All Bets Are On

The ball bearing jumps capriciously. The anticipation of the next card dealt. The moment a die topples to a standstill. Raucous jubilation can turn sour in the space of a few minutes. Anger, relief, nervousness, joy and utter hopelessness. The experiences one feels when gambling is like no other.

Casinos are only now opening their doors to the public after prolonged governmental imposed closures throughout the UK due to Covid-19.

The overall gambling scene plummeted in April 2020 due to the suspension of football and horse racing, which make up 75% of the UK sports betting market.

That said, online slots, bingo, live casino games, poker and sports betting on more obscure teams, such as the Belarusian League, continued during the lockdown.

Online gambling did not suffer a power cut. Operators such as Bet365, 32Red and William Hill advertise their odds and offers on Twitter. Sky Vegas continued its #tweetyourwin campaign where the online casino giants encourage players to tweet wins in order to stand a chance of winning £50.

The ONS measures period on period growth with regards to gambling and betting activities in the UK including the operation of virtual gambling websites, sale of lottery tickets, bookmaking and the provision of gambling services.

The above chart depicts such activities, showing a dramatic drop in gambling activities in April 2020 (-22.3), the least activity recorded in over 20 years. Conversely and instantaneously, May 2020 saw a huge spike to 7.4 and June to 13.2, the most recorded in over 20 years.

The BBC reported an 'all time high' in terms of online casino searches during the lockdown, as shown in the chart below.

I spoke to Chris Raddings, from Hull, where searches for online casinos were the most popular according to Google Trends from 19 February to 19 May 2020. He was a former problem gambler, especially with slot and FOBT machines.

"Online gambling is a problem since it's a 24 hour thing from your very armchair. Thankfully, I didn't online gamble that much, but that was because I was rock bottom by then," he said.

He explained one of the main reasons people in his area entered gambling was due to high unemployment, and a large number of betting shops and casinos.

"It's easy to get into the habit as they are placed everywhere. I'm 53 and some punters I recognise walking out went in when I was 17! From what I can gather it's on the increase again after lockdown."

From doing a Google Trends search on certain topics related to online gambling, the results showed sharp spikes in interest following the imposition of lockdown in the UK.

Interest in online slots saw an all time high between March 22-28 2020. Online casinos were searched for the most ever between July 19-25 2020 and searches for online poker increased significantly in the same period.

Carolyn Harris, Labour MP for Swansea, expressed her deep concerns at the outset of lockdown regarding the potential devastation online gambling could have on people's livelihoods.

“Without the usual distractions of everyday life, people will undoubtedly be turning to technology more, and the online gambling companies will be well aware of this and, if previous evidence is anything to go by, using it to their own advantage.

Carolyn admitted that even before the pandemic, she had received huge amounts of correspondence from people who were affected by gambling addiction, including those in recovery, family members of addicts and those who have lost loved ones to suicide as a direct result of their addiction.

In response to increased gambling activities, the Gambling Commission issued tighter measures to protect online gamblers during lockdown in May.

Some of these included preventing reverse withdrawal options for customers until further notice, not offering bonuses or promotions to customers who display indicators of addiction, and implementing processes to monitor customer behaviour.

Gambling Commission chief executive Neil McArthur said: “Operators must use the data they hold to protect their customers and now, more than ever, it’s vital that online operators really know their customers by monitoring how long they are playing for and understanding how financial uncertainty is impacting them and what they can afford to gamble with. "