If you wish to hold a lottery you may need to register with us.
There are two types of lottery defined in the Gambling Act 2005:
A simple lottery is one where:
- persons are required to pay to participate in the arrangement
- in the course of the arrangement one or more prizes are allocated to one or more members of a class; and the prizes are allocated by a process which relies wholly on chance.
(A raffle which involves the sale of tickets for a prize is a simple lottery)
A complex lottery is one where:
- persons are required to pay to participate in the arrangement
- in the course of the arrangement one or more prizes are allocated to one or more members of a class
- the prizes are allocated by a series of processes
- the first of those processes relies wholly on chance.
Please refer to the Lottery guidance factsheet, available to download below, for further information on whether your lottery is one which requires registration or whether it falls within one of the exemptions. Further information and advice is also available from the Gambling Commission website.
Applications for registration as a Small Society Lottery must be made on the prescribed form. You must also fill in an External Lottery Manager notification form as part of the application process. If you need any help in filling in the form please call us on 020 8753 1081.
Application form for registration and external lottery manager notification form (154KB pdf)
Lottery guidance factsheet (264KB pdf)
Registered Small Society Lotteries must send us a statement with the following information within three months of a draw taking place:
- date on which tickets were available for sale or supply and the date of the draw
- total proceeds of the lottery
- amounts deducted by promoters of the lottery in providing prizes, including rollovers
- amounts deducted by the promoters of the lottery in respect of costs incurred in organising the lottery
- the amount applied directly to the purpose for which the promoting society is conducted
- whether any expenses incurred in connection with the lottery were not paid for by deduction from the proceeds, and, if so, the amount of expenses and the sources from which they were paid.
The statement can submitted on the lottery returns form (pdf 131KB)