Clive, Iowa — The Iowa Lottery plans to move to some more modern methods of payment for prizes in the new year.
Lottery spokesperson, Mary Neubauer, says paper checks had been the standard.
She says a working group in the organization studied the options and what Lottery customers want.
Neubauer says cash payments won’t go away, but they do plan to start using prepaid debit cards that allow retailers or Lottery offices to load the prize money onto the card.
Neubauer says retailers could pay prizes from 20 up to 600 dollars on the cards, while lottery offices could use the prepaid debit cards for prizes from 20 up to five-thousand dollars. They hope to start a pilot project with the debit cards in six months. The other change would allow prizes that have to be redeemed at Iowa Lottery offices to be made through what’s called an ACH (or Automatic Clearing House) payment that goes directly into a person’s bank account.
The ACH prize payments could go up to five million dollars. Neubauer says they are only making a couple of changes because they have to be very careful about the security surrounding the prize money.
Neubauer says the large jackpots from lotto games would still be paid out by wire transfer, as that is the safest method.
