I bet relatively small amounts a year but have multiple accounts. Would the affordability tests be cumulative across accounts or each one (which, with the number of bookies out there would render them pointless tbf).
Gambling can be a serious addiction and is the direct cause of over 400 suicides a year. I'm sure we've all seen the documentaries (i.e. the Paul Merson one) or know someone effected. A serious problem gambler will lose their money the day they get paid and borrow wherever and from whoever they can, I have one in the family.
I think it's right in certain circumstances checks are carried out. Although I assume the majority of this is online rather than at the track or in a high street bookmakers as I'm not sure how you would police someone betting in various shops in a day. But equally that could apply to someone with numerous online accounts.
It's good in my view that it's being looked at, as to the plan being sufficient, workable etc I don't know.
Thing is Rob. How many people commit suicide over debt a year?
No idea, maybe as many? maybe less? maybe more? Not sure of the point?
The leading cause of death in the UK is Dementia, doesn't mean you do nothing for any other illnesses that may cause death.
For me We would be in agreement that if these checks came in and it saved one person from commiting suicide or one family not decimated by gambling its worth it. My argument is there's people/families up and down the country going to bed tonight in thousands of pounds in debt. Some of these won't sleep properly through worry of the debt , a couple of them might even be thinking about suicide as a way out. Now with this in mind if affordability checks were across the board and it helped one person/family not go into debt would that not be worth it?
I bet relatively small amounts a year but have multiple accounts. Would the affordability tests be cumulative across accounts or each one (which, with the number of bookies out there would render them pointless tbf).
I'm guessing the bookies will be linked. You will probably be allowed to bet a percentage of your wage a year.
Gambling can be a serious addiction and is the direct cause of over 400 suicides a year. I'm sure we've all seen the documentaries (i.e. the Paul Merson one) or know someone effected. A serious problem gambler will lose their money the day they get paid and borrow wherever and from whoever they can, I have one in the family.
I think it's right in certain circumstances checks are carried out. Although I assume the majority of this is online rather than at the track or in a high street bookmakers as I'm not sure how you would police someone betting in various shops in a day. But equally that could apply to someone with numerous online accounts.
It's good in my view that it's being looked at, as to the plan being sufficient, workable etc I don't know.
Thing is Rob. How many people commit suicide over debt a year?
No idea, maybe as many? maybe less? maybe more? Not sure of the point?
The leading cause of death in the UK is Dementia, doesn't mean you do nothing for any other illnesses that may cause death.
For me We would be in agreement that if these checks came in and it saved one person from commiting suicide or one family not decimated by gambling its worth it. My argument is there's people/families up and down the country going to bed tonight in thousands of pounds in debt. Some of these won't sleep properly through worry of the debt , a couple of them might even be thinking about suicide as a way out. Now with this in mind if affordability checks were across the board and it helped one person/family not go into debt would that not be worth it?
Affordability checks for what though? Food? Clothes? Restaurants? Tui? AO.com? Petrol?
There's lots of 'debt' help out there, probably should be more, but I'm not really clear if someone has got into debt (not through gambling) where would these checks have been to stop it?
Gambling is in my view somewhat unique. Where else could you spend your months wages and come away with nothing 2 minutes later? Most other debt you will have actually purchased something.
One of my close family had/has a gambling problem, now attends GA. He like most there first started gambling in an attempt to make money as they were either struggling or already in debt. It's not by luck that the busy bookies are generally in the poorer areas......... I was in Ryde, IOW last week and there were more bookies in one road (maybe within 500 yards) than there are within a mile of my office in the city. Yet there's probably more money in that mile than the whole of the IOW!
Perhaps, at almost £2,000 per annum, they could also do affordability checks on the cost of the Racing Post. Now that is daylight robbery!
I was being facetious when I made this comment but, after doing so, read this:
Although it is registered in the name of Nevin Truesdale, Chief Executive of The Jockey Club, the petition is launched on behalf of Britain’s horseracing industry, which supports more than 85,000 jobs and contributes £4.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
Its online citation reads: “We want the Government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. Such checks – including assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.
