Belgium Agrees to Restrict Weekly Gambling Deposits to $203

The Belgium Gaming Commission has confirmed a highly-controversial decision to reduce the weekly depositing limit at gambling platforms to only €200 ($203) weekly, down from €500 ($508) presently. The new measure will come into effect in October 2022 and is part of the country’s broader ambitions to regulate the industry.

Weekly Deposit Limits in Belgium to Be Just €200

The Belgium Gaming Commission website has already made the relevant publications that will introduce this new ruling as a law come the designated commencement date. The measure is applied to customers based on their last seven days of spending rather than an astronomical week.

If a player wishes to bet more than €200 weekly, they will have to ask their operators to increase the limits manually. This may only be done if the operator carries out deeper affordability checks that some have feared are too invasive. Those checks may push many customers into the offshore gambling market.

The operators will have to check with the National Bank of Belgium Central Individual Credit Register to see if the consumer has defaulted on payments, for example. In other words, debtors would not be allowed to have their gambling limit expanded. Limits are only increased if this condition is met and after a three-day mandatory hold period.

However, the Gambling Commission will continue to carry out regular checks to ensure that players who have had their limits increased have not ended up as debtors as a result of this. Essentially, Belgium hopes that this middle-ground measure will enable gamblers to spend more provided that they qualify under the new safeguards. This way, the country hopes to limit gambling-related harm.