According to research from the Australian dedicated and proven outcome-focused lottery enabler Jumbo Interactive, lottery players in the United Kingdom have collectively piled up a whopping $156 million (£117 million) of debt.
The Data from Jumbo’s Research
The statistics show that every tenth person who participates in a “big ticket” lottery promising big luxurious items and properties as prizes eventually ends up in debt.
One of the major issues leading to this problem is the fact that although the British Gambling Commission banned the use of credit cards for gambling in 2020, it didn’t ban their use for prize draw games simply because the latter often offer free entries, effectively making it possible to pay for free.
Despite this, players have collectively spent $1146 million (£860 million) on paid draws in 2021 – a number that will go higher as the Q4 results get announced.
Furthermore, lotteries’ charity element also makes people 45% more likely to play, according to Jumbo’s research. However, 57% of the lottery players that donate to charity don’t bother checking how much of their donation actually benefits the cause.
To make matters worse, 15% of lottery players fall victims to fraudulent lotteries. Some of those, for example, require payments for prizes that either never arrive or happen to be of inferior quality and/or value than expected.
Jumbo and The Lotteries Council Address the Issue
Because of the worrying statistics, Jumbo Interactive has appealed to the United Kingdom’s Gambling Commission to have a look into the matter and enforce stronger regulation on draw games and lottery-style products. The Australian lottery also asks the UKGC to demand a higher level of transparency when it comes to lotteries that donate to charity.
The general manager of Jumbo Interactive’s UK branch, Nigel Atkinson, has commented on the large credit cards sums that go into lotteries and how they push people into debt only because the free draws allow prize draw games to be exempt from the credit card ban.
“With so much money changing hands, the government needs to look at the proper regulation of prize draws and competitions to better protect consumerism,” Atkinson said.
He added on Jumbo Interactive’s push for transparency, mentioning that many people are attracted to lotteries because of the charity element. Atkinson warned that it “remains easy for companies to bury information in the terms and conditions about how much actually goes to charity.” Atkinson added that despite the noble cause of society lotteries, public trust remains crucial for the gambling and lottery sector and it is important to maintain transparency.
The Lotteries Council of the United Kingdom seems to agree with the points made by Jumbo Interactive. It explained that it is increasingly concerned about commercial gambling companies who adopt prize draws and are marketing them in a similar fashion to charity lotteries.
“Lotteries face a series of legislative hurdles that restrict our ability to grow and raise funds for good causes while prize draws face no limits on how many tickets they can sell, what prizes they can offer, and choose whether and how much to give to any charity. We hope the Government looks at this to ensure a fairer playing field,” Tony Vick, the council’s chairman, said.
Jumbo Interactive and The Lotteries Council aren’t the only ones that agree lotteries should be better regulated. According to statistics, almost three-quarters of the lottery players also think that the usual gambling regulations should apply to lotteries and prize games as well.