“The proposed checks could see bettors having to prove they can afford their hobby if they sustain losses as low as £1.37 per day. We accept the need to help those with problem gambling but more intrusive checks triggered at a higher threshold risks bettors moving to the black market where there are no consumer protections or safer gambling tools. There will also be a negative impact on British horseracing’s finances due to a reduction in betting turnover and resulting fall in Levy yield.”
I am someone who loves a flutter and always bets within my means.
However, I can see how it is so easy to put bigger numbers into the websites, it can devastate lives.
I completely agree with this idea, and with the greatest of respect to people comparing this to holidays etc, I would strongly recommend you read up on addiction.
In an ideal world your cocaine dealer would be running affordability checks on you, as would the pub or off licence to be honest... Addictive substances/behaviours should have more things to stop people becoming addicted. It probably won't deter people already addicted, but will hopefully make it more difficult to become more addicted in the first place.
I have people very close to me who had a terrible childhood due to the addictions of people that should have been caring for them/using that money to give those children a proper childhood.
I know when I was in my late teens, first paypacket etc, and happened to win £1k on an introductory £50 free bet which then almost entirely disappeared in the couple of days after, that I was at a fork in the road and luckily went the right way. Many don't.
Perhaps, at almost £2,000 per annum, they could also do affordability checks on the cost of the Racing Post. Now that is daylight robbery!
I was being facetious when I made this comment but, after doing so, read this:
Although it is registered in the name of Nevin Truesdale, Chief Executive of The Jockey Club, the petition is launched on behalf of Britain’s horseracing industry, which supports more than 85,000 jobs and contributes £4.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
Its online citation reads: “We want the Government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. Such checks – including assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.
“The proposed checks could see bettors having to prove they can afford their hobby if they sustain losses as low as £1.37 per day. We accept the need to help those with problem gambling but more intrusive checks triggered at a higher threshold risks bettors moving to the black market where there are no consumer protections or safer gambling tools. There will also be a negative impact on British horseracing’s finances due to a reduction in betting turnover and resulting fall in Levy yield.”
An otiose argument. I mean, yeah sure, the illegal drug trade in the UK is worth more than £10bn to the economy, employs far more than 85,000 people and keeps BMW dealers in work. That doesn't mean it's a good thing. All those gambling related workers would soon find another job: there's nigh on a million job vacancies in the UK. In any event I have a sneaking suspicion that the gambling industry would survive despite the doom-mongering.
Perhaps, at almost £2,000 per annum, they could also do affordability checks on the cost of the Racing Post. Now that is daylight robbery!
I was being facetious when I made this comment but, after doing so, read this:
Although it is registered in the name of Nevin Truesdale, Chief Executive of The Jockey Club, the petition is launched on behalf of Britain’s horseracing industry, which supports more than 85,000 jobs and contributes £4.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
Its online citation reads: “We want the Government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. Such checks – including assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.
“The proposed checks could see bettors having to prove they can afford their hobby if they sustain losses as low as £1.37 per day. We accept the need to help those with problem gambling but more intrusive checks triggered at a higher threshold risks bettors moving to the black market where there are no consumer protections or safer gambling tools. There will also be a negative impact on British horseracing’s finances due to a reduction in betting turnover and resulting fall in Levy yield.”
An otiose argument. I mean, yeah sure, the illegal drug trade in the UK is worth more than £10bn to the economy, employs far more than 85,000 people and keeps BMW dealers in work. That doesn't mean it's a good thing. All those gambling related workers would soon find another job: there's nigh on a million job vacancies in the UK. In any event I have a sneaking suspicion that the gambling industry would survive despite the doom-mongering.
Soon find other jobs ? I doubt the thousands of stable staff in mainly rural areas will be able to walk into a job so easily. Not to worry though, eh.
