The countdown is on for two Powerball® prizes of $50,000 that are still unclaimed months after they were won in Iowa. At the Iowa Lottery, we’re reminding you to double-check your tickets! One of the prizes will expire next month if it isn’t claimed in time, and the other will expire in October.
The first ticket up was purchased at Casey’s, 3434 Nebraska Ave. in Council Bluffs, for the Powerball drawing on July 21, 2021. The ticket matched four of the white balls and the red Powerball in that night’s drawing to win a $50,000 prize. The prize will expire next month – at the close of business on July 21 -- if it isn’t claimed by then at an Iowa Lottery office.
The other big unclaimed ticket was purchased at Kum & Go, 629 S. Division St. in Stuart, for the Powerball drawing on Oct. 23, 2021. It also matched four of the white balls and the red Powerball in that night’s drawing to win a $50,000 prize. That prize will expire at the close of business on Oct. 24 if it isn’t claimed in time at a lottery office.
A current list of unclaimed lotto and InstaPlay prizes of more than $600 in Iowa is available here. Details about how to claim a prize at an Iowa Lottery office are available here.
And here’s an interesting detail: Time does appear to be a factor in these situations! The Iowa Lottery reviewed plays from a sampling of recent lotto drawings and found that nearly all the prizes that were claimed happened within six months of the drawing. Less than 3 percent of prizes from those drawings were claimed after that point.
That’s something we'll continue to evaluate for how best to encourage and remind players to claim their prizes.
The money from lottery prizes that expire in Iowa without being claimed goes into the lottery's prize pools for future games and promotions, so it will be used to pay prizes, just not those prizes that have expired.
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