So Would You Take a Check?

So far about 1,200 businesses are offering the Oklahoma Lottery scratch-off tickets and since Wednesday morning have done about $3.7 million in business ... which means that much money has left the hands of hard-working citizens and is going out to where?

A -- 30% is allocated to public schools. That's about $1.11 million.

B -- 6% goes to the businesses that host the games. That's about $222,000. If business was balanced among all entities (it won't be) that's about $185 per business.

C -- The rest, 64%, goes for "administration" and other costs of operation, including winnings. That's $2.37 million, roughly. Of this 52.5% is supposed to be for winnings. At this point, some $1.94 million should have been redistributed. Hope someone is keeping track.

Please don't ask us what constitutes "administration" because we haven't a clue.

What we do know is that the state had hoped to have 3,500 sites for lottery sales. It's running a bit slow. One reason: a lot of small businesses are less than enthusiastic about keeping enough cash on hand to handle a $600 payout, as lottery rules dictate.

Some rural store owners, like Jim Brown of McGuire Farm Store in Slaughterville, are concerned about having large amounts of cash on hand to pay winning customers.

"Someone broke into our store last week and tried to break into our ATM machine," Brown said. "It makes me nervous, being a rural store and all, carrying large amounts of cash. I think it's something the state could do something about.

"Having to pay out $150 or $200 would be no problem, but $500 or $600, well, that's a lot of money."

Beverly Hughes, director of sales and marketing for the Oklahoma Lottery Commission, said officials are encouraging store owners to either write a check or tell customers to make an appointment so they can be quickly and safely paid.

Write a check?

Hughes said the Lottery Commission is not policing compliance with its policy. That's a questionable strategy, in our opinion, since there are bound to be bugs in the system at first. But she says that businesses will get more comfortable with the lottery as they discover that most payouts are under $25.

But Randy Goode, manager of Ashmore's Diamond Shamrock in McAlester, said he is not taking chances.

"The biggest issue is the safety of your clerks when you have that much cash on hand," he said. "We have moved some surveillance cameras to safeguard ourselves."

Goode said a store down the street is not cashing any tickets worth more than $25 and, unless the state starts enforcing the $600 minimum requirement, he said he will have to keep even more cash on hand for overflow winnings from that store. His largest payout so far has been $100, but he said he will stick to the $600 maximum rule unless he runs out of money.

It's nice to know someone's hit a bigger payoff than $2. Oh, wait. Several have.

As of 4 p.m., no one had won the $25,000 jackpot on the $5 game, but five people had claimed the $5,000 top prize on the two types of $2 games. Also, 11 customers had won $777, the maximum prize from a $1 ticket.

A long way from $1.94 million, but we'll keep the adding machine plugged in.