In mid-May, the Government of the City of Buenos Aires issued the Decree 206/20 to enable the reopening of commercial businesses, including lottery agencies, with the exception of those that are located inside galleries, shopping centers or commercial areas.
While the decree allows 1,264 authorized lottery outlets to operate again, the city’s lottery operator LOTBA, has opted to leave the decision in the hands of individual locations. Operation hours are from Monday to Friday from 11 am to 9 pm, while draws are held three times a day, every day.
In response to the disqualification of certain agencies, the lottery members from the Chamber of Official Lottery Agencies of the City of Buenos Aires started legal actions in the Court of First Instance for Administrative and Tax Dispute 8. They argue that they’ve been closed for more than two months, with no revenue as they don’t operate online.
According to the lawsuit, the lottery operators agreed that shopping centers and galleries must remain closed. They also agreed to keep their doors closed, but in exchange, they asked authorities to let them operate online through a LOTBA official channel.
In the Province of Buenos Aires, a jurisdiction with different authorities, agencies are still closed. The Governor Axel Kicillof had allowed them to restart their operations, and even the regulator, the Provincial Institute of Lottery and Casinos (IPLyC), had given them the green light.
However, after only a couple of hours, departmental authorities urged the Governor to backtrack his decision as they noticed large crowds outside agencies.
In addition, the Chamber of Official Agents of Lottery and Related from Buenos Aires (CAOLAB) has urged the President of IPLyC Omar Galdurralde to approve online lotteries, to mitigate some of the negative effects of the pandemic.