Addicted to playing bingo online

Even in the comparatively innocent world of online bingo, people are susceptible to the dangers of becoming addicted to playing bingo online.

I’ve been following the court case of a 39 year old woman from Norwich who received a 12 month prison sentence just last week, after being convicted of stealing a huge sum of money to fund her gambling addiction to online bingo and slots.

Over a period of 14 months starting in April 2007 she managed to steal a total of £75,000 from the local sorting office in Norwich where she had been an employee for 14 years. Every penny she stole she used to play bingo online, or spin away on the slots.

According to gambling counsellors, these types of court cases are on the rise in the UK. Although 98% of gamblers are able to gamble responsibly, there is a minority of 2% of those who don’t or can’t.

It is very easy, some would say too easy, to open an internet bingo account and start gambling online. In spite of being a great community game, playing bingo online is a form of gambling. As such it becomes part of the greater issue when it comes to problem gambling.

In the same way that Government Health Warnings are now plastered all over cigarette packs, so are the dangers of gambling addiction displayed on the front pages of all regulated and legal online bingo sites in the UK, with direct links to Gamblers Anonymous.

However, as with tobacco, there’s only so much that you can do to protect the minority while catering for the 98% majority of gamblers that gamble responsibly.

In spite of being an avid online bingo supporter and fan, I do feel however, that a portion of the unpleasant burden must be shouldered by the online bingo industry in general, and accepted as an issue that needs to be addressed even more responsibly.

The onus needs to be on the individual bingo sites to identify problem gamblers earlier, and if necessary, these players should be permanently banned from ALL online bingo sites for life - not only for their own protection, but also for the protection of the online bingo industry itself.