Casinos legislation
In addition to the obligations on operators in the Gambling Commission’s LCCP, many businesses have taken voluntary steps to go further than the minimum requirements to ensure gambling is safe for customers. The Commission has a wide range of powers to deal with operators which do not abide by their licence conditions, ranging from warnings and enhanced compliance procedures to licence reviews and formal enforcement action, including fines which are paid to the Treasury. Non-industry groups argued that the Commission needed to impose larger fines that impact operators more meaningfully or be more willing to suspend and revoke operator licences where appropriate.
Operator licence fees are different for 1968 Act and 2005 Act casinos. We do not intend on changing any of the requirements placed on operators for when a variation to a premises licence may be required. The Gambling Commission will also need to be notified of an operator’s projected annual licence fee category based on GGY for the forthcoming licence period, so that the correct fees can be paid. Currently, non gamstop sites the Gambling Commission’s guidance to licensing authorities states that an application for a variation of a premises licence will only be required where there are material changes to the layout of the premises. What impact is permitting sports betting expected to have on revenue from non-gambling activities e.g. increased income from sports bars which allow customers to place a bet? If you are a casino licence operator, what impact is permitting sports betting expected to have on the Gross Gambling Yield (GGY) of your casino(s)?
Help With Gambling Addiction In The UK
Your data will be used to inform the development of policy measures relating to the land-based sector. DCMS is consulting on policy options for measures relating to the land-based gambling sector. We welcome evidence from all parties with an interest in the way that gambling is regulated in Great Britain. Please upload any further evidence or any other information that should be considered in this consultation relating to licensing authority fees. Please provide any additional views or evidence on the potential impacts of raising licence fees here. What do you think are the potential impacts of raising licence fees on gambling companies?
The gambling industry should work with financial service firms to enable the blocks to be extended to other payment methods like bank transfers. While GAMSTOP is the principal means of online self-exclusion, we welcome that banks and payment providers offer opt-in gambling transaction blocks. This will include options of a £2 limit per stake; a £4 limit per stake; or an approach based on individual risk.
Evidence we have received indicates that there could be serious financial impacts, particularly for sports and leagues outside the Premier League, including at grassroots level, if gambling sponsorship were removed without an alternative source of funding in place. As gambling operators are held responsible for their affiliates and third parties they were in clear breach of CAP’s rules and Licence Conditions and/or Codes of Practice imposed by the Gambling Commission, with West Ham’s sponsor Betway incurring a £400,000 penalty as a result. As with advertising more broadly, it appears that while sponsorship is rarely the factor causing the development of harmful gambling, it can still exacerbate impacts for those who are already suffering harms. This is also reflected in polling commissioned by a major operator, which found that only around 20% of past-month gamblers would view a gambling sponsor for their team negatively, and that they were perceived slightly more positively than other possible partners, such as airlines or lager brands. In addition, research by Steve Sharman and others looking at matchday programmes in English football found that the industry of the sponsor was a significant factor in the proportion of pages containing adverts. It did not find any correlation between exposure to gambling sponsorship and participation in 11 to 18-year-olds, or significantly higher levels of betting participation from fans of a club or league with betting sponsorship.
We welcome the significant contributions industry has made to research, education and treatment (RET) since the introduction of the Gambling Act, and the substantial increase in funding the largest gambling operators have made available for treatment in recent years. The threat of an online gambling black market does not mean we should avoid tightening controls on licensed operators. We welcome that some major online platforms have introduced the facility for customers to opt-out of all gambling adverts, and strongly encourage others to do so. We want customers to have greater control over the types of marketing they receive, such as opting-in for online bonuses and offers for different types of gambling products. In a sector with a known addiction risk, the online data-driven targeting of certain individuals with promotional offers to encourage further spending presents risks because it actively encourages individuals to incur larger and larger losses.
Who Regulates Gambling In The UK?
We will review the Commission’s licence fees during 2024 to ensure it has the resources to continue improving how it delivers its core responsibilities and the commitments across this white paper. We will ensure it has the powers and resources it needs to pursue the licensing objectives, with the flexibility to meet challenges like the black market or boundary-pushing products. A Code of Conduct for gambling sponsorship will complement the principles already in place for alcohol sponsorship through the Portman Group code, as well as further developing the established culture of self-regulation in the sport sector. The ASA’s ‘strong appeal’ guidance also recognises esports, like Premier League footballers, as high risk content in terms of its inherent appeal to children. The reduced exposure to sponsorship during matches that this measure will achieve in the world’s most popular league will complement the existing whistle-to-whistle ban, which prevents gambling adverts from being broadcast during live sporting events. Up to 40% of the UK population watches live Premier League coverage, meaning that reducing the visibility of gambling sponsors should result in a meaningful reduction in exposure to gambling branding for millions of children and adults alike.
