Lottery rules

Unclaimed Lottery Prizes in Canada: Claim Deadlines and Where the Money Goes

Casino newsUpdated October 28, 2026

In every region of Canada, a draw-game prize has to be claimed within one year of the draw date printed on the ticket. Scratch tickets follow the expiry date on their back instead. Once the deadline passes, the money is not lost to the system: each lottery corporation recycles it into bonus draws, jackpots or provincial revenue, but the original ticket holder gets nothing.

One year from the draw, almost everywhere

Canada has no single national lottery operator. Tickets are sold by regional corporations: OLG in Ontario, BCLC in British Columbia, Loto-Québec, the Western Canada Lottery Corporation (WCLC) for Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and the three territories, and Atlantic Lottery for New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador. National games such as Lotto Max, Lotto 6/49 and Daily Grand are shared between them, but each corporation pays its own winners under its own rules.

For draw games, those rules line up closely. Every corporation's published terms give a window of one year from the draw date, not from the date you bought the ticket. A ticket bought for a draw several weeks ahead therefore starts its clock on the draw night, which matters if you play advance draws or multi-draw tickets.

Scratch tickets are the exception. Their deadline is tied to an expiry date printed on the back of the ticket rather than to any draw, so an old scratch card found in a drawer may still be valid long after a draw ticket from the same week has lapsed. Atlantic Lottery goes further and notes that most of its Scratch'N Win prizes have no expiry date at all, although some carry a fixed one.

Claim deadlines by lottery corporation

The table below summarizes what each corporation states in its own player information. Where a corporation's page does not spell out a rule, we say so rather than guess.

WCLC states plainly that no prize can be paid once the one-year period is over, and the British Columbia guidance describes the 52-week window as a hard cut-off. Treat the deadline as final everywhere, even though one corporation, discussed below, has said it will look at a late claim with a good reason.

The same one-year clock applies to the fast-draw games sold at lottery terminals. If you have played keno and how its draws work at a WCLC retailer, those tickets are on the WCLC list of games that expire one year after the draw.

What happens to the money when a prize expires

None of the corporations keeps expired prize money as a windfall for itself, but they do not all route it the same way. National games and regional games are often treated differently.

• OLG: when a $70 million Lotto Max prize from the June 28, 2022 draw went unclaimed, OLG returned it to the prize pool for future bonus games or promotions of Lotto Max, Lotto 6/49 and Daily Grand. Before declaring it unclaimed, its lottery investigators reviewed almost 2,700 individual claims from people who said they had lost the ticket. None succeeded, and OLG confirmed the ticket had never been checked at a self-serve checker or through the OLG App.
• WCLC: unclaimed prizes on national games go back to players through guaranteed jackpots and bonus draws, while unclaimed prizes on regional games are returned to the member provinces and territories as revenue.
• Loto-Québec: unclaimed prizes are redistributed to players as bonus prizes and special draws.
• Atlantic Lottery: expired prizes from its own games go into a special prize fund used for prizes in later draws. Unclaimed prizes on national games are administered by the Interprovincial Lottery Corporation.
• BCLC: money not claimed in time on major lotteries in British Columbia is given back to players through bonuses and promotions.

In other words, the expired jackpot ends up in someone else's bonus draw. The one person who cannot receive it is the holder of the original ticket.

How to check an old or found ticket

If you have turned up a ticket in a coat pocket, a car or a relative's papers, work through it in this order before the date runs out.

1. Read the draw date. On a draw ticket, add one year to the draw date. On a scratch ticket, turn it over and find the printed expiry date.
2. Scan it yourself first. OLG says every one of its lottery retail locations has a self-serve ticket checker, and its app can scan tickets. If the app shows an error or a See Retailer message, the ticket has to be checked at a store.
3. Compare it with the published lists. OLG, WCLC and Loto-Québec all publish large unclaimed prizes, with the region or community where the ticket was sold and the draw date. A match is a strong reason to call before the deadline.
4. Have a retailer validate it and watch the screen. The customer display should face you and show the result. Make sure the ticket comes back to you either way.
5. Put your name on it. OLG will not process an unsigned claim, and WCLC asks winners to print their legal name, address and daytime phone number on the back; its retailers cannot validate a ticket without the customer's name.
6. Call the corporation for anything large. OLG's line is 1-800-387-0098 and WCLC Player Care is 1-800-665-3313. Have the ticket in hand when you call.

A found ticket raises an obvious question: whose prize is it? Lottery corporations investigate ownership on large claims. OLG states that if it cannot establish ownership of a ticket, the prize may not be paid, so a stranger's ticket picked up from the floor is not a reliable route to a payout.

Lost tickets and missed deadlines

Losing the ticket is worse than finding it late. BCLC's player guidance is blunt: without the ticket you generally cannot claim winnings. If you know the ticket number and can say where, when and for which game you bought it, the corporation may help, but recovery is not guaranteed and takes time. OLG says it may still verify a claim for a lost winning ticket using data analysis and has a Lost Ticket web form for that purpose.

Tickets bought online are far safer on this point. A digital copy sits in your account, and the online channels notify winners: PlayNow emails a courtesy notice on larger wins, and WCLC says players who bought on PlayAlberta.ca receive an email with claim instructions.

If the deadline has already passed, expect a refusal. The only flexibility on record comes from OLG, whose spokesperson told CDC Gaming Reports that it would do its due diligence on a claim made shortly after expiry with a legitimate reason. That is a review, not a promise of payment.

Habits that keep a prize from expiring

• Check every ticket within a few days of the draw, not when the jackpot is in the news.
• Sign or print your name on the ticket as soon as you buy it.
• Photograph the front and back; PlayNow's lottery guidance suggests a photo can support a claim if the ticket goes missing.
• Keep paper tickets in one fixed place at home, not loose in a wallet or glovebox.
• For office pools, name a trustee. WCLC asks the trustee to print or sign their name followed by In Trust.
• Check scratch tickets for the printed expiry date; many scratch card games sold online settle prizes automatically, which removes the deadline problem entirely.

A lottery prize in Canada is generally not taxable; the CRA treats the value of a lottery prize as neither income nor a capital gain in ordinary circumstances. Our guide to gambling law and how winnings are taxed in Canada covers the exceptions. And if checking old tickets has become a habit you would rather break, the responsible gambling resources page lists provincial help lines.

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