Perhaps, at almost £2,000 per annum, they could also do affordability checks on the cost of the Racing Post. Now that is daylight robbery!
I was being facetious when I made this comment but, after doing so, read this:
Although it is registered in the name of Nevin Truesdale, Chief Executive of The Jockey Club, the petition is launched on behalf of Britain’s horseracing industry, which supports more than 85,000 jobs and contributes £4.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
Its online citation reads: “We want the Government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. Such checks – including assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.
“The proposed checks could see bettors having to prove they can afford their hobby if they sustain losses as low as £1.37 per day. We accept the need to help those with problem gambling but more intrusive checks triggered at a higher threshold risks bettors moving to the black market where there are no consumer protections or safer gambling tools. There will also be a negative impact on British horseracing’s finances due to a reduction in betting turnover and resulting fall in Levy yield.”
An otiose argument. I mean, yeah sure, the illegal drug trade in the UK is worth more than £10bn to the economy, employs far more than 85,000 people and keeps BMW dealers in work. That doesn't mean it's a good thing. All those gambling related workers would soon find another job: there's nigh on a million job vacancies in the UK. In any event I have a sneaking suspicion that the gambling industry would survive despite the doom-mongering.
Soon find other jobs ? I doubt the thousands of stable staff in mainly rural areas will be able to walk into a job so easily. Not to worry though, eh.
We keep hearing there are loads of jobs in farm labour. Sounds like an ideal situation to me...
Anyway, racing fans will always tell you that it isn't all about the gambling, so nothing should change anyway, they will still follow their favourite "sport".
Average credit card debt is just over a £1000 per person, how much of that is down to gambling? Got no problem with the goverment telling me I can only bet so much a week/month. But if I want to pay for a £5000 holiday do affordability checks on that aswell.
You cannot use a credit card anymore on a betting site
No but you can still rack up debt because of gambling
First rule of gambling - Only bet what you can afford to lose
First rule of learning to play poker well: make the stakes more than you can afford to lose.
think some of you are missing the point , if you try to have a bet, they will run checks to see if you can afford it , this may mean you proving you have sufficient funds and income to them, i e with copies of bank statements, payslips etc it’s to save you from yourself and you cannot spend your own money as you like. a slippery slope maybe… when you buy your fifth pint in future the publican may have to check you can afford it and the kids are not starving at home
Not what I read - see my earlier post.
It read as checks if you lose and trigger some thresholds. Not for starting out I don't think.
But this is a fundamental misunderstanding of statistics and in particular variance. Every gambler goes through periods of losing more than winning and periods of winning more than losing.
Stick with me on this imaginary scenario… Imagine a bookmaker comes out with a brand new heads or tails game that can only be played once per day and if you win you get the perfect 1/1 payout with no bookie overround.
A punter with no history of gambling addiction and enjoys flipping coins signs up and wants to bet £50 per day on heads. The first three days all land tails. You’ve exhausted your 30 day limit in three days.
Meanwhile, statistics tells us that there’s a high probability that in a 30 day rolling period, you’ll see 15 of each outcome and have lost no money.
All the loss limiting legislation will have done is cost the punter £150 with no opportunity for variance to take effect, ready for them to repeat the same process the following month.
As I said, this will catch a significant number of legitimate punters who enjoy a bet but don’t have a problem. And the real problem gamblers won’t be sufficiently identified as they’ll be lost in the crowd.
isn't this the literal definition of the gamblers fallacy?
I mean it COULD be tails 50 times in a row and still be statistically insignificant. How many goes should we allow before you say enough? (ask Nasser Hussain!)
Probability theory is a rabbit hole that would blow your mind Cal.
