How to Play the Taiwan Receipt Lottery

In Taiwan, almost all receipts are lottery tickets. Check your receipt numbers for a chance to win up to NT$10 million in the bi-monthly Uniform Invoice Lottery. Read on to learn how.

I’ve been “playing” the Taiwan Receipt Lottery for years and want to help any of y’all who are interested in it. Thus, I’ll explain how it works and how to participate.

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Key Takeaways

• The Taiwan Receipt Lottery is a unique program that incentivizes getting receipts, boosting tax compliance.
• Checking if you’ve won is easy with manual methods, lottery apps, or even convenience store kiosks.
• Receipts in Taiwan have specific formats, and understanding them is key to identifying the lottery number.
• Claiming winnings depends on the prize amount, with small prizes redeemable at stores and large ones at banks.
• Lottery apps simplify the process and can even automate winnings deposits for smaller prizes.

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What Is the Taiwan Receipt Lottery?

The Taiwan Receipt Lottery allows shoppers to win cash prizes by keeping receipts from purchases (cloud and physical receipts). It’s operated by Taiwan’s Ministry of Finance (MOF).

Other names it goes by:

• Uniform Invoice Lottery
• 統一發票 (Tǒngyī Fāpiào)
• Unified Invoice Lottery

You can win up to NT$10 million (around $308,675). Tourists, expats, digital nomads, and non-Taiwanese folks can participate. Drawings are held every two months on the 25th of odd-numbered months.

It began in 1951, and the MOF used the program to encourage people to ask for receipts. An attempt to push businesses to pay taxes.

The program was a success, and the government received 75% more tax revenue from businesses than in 1950. Thus, it continued.

There’s no benefit to not checking your numbers.

If you don’t stay in Taiwan during a receipt lottery drawing, donate the receipt to a receipt donation bin or an individual. They can then claim the winnings if drawing a winning number.

It’s a great way to prevent wasted winning tickets. Plenty of these tickets go unclaimed every drawing.

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Did you win the Taiwan receipt lottery? Here’s how to find out…

Manual checking:

1. Check the Ministry of Finance’s website every couple of months.
   1. We also show the winning numbers whenever drawings happen.
   2. Scroll to the bottom of the post to see the latest set of winning numbers
2. Manually compare your receipt numbers against the list of winning numbers.

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Lottery apps:

1. Download a Taiwan Receipt Lottery app (like Colibri or Taiwan Receipt Scanner).
2. Scan your receipts using the app’s QR code scanner, number scanner, or manual input.
3. The app will automatically check your receipts against the winning numbers and let you know if you have any winners.

You technically don’t need an app if you register for a carrier. I’ll give you a vague introduction to how to do it later, but I’ll need to create a separate guide for this.

As for recommended apps, I use one that’s only in Chinese, but connects to my EasyCard and memberships (e.g., Carrefour). I can’t figure out how to type the Chinese name, though. And I honestly don’t recommend it.

Most people will recommend Colibri, but it’s only available for Android. I stumbled upon Midana, which is available for Android and iOS. It’s in early access at the time of writing. It is also in English.

I’ll test it and update this post once I understand how it functions.

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Convenience Store Kiosks (for e-receipts):

1. Go to a 7-Eleven or Family Mart and use their kiosks (ibon or FamiPort).
2. Follow the on-screen prompts to access the lottery section and check for winnings linked to your EasyCard (if you used it for purchases that generated e-receipts).

This process is a nightmare if you can’t read Chinese. I’ll link to a guide that makes it easier later.

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How to Read a Receipt in Taiwan

Regular Receipt

• If you use a mobile app, the QR codes are essential. Otherwise, only worry about the Lottery Number.

How to read:

• Shop Name: In this case, “7-Eleven”
• Lottery year and months
  • Taiwan uses the ROC calendar; “113” would equal 2024.
  • 3–4 means the period is March and April.
• Lottery Number: 8-digit number that’s drawn during the receipt lottery.
• Purchase Date & Time: When the purchase occurred.
• Amount Spent: Your transaction total
• QR Codes: Scan these on cloud receipt mobile apps

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“Traditional” Receipts

• Lottery number is the only relevant information on your receipt.

