Responsible Gambling: Tools, Support and Help for UK Players

If gambling is causing you harm, or you’re worried about someone close to you, you can talk to someone today. Every service below is free and confidential.

You don’t need a diagnosed problem to call any of these numbers. They take calls about early warning signs and money worries, and from family members as well as players.

The questions below come from the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI), a standardised screening tool used by gambling researchers and charities. It was developed as part of the Canadian Problem Gambling Index, and it is the screen the UK Gambling Commission uses in its Gambling Survey for Great Britain. Over the past 12 months:

• 1. Have you bet more than you could really afford to lose? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 2. Have you needed to gamble with larger amounts of money to get the same feeling of excitement? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 3. When you gambled, did you go back another day to try to win back the money you lost? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 4. Have you borrowed money or sold anything to get money to gamble? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 5. Have you felt that you might have a problem with gambling? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 6. Has gambling caused you any health problems, including stress or anxiety? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 7. Have people criticised your betting or told you that you had a gambling problem, regardless of whether or not you thought it was true? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 8. Has your gambling caused any financial problems for you or your household? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)
• 9. Have you felt guilty about the way you gamble or what happens when you gamble? Never (0) · Sometimes (1) · Most of the time (2) · Almost always (3)

How to score: Add your nine answers together for a total between 0 and 27.

These bands indicate risk. They are not a clinical diagnosis.

If you’d rather use a guided version that scores itself, GambleAware’s gambling harms self-assessment takes two to four minutes and is completely anonymous.

Every UKGC-licensed casino has to provide these tools. If an operator hides them or makes them difficult to find, treat that as a warning sign.

• Deposit Limits

  Set a daily, weekly, or monthly limit on how much you can deposit. Since October 2025, every UKGC-licensed operator has been required to prompt you to set a deposit limit before your first deposit. You can lower the limit at any time and it takes effect immediately. Raising it triggers a 24-hour cooling-off period, and you then have to confirm the request again before the higher limit applies. If you do nothing at the end of the 24 hours, the old limit stays. The date and the wording of the prompt requirement are in our rule-change timeline.

• Session Time Limits and Reality Checks

  A session time limit logs you out after a set period. A reality check pops up at intervals you choose (every 30 or 60 minutes, usually) and tells you how long you’ve been playing and how much you’ve spent. Both are in the account settings at every UK casino.

• Loss Limits

  This limits how much you can lose over a set period. Unlike a deposit limit, it counts wins you put back into play. If you hit the loss limit, you can’t keep playing until the period resets. A loss limit is one of several practical ways to keep losses down.

• Cooling-Off Periods and Time-Outs

  A time-out is a short break from your account, usually 24 hours to six weeks. During the cooling-off, you can’t log in, deposit, or play. Useful if you’re spending more than you want to but aren’t ready to self-exclude.

• Self-Exclusion at the Operator Level

  A longer block on your account, usually six months to five years, at a specific casino. Once activated, the operator must close the account, refund any remaining balance, and stop all marketing to you. Self-exclusion cannot be reversed early. That’s the point.

• GAMSTOP: Nationwide Self-Exclusion

  GAMSTOP is the UK’s national self-exclusion register. Sign up once and you’re blocked from every UKGC-licensed online gambling site and app for a period you choose: six months, one year, or five years. There is also a five-year option that renews automatically. Registration is free and takes a few minutes. Since April 2024, GAMSTOP also covers gambling by telephone and email, not just online play.

• Affordability Checks

  Since February 2025, UKGC-licensed operators carry out financial vulnerability checks when your net deposits hit £150 over a rolling 30-day period. These checks run in the background and don’t affect your credit score. Their job is to catch warning signs early. If an operator asks for payslips or bank statements, that’s an enhanced affordability check, usually triggered by higher spend. Being asked is not an accusation.

These are the organisations we point people to, whether you’re worried about your own gambling or someone else’s:

Gambling harm rarely stops with the person gambling. If you’re worried about a partner, a parent, a child or a friend, there is support aimed specifically at you.

Signs that someone close to you may be struggling:

• Money going missing, or unexplained borrowing
• Secrecy around phone use, especially in the evening or at night
• Mood changes tied to wins and losses
• Missing work, appointments, or family events
• Lying about where they’ve been or what they’ve spent
• Withdrawal from family life, hobbies, or friends

Starting a conversation. Pick a calm moment, avoid accusations, and talk about what you’ve noticed rather than what you think they’re doing wrong. You can prepare by reading GamCare’s guide for friends and family. If they are ready to take a practical step, most UK banks can block gambling transactions on their card.

Support specifically for affected others:

• Gam-Anon offers peer support for people affected by someone else’s gambling.
• GamCare family support includes confidential chat, advice, and group sessions.
• The National Gambling Helpline on 0808 8020 133 also takes calls from family members.

