impossible to win instant awards

I've not won anything since Oct 2020.  Before that I did win a few instant wins, $15 at Lowe's and B&N and $5 at Amazon and Land's End.

Instant win games are based on random computer generated winning times, so my strategy has been to play at different times on different days and occasionally even spread out my daily entries (i.e. play 2 out of the 7 entries in morning, another 3 in the afternoon and the remaining 2 in the evening etc). I've had some luck doing that. 

The rewards program could definitely use some improvements, but IMHO it is still relatively generous and being run with integrity. 

@Tomsowa   I have not won anything since the change to make them last a week, not a day.   Everyone is seven times less likely to win, i think.    And then there's the issue of the same entity winning repeatedly.   Someone called our attention to this a while back.   I say entity because I don't think a single individual would be that lucky....a bot more likely.   With email "cards" rather than cards mailed to a real address, it made fraud easier.  With rewards being electronic, it's my opinion that they need to be members only.   That way an address would be linked to the winners.  City and state should be listed on the winners' lists like they used to be.   Hello World has rolled out the welcome mat for fraud compared to the last operator.

It seems to be more difficult to win since the change of each Instant Win to last for 7 days.   I agree with HokiePoq that there may be something going on if someone is lucky enough to win repeatedly.  AARP tech support should investigate if these are legitimate wins and that no fraud is going on.

I also think it is pretty much impossible to win an instant win.  I would like to know how the computer generated winning times works.  Does the computer pick pick around 14 wins in one day for each of the seven wins?  Or does the computer pick 50 in one day for a certain win such as an Amazon card?   Or, maybe the computer picks all 100 in one day.  Do they spread wins throughout the 24 hours or are all the wins in an eight hour period or some other period of time?  I doubt that it would help me win an instant win if I knew more about how the computer generated times actually worked, but it might give me an idea as to why I am not winning.  I did win some instant wins before they changed to the seven days.  And I have never won a sweepstakes and I generally enter sweepstakes everyday with the maximum entries.  Unlucky, I guess.

There has been a lot of dissatisfaction and suspicions aired on this discussion board about the Daily Instant Wins, going back over a year. There was a series of revealing posts on this topic in late Feb. 2021 which can be accessed at the following URL (beginning with the 2nd post):

https://community.aarp.org/t5/Earn-Activities/Daily-Instant-Win/m-p/2190045#M45

FYI, an "official" list of Daily Instant Winners (first name, last initial) from Dec. 31, 2020 through March 31, 2021 is available at:

http://winlists.helloworld.com/245438_IW.pdf

400 consecutive Instant Wins?  That's all?  I figure I do at least four a day, every day, and I've gone over a year without winning anything.  That's over 1,400 attempts!  I've asked this question before without answer:  When it says 100 cards, is that per eight days, per month, per year, forever,.....?  I'm guessing the latter.

I did a visual scan of the instant winner's list yesterday which can be seen at:

http://winlists.helloworld.com/245438_IW.pdf

This list appears to have a rolling timeframe. It is now reporting winners between 12/31/20 and 3/31/21. I downloaded the file and searched for the names which stood out to me in February when I reported to @AARPTeri repeated winners - at that time some had winnings up to 20 times in the 3 month reporting period which at that time was Nov 11 to Feb 10. I reported this to her on Feb 22. Since then (period of Feb 11 to Mar 31), one of those repeated winners won 9 more times, 3 others won 6 more times. Miraculously, one which won 20 times during the period of Nov 11 and Feb 10 has only won 2ce between Feb 11 and Mar 31.  

If this sounds **bleep** to anybody out there, I'm a retired systems analyst with a degree in Math. So besides being old and like a dog with a bone, numbers and patterns are my thing!! 

I do not know how these people keep winning. I realize that there might be multiple people with the same first name, same first initial of the last name so perhaps these are not the same people winning but the very uniqueness of the first names followed by the first initial of their last name is how they stood out to me. I expressed my suspicion to @AARPTeri that somehow they were gaming the system and was hoping she could run a report on the instant winner file to confirm what I had found and perhaps see how this was happening with the wins. Clearly something is not right. Every time they win multiple times, one of us loses.

Like you, I had not won in well over 6 months. THEN, the day after I reported my findings to @AARPTeri, I won an instant win. Coincidence? Right. I did search the current file for my first name followed by the first initial of my last name and the current file says I won 3 times. I did not so clearly somebody else shares my name (very common) and the first initial of my last name (my last name is so common we may well have the very same full name). 

Hopefully I have not thrown a monkey wrench into our ability to see the Instant Winner's file. I just really want it to be fair for all the participants. Perhaps there should be a limit on the number of Instant Wins a person can get in a given month just as there is a limit on the number of points only items one can get in a month. Just a thought.

I can't speak to any problems with the system or bots or anything else. I can say I am a paying member and have won instant wins multiple times (7 or 8 in last 6 months) as well as one of the sweepstakes. My dad (also a paying member) has never won an instant win but did recently win a sweepstakes. Just wanted to let you know that there are real members like us who are winning some rewards.

I've tried numerous times over the last year to no avail.  Last instant win was in 2019.

Could I be added to complaint list to receive an instant win?  Thanks😊

Marylin