What Is Responsible Gambling?
Responsible Gambling refers to taking the necessary steps to ensure that your gambling activities are done in a way to minimise the risk of experiencing gambling problems. Trustworthy casinos offer many tools and information on how you can play at their site safely. Several authorities including the Malta Gaming Authority and the United Gambling Commission enforce Responsible Gambling related regulations such as mandatory tools and limits that a casino has to offer to its players as well as KYC checks that need to be conducted.
Tips for Betting Online
Following these tips can help you stay safe when gambling:
- Play for fun. Gambling should not be used for income
Gambling is not a way to make money, in the long run, the casino venue or site is the one making the money. Gambling should be a leisure activity. We recommend that you balance gambling with other hobbies so that it won’t be the only pastime during your free time.
- Play with money you can afford to lose
Just like you budget for monthly expenses, you should allocate money for gambling from your entertainment budget. If you cannot set aside money for gambling avoid using money that you would need to pay necessities such as rent, bills, food and medicines. Most importantly do not borrow money from other people to gamble.
- Do not chase your losses
If you’re having a bad run, the best thing to do is to switch off and walk away. Chasing your losses until you win some of the money back could result in bigger losses. This could make you stressed and upset which in turn will make it harder for you to focus and make clear decisions.
- Set time and monetary limits before you start gambling
By setting time and monetary limits in advance, you can control how much time and money you’re spending on gambling. Once your allocated time is up or you’ve reached your deposit/loss limit, call it and quit. It’s also recommended to take breaks so that you do not lose track of time.
- Do not gamble under the influence
Having good judgement and a clear head is important to ensure safe gambling. Gambling under the influence will lower your resolve and make it easier for you to lose control and make irrational decisions.
List of Helpful Tools to Help Players Stay in Control
- Deposit Limits - daily, weekly or monthly monetary limits to control how much you're depositing into your casino account. These limits can be increased, decreased or removed.
- Loss Limits - these limits will be triggered when you lose a predetermined amount whilst gambling.
- Reality Checks - a message will be triggered to help you keep track of time.
- Calculator - a budget calculator will help you figure out how much money from your income you're spending on gambling.
- Session Limits - you can specify the amount of time you wish to be logged in. Once the session limit is reached, you will be logged out of your casino account.
- Self-Assessments - a set of questions that will help you find out how much your life is being impacted by gambling.
- Self Exclusion - you can ask a casino operator to exclude you from gambling for at least 6 months. You can also choose to be permanently self-excluded, this option is non-reversible.
Spot the Signs of Problem Gambling
Issues with gambling arise over time making it hard to recognise that you have an issue early. The signs mentioned below are the most common signs of problem gambling, there may be others that we have not mentioned.
- Unable to stop: you’ll do anything to continue gambling including missing work, university and other events.
- Chasing losses: believing that you can turn your luck around and win back what you lost.
- Lying to friends and family: finding yourself having to hide your gambling activities such as hiding gambling transactions and lying about how much time you’re spending on casino sites
- Irrational behaviour: having unexplained changes to your personality, experiencing mood swings or episodes of irritation, particularly after a gambling session.
- Money problems: your finances are not looking good, or you’ve borrowed money for gambling that you are unable to pay back
Protecting Underage Children from Gambling
Underage gambling is illegal. The minimum gambling age may differ from one country to another or from one province to another. For example, in the UK, the minimum gambling age is 18. In Alberta Canada, the minimum gambling age is 18, whereas in Ontario you have to be 19 to gamble legally.
Nowadays, casinos are also held responsible to monitor for and prevent underage gambling. Part of obtaining a license is to have processes such as Know Your Customer and age verification in place. KYC is used by the casino whereby it conducts checks to make sure that the player’s identity is true and also to verify that the funds used for gambling come from a legitimate source. The casino will ask for ID verification such as an ID card, passport or driver’s license. With these documents, the casino can verify that the player is of legal age.
Tips for Protecting Minors from Gambling Online
There are several ways in which you can prevent minors from gambling.
- Don’t leave accounts logged in and avoid having passwords and payment information saved. This is very important especially if you share the devices you gamble on with underage persons.
- Invest in website blocking software such as Netnanny. These blocking software and apps will further limit access to sites for underage persons.
- Use parental controls. This setting will ensure that minors cannot access inappropriate content such as gambling sites.
- Limit the time children spend online and if possible do not let them use the internet unsupervised.