see, you not only win more as part of that syndicate, you can also get to play for free.

Plus, you may have looked by now and as I mentioned, the lotteries council seem to approve of it.

Shem.

 

[RainyDay]

I see your argument there, but and a BIG BUT, for £5, you get 88 lines a week. That's 44 on Wednesday and 44 on Saturday. Now, you only need to match 5 numbers to win the jackpot with e-lottery. say the jackpot is £1 million. that will be divided amongst 49 players making approximately £20,000 for each of the 49 players. If you matched 5 numbers on your own on the uk lotto, you would win aproximately £1,000. See the difference.

Hold your horses, there - You do NOT get 88 lines a week for your fiver. You get one forty-nineth share of 88 lines per week - which is less than 2 lines a week.

The company also gives you two free goes every week. Match five on the free go and you get £1,000.

You mean you get 1/49th share of 2 'free' lines again - right?

You also don't have to queu up in the shops, plus you get results in your mailbox plus they also let you know of any winnings. You can also get to play for free by introducing five people to play. Say you are playing the uk lotto and you get five people to play the uk lotto there, you are automatically playing for free.

Seems an expensive service, given that you play the [broken link removed] for standard prices - no queuing up, automatic notification of results, all those things that eLottery are creaming off the top are available at no charge.

So, it's clearly the better way to play. And as you can see, you not only win more as part of that syndicate,

There is no 'win more' - the benefits of your syndicate have been cut in half by the huge fees. You win more if you start your own syndicate and treat eLottery with a 40-foot-bargepole.

you can also get to play for free.

Assuming you can find 5 suckers to pay for you, right?

Plus, you may have looked by now and as I mentioned, the lotteries council seem to approve of it.

First of all, I'd really need to see some explicit confirmation of approval (not just having VWC as members) before I'd accept this. But even if I did accept this, what does it mean? Who is the 'lotteries council'? A group of organisations who run lotteries - right? What value should I really place on their 'approval'?

 

[Shem]

No you don't share your two free goes. That's yours to keep. and if you introduced three people to play the free go, the prize money jumps up to £5000 -all for you if you match 5. Better than paying £1 on the counter huh!

And yes, you do get 88 lines a week for your £5. You're in a 49 player syndicate for £5, with 49 tickets. All 49 players have the same 5 numbers. If your syndicate matches the 5 numbers, you win the jackpot due to the guaranteed 6th ball number, and you share the jackpot amongst the 49 people. So say the jackpot is £1 million, because you have 49 tickets with slightly different combinations, the Prize money goes to £1.2million approximately, so you win more in essence.

 

[RainyDay]

No you don't share your two free goes. That's yours to keep. and if you introduced three people to play the free go, the prize money jumps up to £5000 -all for you if you match 5. Better than paying £1 on the counter huh!

Why do I get the feeling that you're making this up as you go along? I'm still not clear on what exactly you mean by 'two free goes' - please clarify? Is this 2 'free' lines in every draw? Are these real lines in the draw? or some 'virtual' 5-number line allocations?

And what on earth is meant by '3 people to play the free go'? This is clearly designed to be completely confusing and impenetrable, as evidence by the claim on the website that the calculations are 'too confusing' to be shown but they were done by a 'University professor' - Wow, that's me sold on the idea then.

And yes, you do get 88 lines a week for your £5. You're in a 49 player syndicate for £5, with 49 tickets. All 49 players have the same 5 numbers. If your syndicate matches the 5 numbers, you win the jackpot due to the guaranteed 6th ball number, and you share the jackpot amongst the 49 people.

Funny how the bit about sharing the jackpot is just slipped in at the end. That's the important bit - you get a one-49th share of any jackpot. So you don't get '88 lines per week' - you get 1-49th share of 88 lines.

 

[Shem]

Funny how the bit about sharing the jackpot is just slipped in at the end. That's the important bit - you get a one-49th share of any jackpot. So you don't get '88 lines per week' - you get 1-49th share of 88 lines.

C'mon rainy day, no need to stress yourself, Of course you share the jackpot with the other 49 players in your syndicate. The beauty is that you don't have to match six numbers to win the jackpot, you only need 5 with e-lottery. And it's 44 lines on saturday and 44 on wednesday making 88 lines per week for £5.

And if you visit the e-lottery sight, click on the grab-a-grand for free icon, you just put in 5 numbers, you get a confirmation e-mail. If you then forward that e-mail to three other friends and they decide to have a free go as well, you don't win a grand if you match 5, instead you win five grand.

