Published: 27.02.2020, 19:14
4 min read
Spain will create over a hundred limitations for betting advertising.
Alberto Garzón, the head of the Spanish Ministry of Consumer Affairs, declared the latest updates of the state’s strategy to force back gambling services promoting. Since February 24, the Spanish government is reviewing the suggested updates. They were presented to the Commission for approval of the EU at first and published in the Royal edict.
The updated restrictions will possibly outlaw about 8 out of 10 of the current web betting ads, Garzón told at the briefing. Spanish gaming sector affects people’s health, so new rules are to mark the edges of gaming ads, — the Minister also said.
Mr. Garzón (in the photo) insists that more than 100 recently proposed rules are just the beginning in a fight with a so-called “social alarm” in the Spanish betting industry.
The full text of Royal edict is about to be announced yet, though we could find out what it is going to be about using several Spanish media sources.
Earlier this year, the Spanish government has declared another step in an anti-gambling campaign: it was going to limit gaming ads on various online platforms, TV, and radio to four hours — from 1 am to 5 am.
Betting ads in Spain
Gambling platforms still have permission to broadcast their ads during live sports shows, though the permitted time lasts only from 8 pm. Also, these commercials are prohibited from giving any data related to particular gambling markets or holding appeals for ‘betting now.’
The Minister says that bans will only help to defend interests of those gamblers who need protection from operators that operate with licenses issued outside the country. That means there’s no Spanish government protection for betting at such gambling platforms at all.
Spanish rules still permit sponsoring of sports clubs and individuals. Yet team equipment can only have a gambling platform logo or brand excluding texts. Also, these logos aren’t allowed on the minor-sized equipment.
Betting systems also cannot have in-stadia advertising or take part in naming rights contracts with sports stadiums.
Likewise, online betting ads will be excluded from all outdoor ad channels (like bus stops or billboards), as well as all public spaces where minors are admitted.
Also, provincial administrations will be able to issue permissions for outdoor ads for the ‘offline’ casino, bingo, or betting operators.
Surprisingly, gambling ads still can be distributed via print media, as long as they follow all the requirements.
Betting ads can no more emphasize approvals from influential people, especially individuals famous in the worlds of entertainment or sport. The government itself will define who fits to be a celebrity.
Ads are prohibited from presenting betting as the way to solve one’s money problems, ‘extolling’ betting, or equalizing it with any monetary benefits. Advertising, too, can’t support the opinion that skill predominates over luck in expecting a betting outcome, although poker operators will be able to have some flexibility on this.
Ads cannot include mentions of bonus proposals for newly registered players. There’s a new limit of €100 for bonus grants to clients made on operators’ websites. Any aggressive advertising forms (like pop-ups) aren’t allowed on sites anymore. The only exception is when a gambler has already taken some concrete steps to wager.
Betting operators are now prohibited from advertising on any social media that doesn’t have age filtering for users. We couldn’t find any leading social platforms that don’t have it, though. Also, gambling platforms are to be required to take steps to avoid minors from following operators’ social media accounts.
Betting ads will need to share statistics on how their picks have panned out, and gambling operators will be banned from working with any platform which fails reporting one’s losing/winning results openly.
Free-play random number generator (RNG), used in the classic gaming ‘offline’ systems, will also be used in online betting platforms.
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Earlier researches showed that the win-rate of some of the online betting operators was higher than the offline gambling systems ones. It provoked critics as the clients could expect some unrealistic profits while switching to other types of systems.
The government-run ONCE and SELAE lotto companies will have to follow the same rules as other operators, yet they will be able to omit the timing limits for showing commercials.
ONCE is La Organización Nacional de Ciegos Españoles is a public government corporation of a non-profit social type. It has the primary goal of improving the quality of life of blind people, people with visual problems, and people with disabilities throughout Spain.
It has a state authorization for running lotteries, which allows it to fund its social work and create jobs for its members.
It has more than 72 thousand members (as of December 31, 2019), of which 87% are people with severe visual impairment, and 13% are people with total blindness.
Other betting operators complained about newly coming rules, especially after some awkward incidents involving minors buying lotteries earlier this year.
Failing to follow updated rules will occur in money fines varying from €100k up to €1m. Penalties will depend on the type of violation and if a platform has been punished before. Platforms can lose their permissions to run betting services in the country for half-of-year periods or even forever if they keep violating the rules.