Its a fine balancing act bringing in things like this. I hate government interference and they can help gambling addicts in other ways, because where does affordability checks stop? As someone above said, when buying alcohol or tobacco, junk food? They are physically harmful and prematurely end lives.
think some of you are missing the point , if you try to have a bet, they will run checks to see if you can afford it , this may mean you proving you have sufficient funds and income to them, i e with copies of bank statements, payslips etc it’s to save you from yourself and you cannot spend your own money as you like. a slippery slope maybe… when you buy your fifth pint in future the publican may have to check you can afford it and the kids are not starving at home
Not what I read - see my earlier post.
It read as checks if you lose and trigger some thresholds. Not for starting out I don't think.
But this is a fundamental misunderstanding of statistics and in particular variance. Every gambler goes through periods of losing more than winning and periods of winning more than losing.
Stick with me on this imaginary scenario… Imagine a bookmaker comes out with a brand new heads or tails game that can only be played once per day and if you win you get the perfect 1/1 payout with no bookie overround.
A punter with no history of gambling addiction and enjoys flipping coins signs up and wants to bet £50 per day on heads. The first three days all land tails. You’ve exhausted your 30 day limit in three days.
Meanwhile, statistics tells us that there’s a high probability that in a 30 day rolling period, you’ll see 15 of each outcome and have lost no money.
All the loss limiting legislation will have done is cost the punter £150 with no opportunity for variance to take effect, ready for them to repeat the same process the following month.
As I said, this will catch a significant number of legitimate punters who enjoy a bet but don’t have a problem. And the real problem gamblers won’t be sufficiently identified as they’ll be lost in the crowd.
isn't this the literal definition of the gamblers fallacy?
I mean it COULD be tails 50 times in a row and still be statistically insignificant. How many goes should we allow before you say enough? (ask Nasser Hussain!)
Probability theory is a rabbit hole that would blow your mind Cal.
Gamblers fallacy is thinking that previous events have an impact on future random events. I can see how my post reads like that but it's not at all what I mean.
I was not saying that because it's been three tails, it's guaranteed that there's going to be more heads in the following 27 events. Of course that's nonsense, every event is independent.
But over many hundreds and thousands of events and eventually infinity, it WILL converge to 50/50. You're right that it could be 50 tails in a row and in fact that probably will happen at some point in time if you flipped a coin continuously millions of times.
Whether you get lucky and win 50 in a row or get unlucky and lose 50 in a row, the event and the given odds have a breakeven expectancy. I don't think punters should be soft restricted just because they've lost X in a row - that's one way to guarantee they'll never see the other side of it.
Checks should be based on behaviours IMO. One such behaviour that might trigger a check for example is someone losing over 95% of their account balance in a short period of time, immediately depositing more money and then gambling with a sizeable amount of that new balance in quick succession. It's not perfect but I'd suggest it's a damn sight better at weeding out those with a problem, compared to limiting everyone to an arbitrary number in 24 hour or 30 day windows.
Perhaps, at almost £2,000 per annum, they could also do affordability checks on the cost of the Racing Post. Now that is daylight robbery!
I was being facetious when I made this comment but, after doing so, read this:
Although it is registered in the name of Nevin Truesdale, Chief Executive of The Jockey Club, the petition is launched on behalf of Britain’s horseracing industry, which supports more than 85,000 jobs and contributes £4.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
Its online citation reads: “We want the Government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. Such checks – including assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.
“The proposed checks could see bettors having to prove they can afford their hobby if they sustain losses as low as £1.37 per day. We accept the need to help those with problem gambling but more intrusive checks triggered at a higher threshold risks bettors moving to the black market where there are no consumer protections or safer gambling tools. There will also be a negative impact on British horseracing’s finances due to a reduction in betting turnover and resulting fall in Levy yield.”
An otiose argument. I mean, yeah sure, the illegal drug trade in the UK is worth more than £10bn to the economy, employs far more than 85,000 people and keeps BMW dealers in work. That doesn't mean it's a good thing. All those gambling related workers would soon find another job: there's nigh on a million job vacancies in the UK. In any event I have a sneaking suspicion that the gambling industry would survive despite the doom-mongering.
