If you're planning on keeping your winning lottery ticket for a rainy day, you better think twice -- Connecticut lottery winners now have only 180 days to redeem their prizes instead of a full-year.
"It's important that people who buy lottery tickets be aware of the time period change, particularly if they have winning tickets," State Rep. Stephen Dargan,D-West Haven, co-chair of the public safety committee, told The Hartford Courant. "I wouldn't want any lottery ticket winner to lose out because he or she is not aware that the new claim period is now 180 days, and not 365 days."
The move by the public safety committee, which oversees legalized gambling, could bring the state approximately $6.1 million in unclaimed prize money, according to a letter from the lottery corporation's president and CEO, Anne M. Noble, which Dargan released to The Courant.
"The change in the prize period is being effectuated to bring us into parity with the lottery industry and to enhance our contributions to the General Fund," Noble wrote in the letter.