If you a member, you get two free goes with the grab-a-grand every week. So if you match five numbers with the grab-a-grand competition, you win a grand. If you are not an e-lottery member and visit the site, you can still play grab-a-grand for free and have the option of telling three other friends and if they decide to have a go as well, your prize goes up from a grand to five grand on that draw.

And i explained in a post earlier how you win more. Just go back and look at it again and tell me what isn't clear about winning more as part of an e-lottery syndicate.

Anyway, i'm off to bed now, catch you later.

....and i am not making anything up that's for sure.

 

[RainyDay]

C'mon rainy day, no need to stress yourself, Of course you share the jackpot with the other 49 players in your syndicate. The beauty is that you don't have to match six numbers to win the jackpot, you only need 5 with e-lottery. And it's 44 lines on saturday and 44 on wednesday making 88 lines per week for £5.

This is like nailing jelly to the ceiling. You are making it impossible to pin you down on the specifics of the programme (apart from the specific 50% of the fees that is deducted as 'expenses'). But I'll do my best to take this apart, step by step.

There is no magic to the 'you only to match 5' approach. You get 88 lines, all of which have the same 5 numbers. So eLottery do (assuming that they do actually buy some real lottery tickets) is that they add each of the numbers 1-49 to your set of 5 on each line. They cover all the numbers 1-49 - In fact, I'm wondering if they do actually buy 88 lines - Maybe they just buy 49?

You can keep repeating the '44 lines on saturday and 44 on wednesday making 88 lines per week for £5' as many times as you like. Every time you repeat it, I'll repeat the fact that you get (at best) one-49th share of 88 lines (i.e. less than 2 lines) for your £5. Maybe your website should have a little maths test as the first thing visitors see - If they pass the maths test, tell them to go elsewhere - Only someone who is bad at maths would consider this to be a good deal.

And if you visit the e-lottery sight, click on the grab-a-grand for free icon, you just put in 5 numbers, you get a confirmation e-mail. If you then forward that e-mail to three other friends and they decide to have a free go as well, you don't win a grand if you match 5, instead you win five grand.

Thanks for the kind offer, but hell will freeze over before I give my email address to anyone associated with this scheme/scam. I feel quite soiled having spent a little bit of time on the website trying to wade through the confusion.

If you a member, you get two free goes with the grab-a-grand every week. So if you match five numbers with the grab-a-grand competition, you win a grand. If you are not an e-lottery member and visit the site, you can still play grab-a-grand for free and have the option of telling three other friends and if they decide to have a go as well, your prize goes up from a grand to five grand on that draw.

OK - so now we are finally getting to the bottom of what you meant by '2 free goes'. So it is not 2 free lines or anything like it - just some other small draw where the maximum payout is £1k. I guess when you are taking 50% of members subscription as fees, it isn't that hard to give back the odd £1k here and there.

And i explained in a post earlier how you win more. Just go back and look at it again and tell me what isn't clear about winning more as part of an e-lottery syndicate.

Whis is unclear is your failure to recognise that allowing 50% of the subscription to be creamed off in 'fees' is not smart, from the members point of view. The member would be far better off setting up a simple syndicate with friends & family and having 100% of their subscription going into the lottery.

 

[Shem]

Rainy day, You're a toughy. I don't think there's anything I can say to you for you to see the simple logic to the e-lottery syndicate system.

When I say you get two free goes, it's two free goes for the UK National Lottery. You have to be a member to get the two free weekly goes, one on Wednesday and another on Saturdays draw. You put in 5 numbers. If your five numbers match on that UK Lotto draw, you win a grand. If you don't win, go back choose the same numbers or other numbers for the next draw. How hard is that to understand....surely, c'mon, that's pretty straight forward if you ask me....but hey, maybe i'm not good at maths like yourself as you suggest.

And of course they buy real lottery tickets. What else would they be buying. If you form a syndicate for the UK National Lottery, would you then go and buy tickets for the Irish lottery instead? Ask yourself that question.

And I won't explain about the 88 lines to you again. The problem here really is that you have already made up your mind about e-lottery and no-one can say anything to prove you wrong.

I suggest you visit the site and if you must take a mathematecian with you and try and find any flaws. You will be there for months trying to find one. All the flaws you suggest here, are simply because you are not looking at what i've said properly and are miscalculations on your part.

It really surprises me how you can't work this out, especially about the 88 lines you get a week for £5.

Anyway, I give up on this debate now....you're a tough one to hold an argument with. You can e-mail VWD admin or phone them and speak to one of the founders Tom or Len. They may be able to help with your reservations on e-lottery.

Happy days Rainy Day!