Trying to find a satisfactory balance between minimising harm for those with a predisposition to addictive and unhealthy behaviours whilst allowing the vast majority of the rest of people to have unfettered access to a legal form of entertainment is nigh on impossible.
Some people are addicted to alcohol but prohibition was a complete fuck up and turned entire populations into criminals and the alcoholics still got drunk. People have been gambling since day dot.
I really believe in trying to minimise harm but it’s got to be done sensibly and without over catering for the minority at the expense of the majority.
Also as an aside my experience of problem gambling lobbyists is that they are disproportionately middle class. There is a whiff of ‘we need to protect and nurture our poor because they can’t be trusted to make good decisions themselves’ about them.
About time bookies were forced to join the rest of the retail world. You think DFS lets you have a sofa before running checks on you?
You can buy as many sofas as you want without any checks, unless you want credit.
Gambling does not allow credit or credit cards in UK.
However, I can buy as much booze and fags as my credit card will allow - and nobody will check.
Setting aside the point that hardly anyone pays cash at DFS because of their 0% interest finance deal, you couldn't buy as many sofas as you wished without some checks being run on you. If implausibly you offered to pay cash to DFS for, say, 10 sofas, I suspect they would run AML checks. This is because your strange request would form an unusual pattern of transactions or have no apparent economic or legal purpose.
As for your booze and fag frenzy, no further checks are necessary because your card companies have already done them.
About time bookies were forced to join the rest of the retail world. You think DFS lets you have a sofa before running checks on you?
You can buy as many sofas as you want without any checks, unless you want credit.
Gambling does not allow credit or credit cards in UK.
However, I can buy as much booze and fags as my credit card will allow - and nobody will check.
Setting aside the point that hardly anyone pays cash at DFS because of their 0% interest finance deal, you couldn't buy as many sofas as you wished without some checks being run on you. If implausibly you offered to pay cash to DFS for, say, 10 sofas, I suspect they would run AML checks. This is because your strange request would form an unusual pattern of transactions or have no apparent economic or legal purpose.
As for your booze and fag frenzy, no further checks are necessary because your card companies have already done them.
Maybe DFS is a complicated example, but I take it you accept the premise that someone could go from shop to shop, town to town, buying products with cash/ debit card without anyone checking if they can actually afford it.
For the booze and fags frenzy, I could be using a debit card (available funds only) - again, unchecked.
The proposal for the new legislation is that placing bets (with available funds) above a certain frequency / amount will trigger some kind of background affordability check.
The ultimate irony will be someone who has bought a racehorse for several thousands (using available funds), and without an affordability check - who will not be able to bet on it without someone else deciding whether they can afford to bet or not.
About time bookies were forced to join the rest of the retail world. You think DFS lets you have a sofa before running checks on you?
You can buy as many sofas as you want without any checks, unless you want credit.
Gambling does not allow credit or credit cards in UK.
However, I can buy as much booze and fags as my credit card will allow - and nobody will check.
Setting aside the point that hardly anyone pays cash at DFS because of their 0% interest finance deal, you couldn't buy as many sofas as you wished without some checks being run on you. If implausibly you offered to pay cash to DFS for, say, 10 sofas, I suspect they would run AML checks. This is because your strange request would form an unusual pattern of transactions or have no apparent economic or legal purpose.
As for your booze and fag frenzy, no further checks are necessary because your card companies have already done them.
And yet there's thousands of people out there telling us they're struggling with their debt. If me and the wife max out our credit card £30000, we should be able to manage that debt. I'm assuming if weren't able to manage that debt the card limit wouldn't of been set at £30000
Comments
We would be in agreement that if these checks came in and it saved one person from commiting suicide or one family not decimated by gambling its worth it.
My argument is there's people/families up and down the country going to bed tonight in thousands of pounds in debt.
Some of these won't sleep properly through worry of the debt , a couple of them might even be thinking about suicide as a way out.
Now with this in mind if affordability checks were across the board and it helped one person/family not go into debt would that not be worth it?