How to read:

• Lottery year and months
  • Taiwan uses the ROC calendar; “113” would equal 2024.
  • 5–6 means the period is May and June.
• Lottery Number: 8-digit number that’s drawn during the receipt lottery.
• Shop Name: In this case, I don’t know because I can’t read it.
• Purchase Date & Time: When the purchase occurred.
• Amount Spent: Your transaction total

These receipts don’t have QR codes. To enter them as a cloud receipt, you’ll need to use the app’s number-scanning feature (if it has one). If not, you’ll need to enter the numbers manually.

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Some larger transactions will come with this receipt. You only need to know where the lottery number is:

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Won the Taiwan receipt lottery? Here’s how to get your prize

No matter your prize’s size, you must fill in the following information on the back of your receipt:

• Prize: Amount you won
• Name: As written on your Taiwan ARC or passport
• Phone Number: Taiwan phone number

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If you didn’t use any of the receipt lottery mobile apps, you’ll need to redeem your winnings through one of these methods:

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Small Wins (up to NT$1,000):

• Head to any convenience store (like 7-Eleven).
• Show your winning receipt and ARC/passport for verification.
• Choose to receive cash, store credit, or merchandise of equal value.

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Large Wins (over NT$1,000):

• * Visit a designated bank.
• Bring your winning receipt, valid ID (like your passport), and potentially fill out a claim form.
• Receive your prize money after tax is withheld (20% for wins over NT$4,000).

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Banks you can claim winnings from are as follows:

• Chang Hwa Bank
• First Commercial Bank
• Agricultural Bank of Taiwan Corporation

Folks said they could claim winnings from the post office (which doubles as a bank). Some said the staff required them to have an ARC (ID card for foreigners). Others said it depends on who you talk to. They also didn’t say how large their winnings were.

I don’t have experience with this because the largest prize I won was NT$500.

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Claim rewards when using receipt lottery mobile apps:

1. Link your App: Make sure your preferred cloud receipt app (like eCloud Invoice) is properly linked to your bank account.
2. Create a Carrier: If you haven’t done so already, visit the government eInvoice platform to create an e-receipt carrier (a digital wallet for storing receipts).
3. Automatic Scanning: The app automatically scans and stores your receipts digitally.
4. Winning Notification: If one of your receipts wins, the app will notify you. Or you’ll need to click a button to scan the apps.
5. Direct Deposit: Small prizes are often deposited directly into your linked bank account, bypassing the need to visit a store or bank.
   

Larger prizes might still require you to go to a bank for verification and tax purposes.

To use receipt lottery applications, you’ll need a Taiwan bank account, or an account at the post office. The latter is more feasible for foreigners (it’s what I do).

What if you want to check an EasyCard if you won? I don’t have a tutorial for this yet. However, TranslatingTaiwan does.

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Confused? Here’s how it works

Here’s how Taiwan’s receipt lottery works:

1. Buy something in Taiwan, get a receipt with a number.
2. It’s a free lottery entry. Numbers drawn every two months.
3. Match receipt number to win prizes, from NT$200 to NT$10 million.
4. Keep receipts. Check numbers online or with lottery apps.
5. Redeem prizes at convenience stores (small wins) or banks (big wins).

All bigger businesses (e.g., 7-Eleven) will give bigger receipts. You may run into mom-and-pop shops that won’t give you receipts. Or you’ll find shops that have signs saying they don’t give receipts.

These signs are usually in Chinese. Use Google Translate’s photo translation feature on signs to see if that’s what they say.

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What you could win

Here are all the prizes available for winners of Taiwan’s Uniform Invoice Lottery:

Prize Type	Winning Amount	Qualification
Special Prize	NT$10 Million	Match all the Special Prize numbers
Grand Prize	NTD$2 million ($69700)	Match all digits of the Grand Prize
First Prize	NTD$200,000 ($6900)	Match all eight digits of First Prize
Regular Prize	NTD$40,000 ($1300)	Match the last seven digits of First Prize
Second Prize	NTD$10,000 ($350)	Match the last six digits of the First Prize
Third Prize	NTD$4,000 ($140)	Match the last five digits of the First Prize
Fourth Prize	NTD$1,000 ($34)	Match the last four digits of First Prize
Fifth Prize	NTD$200 ($7.00)	Match the last three digits of First Prize
Sixth Prize	NTD$200	Match any of three digits of additionally drawn

Taiwan receipt lottery prizes depending on the numbers you match.

What are the odds of winning these prizes?

No one knows.

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Most Recent Winning Numbers

See these posts to see the most recent winning numbers:

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FAQs