Allwyn, the operator of The National Lottery, has today thanked its 43,500 retail partners for their continued support and assistance, as it takes the next major step in its wide-ranging National Lottery transformation plan.

The National Lottery will undergo its biggest technology upgrade since 1994, transforming core gaming and retail systems. This will involve launching new terminal software and moving systems to new platforms, as well as a number of other crucial back-end tech upgrades. The upgrades also include the delivery of 30+ new systems and complex data migrations, including the transfer of tens of thousands of retailer records and millions of transactions.

The technology updates will take place from 2-4 August, taking National Lottery services offline from 11pm on Saturday until late Monday morning. Following Saturday night's Lotto and Thunderball draws, The National Lottery website/app and retail lottery terminals will shut down at 11pm, preventing players from logging into their online accounts, buying draw tickets or claiming prizes – in-store or online – until Monday.

Over the next 10 days, there are several activities to deliver before gaining final approval for this date. This includes final testing and helping retailers to understand how to use new National Lottery systems.

Players will still be able to check results until systems go offline on Saturday and will still be able to buy Scratchcards in shops for the duration. They’ll also be able to see the latest National Lottery draws and view the full results for the Saturday draws on The National Lottery’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/thenationallottery

Once services come back online on Monday, around 8,000 National Lottery retailers will switch over to new state-of-the-art lottery Wave terminals – which have already arrived in their stores. These will allow them to process player transactions more quickly and provide them with more functionality. The remainder of National Lottery retailers will be using the new software that went live over the weekend on their existing terminal and will receive their own new Wave terminal in the coming months.

There are a number of actions that retailers should proactively take to streamline and speed up the process, including:

Retailers should keep their terminal plugged in and powered on all weekend, to allow critical software updates to take place

All stores should activate sufficient Scratchcard stock to keep dispensers full until Monday

Retailers can sign onto their terminal before 10am on Sunday morning to access their weekly invoice, but after they’ve done that, they should put the terminal cover (found in the support pack which will be sent to them) in place to prevent anyone from accessing the terminal

On Monday, the way that all retailers sign-on to their terminal will change, so they should make sure they have their new sign-on details to hand (again, these can be found in their support pack)

Allwyn is providing retailers with customer-facing point of sale materials to keep players informed about the upgrade and distributing comprehensive support packs to the 43,500-strong estate.  

It’s expected that a small proportion of legacy in-store terminals may experience delays coming back up on Monday if certain upgrade processes were interrupted for various reasons. Most retailers who follow the guidance in their support pack will experience a smooth return to service. To assist those who might need additional support, Allwyn has specialist teams standing by to get them back up and running as quickly as possible.

Allwyn’s Director of Operations, Jenny Blogg, said: “These critical tech upgrades follow on from our continuous progress in modernising The National Lottery, which hasn’t had a major refresh since 2009. This includes introducing a fresh new look in our 43,500 retail partners with new stands, dispensers and signage, as well as rolling out state-of-the-art lottery terminals and a new in-store network provided by Vodafone.

“We’re very grateful for our retail partners’ continued support through these latest upgrades. We’ve been working hard to make sure retailers can get back up and running as quickly as possible after the weekend, so it’s really important that they follow the instructions in their support pack. While these significant updates will mean short-term disruption for players and our retail partners, they will allow us to deliver on our promise to bring new, exciting games to The National Lottery; a better player experience; and our commitment to double returns to Good Causes from £30m to £60m every week by the end of the 10-year licence.”

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