The UK Gambling Commission regulates every online casino that accepts UK players. Its rules on safety, transparency and player protection sit in the licence conditions, which means an operator has to follow them. You must be 18 or over to gamble at a UKGC-licensed online casino, and operators have to verify your age and identity before you can play. Every rule below carries its start date, and our UK gambling regulation tracker holds the dated timeline of these changes:

• Online slot stake limits (phased in during 2025): £5 per spin maximum for players aged 25 and over from 9 April 2025, and £2 per spin for players aged 18 to 24 from 21 May 2025. Operators verify age before applying the correct limit. Both sit in the UK Gambling Commission’s licence conditions.
• Wagering requirements cap (since January 2026): Welcome bonuses can carry a maximum wagering requirement of 10x the bonus value. Mixed-product bonuses (casino + sports in one offer) are banned.
• Credit card ban (since April 2020): Gambling with credit cards is illegal at UKGC-licensed operators. Debit cards, e-Wallets, bank transfer and pre-paid methods are allowed.
• Financial vulnerability checks (since February 2025): Light-touch checks at £150 net deposits over 30 days. Enhanced checks apply at higher spend, and operators may ask for proof of income for larger stakes. Our tracker covers how the £150 threshold works in more detail.
• Deposit limit prompts (since October 2025): Every operator must prompt you to set a deposit limit before your first deposit.
• Game speed limits (since October 2021): Online slots must have a minimum spin speed of 2.5 seconds. Auto-play is banned. Our feature on how Big Time Gaming changed online slots explains what those rules did to slot design.
• Mandatory GAMSTOP integration: Every UKGC-licensed online operator must be registered with GAMSTOP. If you self-exclude through GAMSTOP, they have to block you.

If you ever think an operator isn’t following these rules, you can report them to the UKGC directly through the gamblingcommission.gov.uk website.

If you visit UK casinos in person and want a real break from playing, the SENSE scheme is the land-based equivalent of GAMSTOP. SENSE stands for Self-Enrolment National Self-Exclusion, and one application excludes you from every licensed land-based casino in Great Britain.

Key things to know about SENSE:

• Launched in August 2015. SENSE has been running for over a decade, originally under the National Casino Forum, then briefly under the Betting and Gaming Council (BGC), and now as an independent company called Self-Enrolment National Self-Exclusion Ltd. The scheme itself has carried on without interruption through those handovers.
• How to sign up. The quickest route is to self-enrol online at senseselfexclusion.com from a phone, tablet or PC, using the SENSE self-enrolment portal, Tuki. You need a government-issued photo ID and a head-and-shoulders selfie photograph. You can also enrol in person at any participating casino in Great Britain, where a manager completes the process with you and you do not need to enter the gaming areas.
• Exclusion length. The minimum is six months, and a single enrolment can be extended up to one year. This is shorter than GAMSTOP, which runs in bands of six months, one year, five years, or five years with automatic renewal.
• What it does. Once enrolled, your details are shared (with your consent) with every licensed land-based casino in Great Britain. You’re also removed from their marketing lists.

SENSE covers licensed land-based casinos only, and GAMSTOP Online is the register for websites and apps, so for online play you still need GAMSTOP. Betting shops, bingo premises and arcades sit outside both, and each has its own free scheme: GAMSTOP Betting Shops, formerly MOSES, on 0800 294 2060 for bookmakers, BISES through the Bingo Association for bingo premises, and BACTA or SmartEXCLUSION for arcades and adult gaming centres. The UK Gambling Commission lists them all on its free multi operator and national self-exclusion schemes page.

A note on the National Casino Forum. SENSE passed from the National Casino Forum (NCF) to the Betting and Gaming Council and now runs independently. If you were enrolled through NCF, your SENSE exclusion is still valid.

A lot of what people believe about gambling doesn’t match how the games work. These are the four we hear most often:

If one of these thoughts turns up mid-session, that’s a good moment to stop and use a time-out.

Every November, UK gambling charities, operators and industry bodies run Safer Gambling Week. It used to be called Responsible Gambling Week, and the old name is still widely used. In 2026 it runs from 16 to 22 November. It is organised jointly by the Betting and Gaming Council, Bacta and the Bingo Association, and supported by GamCare, GambleAware and most major UK-licensed operators.

During the week, the charities and operators involved promote the tools covered on this page, share stories from people affected by gambling harm, and point people to the free help available. Activities include social media campaigns, in-venue promotion in betting shops, staff training and live events with charity speakers.

The rest of this page (the tools, the helplines, the self-check) is the same information we’d share during the campaign. You don’t have to wait for November to use it.

• When we review casinos, we look at how visible their responsible gambling tools are. Sites that bury deposit limits or self-exclusion options don’t score well in our reviews.
• We don’t use “win big” framing or suggest gambling is a way to make money. Gambling is entertainment, and we treat it that way across the site.
• Where someone needs help beyond information, we point to the organisations above rather than position ourselves as the answer.
• This page carries no affiliate links and no operator promotion. That’s deliberate, and it will stay that way.
• When UKGC rules change, we update the relevant sections here so the page matches what’s in force.

For more on our editorial independence across the site, see the About Us page.

If you’ve got this far and think gambling might be doing harm, to you or to someone close to you, call today rather than waiting for things to get worse. The lines below are free and confidential.

James Awland

Founder & Editor-in-Chief, bestcasino.co.uk · UK-based

I'm James, and I've spent over a decade trying to answer one question for UK players: which online casinos are actually worth it? I launched bestcasino.co.uk in 2015, and my team and I still sit down with every site we cover - from reading the T&Cs to testing the games, checking the RTPs, and confirming the UKGC licence - before anything goes live on the page. A Mathematical Sciences degree helps with maths. The rest we learned from playing.

About me · Editorial team · Contact · X / @JamesAwland

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