Responsible gambling

Gambling is entertainment with a price. These are the tools that keep it that way, and the signs that it has stopped being entertainment.

Decide before you play

Set a budget in money, not in hope. An amount you can lose entirely without it changing your month.
Set a time limit too. Sessions stretch quietly, especially on a phone.
Never chase a loss. Increasing stakes to recover is the mechanism behind almost every serious loss.
Never gamble with borrowed money, including credit cards and overdrafts.
Do not play to fix a mood. Boredom, stress and grief are bad reasons to open a casino.

Tools inside the account

Licensed casinos are required to offer control tools, and they work: deposit limits capped per day, week or month; loss and session limits; reality-check reminders that interrupt play; cooling- off periods of a day to a few weeks; and self-exclusion, which locks the account for a fixed term or permanently. Limits tighten immediately and loosen slowly by design — that delay is the feature, not a fault.

If an account is closed under self-exclusion, do not open another one elsewhere to get around it. National self-exclusion schemes exist in many regulated markets and cover every licensed operator at once; your local regulator's website explains which one applies to you.

Warning signs and where to get help

Gambling more than planned, hiding it from people close to you, borrowing to keep playing, chasing losses, feeling irritable when you cannot play, or spending time you meant for other things — any of these is a reason to stop and use the tools above.

Free, confidential help exists in most countries, usually through a national helpline or a charity funded to do exactly this. GamCare and the National Gambling Helpline cover the UK; Gambling Help Online covers Australia; Gamblers Anonymous and BeGambleAware operate internationally; and your national gambling regulator publishes the local list. Contacting one of them costs nothing and commits you to nothing.

If you are under 18, gambling is not available to you anywhere on this site or at any licensed operator.