The credit card ban: what has been off the table since 14 April 2020
Since 14 April 2020 it has been illegal for a Gambling Commission licensee to accept a credit card for any gambling product, online or in person. The one exception is non-remote lotteries — a National Lottery ticket bought at a till alongside the shopping — where the Commission judged a separate card check impractical for retailers.
Last reviewed: 21 September 2026 · Author: Eleanor Whitlock
What the Commission said, and the numbers behind it
The ban was announced on 14 January 2020 with three months' notice. The Commission's reasoning was simple: gambling with borrowed money multiplies harm. Its figures at the time:
- 24 million adults in Great Britain gamble; 10.5 million of them online.
- 800,000 consumers used a credit card to gamble in 2018.
- 22% of online gamblers who used credit cards were classified as problem gamblers.
The stated aim was to "minimise the risks of harm to consumers from gambling with money they do not have".
What it covers
| Channel | Credit card allowed? |
|---|---|
| Online casino, bingo, poker, betting | No |
| Betting shops, casinos, arcades | No |
| Online lottery purchases (including National Lottery online) | No |
| Lottery tickets and scratchcards bought in person | Yes (exempt) |
E-wallets and the workaround question
The ban would have been hollow if a credit card could fund an e-wallet that then funded gambling. Licence condition 6.1.2 therefore covers credit-card payments routed through a money service business as well as direct card payments, so an e-wallet can only be used for gambling where it does not pass credit-card funds through. In practice, the major e-wallets serving GB customers block that, and a credit card attached to one cannot be used for a gambling merchant.
Buy-now-pay-later products sit outside the ban's wording but are widely blocked by operators as a matter of policy; the Commission has treated gambling on credit as a harm indicator regardless of the instrument.
What it changed for players
- Deposits must come from money the customer already has: debit card, bank transfer, or an e-wallet funded from those.
- A declined deposit "card not accepted" on a GB site is usually a credit card, not a technical fault.
- Overdrafts are unaffected — the ban is about the card, not the source of funds — which is one reason the financial vulnerability checks later followed. See financial vulnerability checks.
Quick answers
Can I use a credit card on a non-UK site? Sites not licensed in Great Britain are not bound by the ban — and not bound by any GB consumer protection either.
Was the ban part of the 2023 white paper? No — it predates it. The white paper's measures (financial checks, stake limits on online slots) came later.
Sources: Gambling Commission, Gambling on credit cards to be banned from April 2020 (14 January 2020); Licence Conditions and Codes of Practice, licence condition 6.1.2 — use of credit cards.