Responsible Gambling in South Africa

Gambling is increasingly popular as a form of entertainment in South Africa, with millions of adults buying lottery tickets, placing sports bets, and playing casino games.

As a result, there is a need for safe, responsible gambling practices. Understanding the importance of safe gambling is essential for protecting your mental health and finances.

In this guide, we will explore responsible gambling, discuss its importance, and provide tips and resources to help you maintain control over your gambling habits.

What is Responsible Gambling?

Responsible gambling involves making controlled, informed decisions when betting. It involves following a set of initiatives developed by experts to ensure you engage in gambling as safely as possible.

Additionally, safe betting promotes the awareness of the risks that gambling can cause.

As a punter, it is important for you to understand that problem gambling can lead to addiction, mental health challenges, strained relationships, and financial difficulties.

As a result, we at AfrikFoot SA have created informative guides to promote proper education and a safer gambling environment. These guides reinforce our commitment to responsible gambling.

More importantly, they can help you learn what to expect from gambling, reducing reckless and impulsive behaviour. Consequently, helping you develop healthy habits that ensure that gambling remains a hobby and a source of entertainment for you.

The Importance of Raising Awareness for Responsible Gambling

The importance of discussing safe gambling habits cannot be overemphasised, as it has become a growing pastime in the country.

According to the latest reports from the National Gambling Board (NGB), gambling among South African adults surged from 30.6% in 2017 to 65.7% in 2023/24.

Similarly, problem gambling has risen to 31%, indicating a need for more substantial support for responsible gambling.

Hence, it is necessary to raise awareness and encourage active conversation about responsible gambling. Fostering discussions about mindful gambling will encourage those struggling with gambling addiction to seek help.

Additionally, it will help other bettors pay attention to warning signs as they will gain a better understanding of the topic and triggers that indicate problems.

Tips on how to Gamble Responsibly

Here are some tips to help you monitor and manage your gambling behaviour:
Learn about gambling: It is necessary to understand odds and the betting options available to you to ensure you know where you want to put your money.

Our experts have created guides to help you, demonstrating our commitment to responsible gambling.

Develop other hobbies

It’s essential to develop other hobbies outside of betting. This ensures that you diversify your attention, thereby reducing the risk of dependency and addiction.

Take regular breaks

Taking short breaks between sessions can help you clear your mind and reflect on how much time and money you’ve spent. You can also consider taking longer breaks to ensure your relationship with gambling remains healthy.

Avoid chasing losses

Making up lost funds can be very tempting, but more often than not, it leads to more losses. Consider setting a loss limit, when available, to help you avoid the temptation to chase your losses.

Monitor your emotions

Your emotions significantly impact your behaviour and your ability to make rational decisions. Hence, it’s advisable to avoid gambling when you’re lonely, stressed, or angry.

Bet small

If you’re gambling as a pastime, it’s advisable to make multiple small, low-risk bets rather than single, high-risk bets. This gives you more control over your money and helps prevent unhealthy betting habits.

Don’t aim to build wealth from gambling

Always treat gambling as a hobby rather than a wealth-building endeavour. Treating gambling as a means of making money can lead to risky, self-destructive habits.

Create safe spaces

Consider creating safe spaces with trusted family members or friends to discuss your gambling behaviour. These safe spaces can help you evaluate your gambling habits and encourage you to make the necessary changes.

Gambling Online: How to Stay Safe

The best betting sites provide tools on their platforms to encourage responsible and healthy gambling habits. Here are some tools and strategies to help stay safe when gambling:

1. Set Deposit Limits

When gambling, it’s advisable to have a budget and stick to it. Creating a gambling budget ensures that you only spend what you can afford to lose. Bookies like Easybet offer deposit limits to help regulate how much you spend on their platform.

These limits control how much money you deposit in your gambling account for a particular period of time.

You could choose daily, weekly, or monthly limits depending on your betting habits. A deposit limit function helps you adhere to your gambling budget even when you’re tempted to overspend.

Similarly, some bookies offer loss limits, which are similar to a deposit limit. A loss limit is the maximum amount of money you can lose during your gambling sessions. Once you meet your limit, the platform prevents you from making more bets.

2. Set Time Limits

Time limits are particularly relevant for digital casino-style games. It’s easy to watch cards or slots on your screen and forget how long you’ve spent on the site.

Using the time limit tool on the betting platform allows you to regulate the duration of your sessions, with minimal personal effort. After your session time elapses, the app sends a reminder and suggests a break. In some cases, it may log you out automatically.

In addition to time limits, some bookies, such as Jackpot City South Africa, also provide periodic reality checks in the form of pop-up notifications. These notifications show you how much time and money you’ve spent on your current session. This encourages you to think about your position before continuing with your session.

3. Track your Spending

Consider keeping a gambling journal to track how much and how often you gamble. Tracking your spending will give you better insight into your gambling behaviour. It will help you understand when you are most likely to overspend and show pointers for concerning habits.

Additionally, it can help you understand yourself and better tailor your responsible gambling plans. Online Betting apps and sites also help you monitor your spending. Most platforms provide a detailed log with dates of your deposits, bets, and withdrawals.

4. Manually Block Transactions

Rather than use the deposit limits on the betting platforms, you can take a more direct step by blocking transactions to gambling sites from your bank. This affords you more control over your finances, preventing any transactions between your bank and gambling sites for a specified period.

Consider using third-party apps to improve your safe betting habits. Apps like Gamban, GamStop, and Betblocker have tools that block transactions from your bank to gambling sites, either permanently or for a particular period. These platforms can also prevent you from accessing gambling sites and provide professional assistance when necessary.

5. Self Exclusions

If it becomes necessary for you to take an extended break, you can use the self-exclusion tool on your preferred betting site. The self-exclusion tool prevents you from logging into your account for a predetermined period.

Different sites have different self-exclusion options, ranging from a few days (time-outs) to a few months. Some platforms also provide permanent self-exclusion, preventing you from ever accessing your account.

For example, Hollywoodbets offers comprehensive cooling-off and self-exclusion tools. The cooling-off tool lets you initiate an exclusionary period of a few days, weeks, or years. Alternatively, you can permanently close your account and receive a refund for unused deposits.

It’s important to note that excluding yourself from a particular platform may prevent you from opening an account on other platforms within the same business group. Additionally, violating the terms of your exclusion may result in permanent account closure.

Resources for Responsible Gambling

If you have concerns about your gambling habits or the behaviour of somebody else, please do not hesitate to seek assistance. Consider reaching out to professionals who offer counselling and guidance for problem gamblers.

Some resources for responsible gambling available in the country include: