Montana Lottery cancels $1 million ticket sale after new system fails

Thousands of Montanans who left their homes before dawn on Sunday to buy $1 million lottery tickets were left waiting in line for up to seven hours before the game was officially postponed. The delay forced the state to halt sales across all retail locations after its new central gaming system failed to process the high volume of transactions required for the annual event.

Ticket sales were scheduled to begin at 5:30 a.m. on November 1. The Montana Lottery acknowledged technical issues at approximately 6 a.m., thirty minutes after the start of the sale. After several hours of attempted repairs, the organization announced the postponement around 11 a.m. Players who had already purchased tickets before the shutdown were told their tickets remained valid.

Jason Ans, who arrived at a Circle K on Grand Avenue in Billings at 4 a.m., watched the system crash after the first few customers completed their purchases. He estimated that the initial transactions took five minutes each before the platform stopped working entirely. Ans contacted his son at another location and confirmed the outage was statewide. He spent nearly six and a half hours in line before the lottery confirmed the delay.

Austin Miles, waiting at a different Circle K location on Broadwater Avenue, reported a similar experience. His store experienced a power outage that temporarily restored the system, only for it to crash a second time. Miles noted that friends at other gas stations and bars across the state reported identical problems. He observed that the game, which sold out in a record three hours in 2024, had not sold out by the time the lottery announced the postponement.

The lottery attributed the failure to its transition to a new central gaming system provided by vendor Bally's Intralot in September. This was the first year Montana Millionaire sales were conducted on this specific platform. The organization identified three specific issues: system performance problems caused by high transaction volumes, instant-win prizes being awarded more frequently than intended, and errors in the data feed for its website and mobile apps.

To preserve the integrity of the game, the lottery stated that approximately $500,000 in instant-win prizes awarded during the brief sales window will be redistributed among the remaining tickets. The organization is currently working with Bally's Intralot to resolve the technical errors. A new sales date and time will be announced once all game and sales data are validated.

Customers waited in lines that stretched into the morning, with some bringing chairs and others standing for hours. Zane Johnson, who was second in line at his location, purchased his tickets just before the system went down. He described the staff as helpful during the wait. The lottery will share updates through its website, social media channels, and retailers once a new sale date is determined.