You will probably be allowed to bet a percentage of your wage a year.
There's lots of 'debt' help out there, probably should be more, but I'm not really clear if someone has got into debt (not through gambling) where would these checks have been to stop it?
Gambling is in my view somewhat unique. Where else could you spend your months wages and come away with nothing 2 minutes later? Most other debt you will have actually purchased something.
One of my close family had/has a gambling problem, now attends GA. He like most there first started gambling in an attempt to make money as they were either struggling or already in debt. It's not by luck that the busy bookies are generally in the poorer areas......... I was in Ryde, IOW last week and there were more bookies in one road (maybe within 500 yards) than there are within a mile of my office in the city. Yet there's probably more money in that mile than the whole of the IOW!
Although it is registered in the name of Nevin Truesdale, Chief Executive of The Jockey Club, the petition is launched on behalf of Britain’s horseracing industry, which supports more than 85,000 jobs and contributes £4.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
Its online citation reads: “We want the Government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. Such checks – including assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.
“The proposed checks could see bettors having to prove they can afford their hobby if they sustain losses as low as £1.37 per day. We accept the need to help those with problem gambling but more intrusive checks triggered at a higher threshold risks bettors moving to the black market where there are no consumer protections or safer gambling tools. There will also be a negative impact on British horseracing’s finances due to a reduction in betting turnover and resulting fall in Levy yield.”
However, I can see how it is so easy to put bigger numbers into the websites, it can devastate lives.
I completely agree with this idea, and with the greatest of respect to people comparing this to holidays etc, I would strongly recommend you read up on addiction.
In an ideal world your cocaine dealer would be running affordability checks on you, as would the pub or off licence to be honest... Addictive substances/behaviours should have more things to stop people becoming addicted. It probably won't deter people already addicted, but will hopefully make it more difficult to become more addicted in the first place.
I have people very close to me who had a terrible childhood due to the addictions of people that should have been caring for them/using that money to give those children a proper childhood.
I know when I was in my late teens, first paypacket etc, and happened to win £1k on an introductory £50 free bet which then almost entirely disappeared in the couple of days after, that I was at a fork in the road and luckily went the right way. Many don't.
We keep hearing there are loads of jobs in farm labour. Sounds like an ideal situation to me...
Anyway, racing fans will always tell you that it isn't all about the gambling, so nothing should change anyway, they will still follow their favourite "sport".
I mean it COULD be tails 50 times in a row and still be statistically insignificant. How many goes should we allow before you say enough? (ask Nasser Hussain!)
Probability theory is a rabbit hole that would blow your mind Cal.
However, I can buy as much booze and fags as my credit card will allow - and nobody will check.
But over many hundreds and thousands of events and eventually infinity, it WILL converge to 50/50. You're right that it could be 50 tails in a row and in fact that probably will happen at some point in time if you flipped a coin continuously millions of times.
Whether you get lucky and win 50 in a row or get unlucky and lose 50 in a row, the event and the given odds have a breakeven expectancy. I don't think punters should be soft restricted just because they've lost X in a row - that's one way to guarantee they'll never see the other side of it.
Checks should be based on behaviours IMO. One such behaviour that might trigger a check for example is someone losing over 95% of their account balance in a short period of time, immediately depositing more money and then gambling with a sizeable amount of that new balance in quick succession. It's not perfect but I'd suggest it's a damn sight better at weeding out those with a problem, compared to limiting everyone to an arbitrary number in 24 hour or 30 day windows.
Trying to find a satisfactory balance between minimising harm for those with a predisposition to addictive and unhealthy behaviours whilst allowing the vast majority of the rest of people to have unfettered access to a legal form of entertainment is nigh on impossible.
As for your booze and fag frenzy, no further checks are necessary because your card companies have already done them.
If me and the wife max out our credit card £30000, we should be able to manage that debt.
I'm assuming if weren't able to manage that debt the card limit wouldn't of been set at £30000