The government proposes that the current deposit and committed payment limits should apply to direct cashless payments on gaming machines. This was a reflection of their overall position that cashless gaming should not be permitted on gaming machines. While this situation appears extremely unlikely, we do not see any reason for it not applying to this type of machine as they still carry risks, even if smaller than other forms of gambling on different machines. The government proposes that a maximum transaction limit of £100 should apply to all direct cashless payments made on gaming machines. The vast majority of responses to the consultation agreed that card account verification should be required if direct debit card payments are permitted on gaming machines. The consultation asked the following questions on allowing direct debit card payments on gaming machines.
Further updates linked to the DMCC Act will affect how gambling complaints are handled. On 6 April 2026, the Commission will update several licence conditions to align with the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCC Act). For operators, the higher threshold slightly reduces reporting obligations for small ownership changes, but loan transparency rules become stricter. The service provides a single point of contact for licensing queries, available by phone and email between 10 a.m. The Commission has also launched a Licence Support service, designed to give operators direct access to technical guidance. For players, the change is unlikely to affect day-to-day gambling, but it reinforces the regulator’s focus on keeping gambling safe, fair, and crime-free.
Furthermore, The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (building on PHE’s report) has estimated the direct cost to government of gambling harm to be £413 million per year. However, even if we made pessimistic assumptions about leakage, displacement is likely to materially reduce the negative economic and fiscal impact from the drop in online gambling tax revenue. Some money not spent on gambling (for instance due to restrictions to prevent unaffordable losses) will go into other economic sectors which pay tax and produce more jobs per million pounds spent than online gambling. There is already evidence of a steady real terms decline since 2014, with machine GGY being outpaced by inflation by about 40%.
This applies universally across all UKGC-licensed online casinos. These changes make every bonus offered at a UKGC-licensed casino today genuinely fairer than at any point in the history of UK online gambling. The new rules also require casinos to carry out enhanced due diligence on players showing signs of problem gambling.
This will ensure all those experiencing the varying degrees of gambling-related harms are able to access the support they need when they need it. Lessons will be learned from other successful data centres in the UK, including the UK Data Service, Consumer Data Research Centre at the University of Leeds, and the Urban Big Data Centre, another ESRC investment at the University of Glasgow. As the Gambling Commission’s funding increases, and in turn its capacity to require provision of and analyse data from operators, it will consider how this data could be made available in anonymised form for use by researchers. We recognise that data is also essential for measuring industry compliance in a meaningful and foresighted way. Understanding whether some gambling products, behaviours or environments are more harmful than others can inform interventions and policy to minimise gambling-related harms and promote safer gambling practices.
While a wide array of evidence submitted to the Commission and this Review has shaped our proposals, three key information points have been important in helping to make sure our proposals are proportionate and properly address the identified risks. The Commission’s requirements will specify that these checks should only be undertaken at the appropriate time and for legitimate purposes like harm prevention rather than to inform marketing tactics or disadvantage successful customers. The consultation will also consider how operators should respond to any findings from these checks in concert with their wider assessments of customer risk.
Online gambling laws in the UK establish clear rules to protect players and ensure fair and responsible gaming. All gambling businesses serving UK customers must hold operating licenses. The Act also brought remote (online) gambling under statutory regulation for the first time, establishing the foundation for today’s digital gambling oversight.
This is consistent with the Commission’s rules on transparency, and the regulator will monitor operators’ compliance in this area. However, operators are required to detail the terms of service, which would include the potential to apply account restrictions, in an easy and accessible way. While informal estimates from operators suggest between 0.7 to 3% of active accounts are restricted, operators tend to use ‘restriction’ to refer to a near-complete withdrawal of services rather than the staking factor restriction outlined above, so the real figure is likely to be higher. Operators already provide the account details to all customers wishing to make deposits by bank transfer, so the details themselves are unlikely to be confidential. This will help limit the ways that those who have taken the decision not to spend money on gambling can do so. However, in spite of most users’ expectations, these payments are not covered by most existing opt-in gambling blocks.
The review found mostly cross-sectional studies linking gambling to harm, with more longitudinal research needed to isolate the causative role of gambling in the harms people experience in order to estimate a more accurate cost. Conversely, industry argued that calculating the social costs of gambling in order to recoup these costs is inherently complex. Canadian provinces tend to have high levels of expenditure addressing gambling harm paid for out of general taxation; but all have specific proportions of their total revenue derived from specific taxes on gambling. GambleAware also produces national safer gambling campaigns to raise awareness and encourage behaviour change in relation to gambling-related harms.
