Australian Banks Want Credit Card Ban for Gambling

Banks in Australia are demanding the federal government pass legislation to ban gamblers using credit cards for online betting.

Former cabinet minister in the Queensland government and now chief executive of the Australian Banking Association (ABA), Anna Bligh, insists online gambling is “a product that is not suitable for credit.”

She is asking the Albanese government for the blanket ban, she says, to protect her members’ interests, rather than to shut down the activity of online gambling per se.

She said: “You can accrue a very, very large amount of debt in an incredibly short period of time and have nothing to show for it.

“Banks have seen the harm that is being done and they are very conscious of their responsibility as lenders to ask, ‘Is this something we should be providing credit for given what’s happening to our customers?’”

Rather than waiting for the government to do something about the issue, a handful of banks in Australia have already issued their own ban on customers using their credit cards for online gambling. This includes Bank of Queensland, Bank Australia, Citibank and Suncorp.

Another bugbear for Bligh and those who support her (such as Responsible Wagering Australia) is the fact that it’s not possible to use credit cards in physical gambling venues. Back at the beginning of the millennium when that ban on credit cards was implemented, online gambling wasn’t conceived of. Now it’s an industry that brings in more than $50bn every year.

“Why should it be possible to do something in the virtual world that is prohibited in the real world?” Bligh added. “Every pub with poker machines, every TAB and every trackside bookie already implemented this 23 years ago.”

The difficulty with implementing a blanket ban on online gambling lies with the merchant code which is attached to transactions. That’s because it’s the same code used by charities to run fundraising lotteries. To make that code pertain only to online gambling is bigger than the Australian government itself and would involve agreement from other countries.

If, and when, the ban is implemented, gambling operators should carry out – and fund – their own compliance measures, says Blight.

Independent MP Rebekha Sharkie is backing Blight and the ABA. She is due to bring a private member’s bill to parliament later this week, in which she wants gambling companies to take responsibility for notifying punters about ongoing losses while gambling. They would also be responsible for reporting suspicious activity in their establishments.