Why does everyone here keep their receipts?
Short answer
Because the receipt is a lottery ticket. Winning numbers are drawn on the 25th of every odd-numbered month, the special prize is NT$10,000,000 and the smallest is NT$200, and you have three months from the sixth of the following month to claim. A passport works as identification, so visitors are not excluded from any of it.
The draw
Winning numbers are drawn on the 25th of every odd-numbered month. Depending on the year’s finances the draw produces one to three grand-prize numbers, three to ten sets for the other prizes, and one special prize.
So a receipt is not spent the moment you take it. It has a draw waiting for it, and the numbers are published — which is why people in shops here put the slip in a wallet instead of a bin.
What it can be worth
The special prize is NT$10,000,000 and the grand prize NT$2,000,000. Below those, the tiers run from NT$200,000 for a first prize down to NT$200 for a sixth.
The bottom of that range is the part that matters to a visitor. NT$200 is not a fortune, but it is the tier people actually hit, and it is the reason the habit exists at all rather than a story about someone who got rich.
The window, and what you need to claim
Prizes are claimed within three months, counted from the sixth day of the month after the draw. Past that the slip is finished, however it placed.
Claims are made at prize disbursement institutions with the receipt stub and identification. A non-national presents a passport or a resident certificate in place of a Taiwanese ID card — which is the clause that decides whether any of this applies to you, and it does.
Good to know
- Drawn on the 25th of every odd-numbered month
- Special prize NT$10,000,000; sixth prize NT$200
- Claim from the 6th of the next month, for three months
- Non-nationals identify with a passport