All operators should continually explore how they can further mitigate these risks through new technologies or procedures. As part of its wider 2019 consultation on age and identity verification procedures online, the Gambling Commission proposed requiring online operators to verify that payment information matches an account holder’s identity. Equally, allowing gamblers to use another person’s funds (such as friends, family members, businesses or potential victims of theft) comes with clear risks as operators cannot easily ascertain whether the funds are being used with or without permission. Where restrictions are to safeguard against harm, any circumvention by the customer may exacerbate the risk. The first leaves open the possibility for individuals to continue gambling when their legitimate account has been restricted, either by the gambler themselves (for instance because of self-exclusion or pre-commitment tools), or by the operator (for instance because of commercial or safer gambling risks).
Specific to gambling, the Behavioural Insights Team audit of 10 popular online operators identified a range of design features that may put consumers at risk of harm, including some of those discussed above. This is in contrast to the land-based sector, where electronic gaming machines (offering games which are otherwise similar to some online gaming products) are subject to stake and prize limits set out in legislation. In their view, significant new controls are needed to curb the risk of harm presented by certain features of online gambling including industry practices. We also support allowing trials of linked gaming machines, where prizes could accrue across a community of machines, in venues other than casinos (where they are already permitted).
The majority of responses were in favour of mandatory limits being a required feature on machines accepting direct debit card payments. We think that the requirements of account verification, transaction limit, and deposit limits, alongside a minimum transaction time will provide appropriate safeguards for these lower stake machines. The pub sector argued that it would be disproportionate, cost-prohibitive and unlikely to be achievable on these types of machines. We are also proposing that this minimum transaction time applies to all machines. Category D machines do not have a committed payment limit.
- No self-exclusion or gambling cessation tool in isolation can be completely effective in preventing someone who is determined to gamble online from doing so.
- These rates are lower than the majority of other gambling products, although remain above the at-risk and problem gambling rates for ‘any gambling activity’.
- On the other hand, in 62% of all sessions from April to September 2019, the player either won money on the machines or lost an amount up to £20.
- Many submissions to our call for evidence agreed that the Gambling Commission has wide-ranging and sufficient powers to effect change in operator behaviour.
- The articles published on SuperCasinoSites are intended to be used solely as informational resources, including our reviews, guides, and casino recommendations.
Therefore, when Parliamentary time allows, we plan to give the Gambling Commission increased powers to support disruption and enforcement activity, such as to pursue court orders which require internet service and payment providers to take down or block access to illegal gambling sites. It is also intended that more regulatory data, suitably anonymised, will be made available in due course to support independent research. We also welcome the commitment from governing bodies across the sport sector to develop a cross-sport gambling sponsorship code, with rules to make sure all sponsorship deals are socially responsible. This should reduce children’s incidental exposure to gambling logos while watching football and particularly via products such as stickers and video games, as well as the direct association with star players. Advertising rules have changed to prohibit prominent sportspeople, in particular Premier League footballers, from appearing in gambling adverts, on the grounds of their strong appeal to children.
Others cited research which has been undertaken on safer gambling messaging, including from the Behavioural Insights Team and the Personal Finance Research Centre (University of Bristol). Some respondents from outside of industry stated that safer gambling messages should be designed independently of industry and that some of the existing industry-led safer gambling messages are ineffective. Responses from industry stated that messaging similar to that which is already in place for cash transactions should be put in place, encouraging customers to take regular breaks, set and stick to budgets and to talk to staff and use player management tools. The overwhelming thrust of responses was that any messaging should be based on evidence.
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We do not currently have sufficient data to estimate the likely reduction of Category C and D machines under each option. This will include assessing the role of sessions limits across Category B and C machines alongside safer gambling tools. Player protections can be used to mitigate increases in the risk of gambling harm.
If they are perceived as permitting ‘risk-free’ gambling by providing a mechanism to subsequently recoup losses, this would risk reinforcing negative and harmful behaviours. Alternatively, we have heard that some operators make payments directly to fund the complainant’s treatment, education regarding the risks of gambling and the support available, or to cover outstanding debts rather than providing a lump sum. A memorandum of understanding between the Financial Ombudsman Service and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), for example, requires that information on complaints data, including any trends and common problems, is shared with the FCA so that both organisations can serve customers effectively. Many stakeholders, including Parliamentary and campaign groups, as well as those with personal experience, said that an ombudsman must be demonstrably independent of the Commission and the gambling industry. We received submissions from a wide range of stakeholders including trade bodies, charities, researchers, treatment and support service providers, organisations in the dispute resolution landscape, and from across the gambling industry. This includes, for example, complaints that an operator allowed a self-excluded customer to gamble, or should have taken greater steps to identify a customer at risk of harm and stepped in earlier to prevent unaffordable gambling.
However, all non-slot casino games are now subject to a mandatory 5-second minimum game cycle to prevent high-intensity, rapid-fire wagering. The statutory per-spin stake limits currently apply only to online slots. The £150 net deposit threshold (within a 30-day period) is the industry standard for “light-touch” checks. Most licensed sites will update your account limit automatically based on your verified date of birth.