Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) and Taipei City Councilor Hung Chien-yi (洪健益) accused Taiwan Lottery Co (台灣彩券公司) yesterday of embezzlement because vendors lost part of their cash deposits following the system crash on Sunday.
Hsu and Hung told a press conference that Taiwan Lottery asked its lottery vendors, many of whom are physically challenged, to turn on their computer vending systems on Sunday -- when there's no public lottery -- for a software upgrade, which instead ended up in a system crash nationwide.
Hsu said the system crash led to the "disappearance" of part of vendors' daily cash deposit the next day, with individual vendor's losses estimated at more than NT$10,000.
For instance, one of the vendors had NT$175,800 deposited in the system when he closed the lottery stand during the weekend, only to find NT$158,000 remaining on Monday, Hsu said.
The vendor's NT$17,800 "vanished" for no reason, Hsu said, while showing the media copies of the vendor's printed cash balance on Sunday and Monday.
In response to vendors' queries, Taiwan Lottery -- a subsidiary of Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控) -- told them to go check the details of their deposit, as the lottery vending system could not have made such a mistake, Hsu said.
"Since there are more then 5,000 lottery vendors in the nation, if each one of them lost NT$10,000, Taiwan Lottery could have embezzled more than NT$50 million [US$1.5 million) during the system crash," he said.
"We urge the Ministry of Finance to investigate the matter and give a report on how it has dealt with the problem," DPP caucus whip Wang Sing-nan (
"The ministry should cancel the right of Chinatrust Financial Holding Co to hold the lottery business if it does not have the ability to manage it," he said.
Meanwhile, Taiwan Lottery Co said it has resolved the problem on Monday, and there should not be any errors in distributors' accounts as lawmakers alleged.
"We're sorry about the inconvenience this has caused our distributors. But the problem has been dealt with and their accounts are back to normal," company senior vice president Phyllis Hung (
The ministry has demanded that Chinatrust Financial submit a report on the issue. It has also asked Taiwan Lottery to set up exclusive telephone lines to assist those affected by the system malfunction, said Ko Hsiu-chuan, a ministry official.
As long as major blunders do not occur again, the ministry will not punish the firm, he said.
Additional reporting by Jackie Lin
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