The 2019-founded Austrian Players’ Aid Association, also known as the Spielerhilfe Association, has recently slammed Austrian Lotteries for allegedly allowing underaged players to buy instant win products.
No Age Controls in Place
According to the association aimed at advocating for better player protection in the country while offering media education and advice, 55% of all children who were used in their testing purchases had no problem buying the respective products, in spite of being aged between 12 and 14.
The Spielerhilfe, therefore, slammed Austrian Lotteries for failing to perform the necessary age verification procedures during the purchases.
Starting July 10, 2023, Austrian Lotteries has imposed an age limit of 18, abolishing the previous age limit of 16 for purchasing lottery tickets and other products.
In the past years, the legal age of gambling has represented a controversial topic in many parts of the world. In March 2022, some of Michigan’s casino properties decided to lower their gambling age to 18 from 21.
Spielerhilfe Carried 175 Test Purchases in Three Federal States
Austrian Lotteries, which features Allwyn-owned Casinos Austria as the major shareholder, has allegedly sold the instant win products to minors in the federal states of Salzburg, Upper Austria, and Lower Austria where Spielerhilfe carried 175 test purchases throughout the current year.
The children part of the testing were sent to buy scratch cards and other lottery products sold by Austrian Lotteries’ retail outlets. The action was used as a means of verifying their compliance with the regulations in the industry.
Spielerhilfe’s chairman and spokesperson, Christoph Holubar, commented that Austrian Lotteries “apparently has big problems controlling its sales partners”. He added that the protection of minors was yet to be guaranteed, since in over 50% of all purchases initiated by children, they were given the green light to buy the products.
Holubar also mentioned the example of the Salzburg branch of Austrian Lotteries whose retail outlets served clients over the age of 16, in spite of the existence of the 2019 Salzburg Youth Act which banned individuals under the age of 18 from taking part in games of chance.
The chairman commented that the lotteries’ actions ignored the federal state’s “legal situation.” He further explained that the company “apparently risked that its contractual partners would continually violate applicable laws” while committing administrative offenses.
So far, Spielerhilfe has referred 34 violations of responsible gaming regulations to the authorities in Salzburg.
At the start of September, Premier Lotteries Ireland was fined $160,000 for breaching its licensing conditions regarding self-exclusion. At the time, Carol Boate, the chief of the Irish lottery regulator that imposed the fine, also emphasized the need for robust measures that would eradicate underage gambling and lower the risk of problem gambling.