Lotteries toolkit
This lottery toolkit contains advice, quick guides and case studies to help you in your regulatory responsibilities.
Small society lotteries do not require a licence from us but must be registered with their local authority in the area where the principal office of the society is located.
You should provide details of requirements, procedures and application forms for registration.
Society lotteries are lotteries promoted for the benefit of a non-commercial society. A society is non-commercial if it is established and conducted:
- for charitable purposes
- for the purpose of enabling participation in, or of supporting, sport, athletics or a cultural activity
- for any other non-commercial purpose other than that of private gain.
A small society lottery:
- does not have proceeds that exceed £20,000 for a single draw
- does not have aggregated proceeds from lotteries in excess of £250,000 in any one year.
GLA: Part 34 - Small society lotteries
Lotteries that exceed the small society lottery limit
You should inform a society that they must apply for an operating licence from us if, in the course of running a small society lottery:
- proceeds exceed £20,000 for a single draw
- aggregated proceeds from lotteries exceed £250,000 in any one year.
You should also inform us in writing and supply a copy of the statement relating to the lottery
Small society lotteries: changes to draw dates
If a registered small society lottery needs to change the date of their draw they must contact you to check if you have specific terms and conditions you must adhere to.
If they put back the date of the draw, it will need to take place as soon as practically possible.
They must make every attempt to notify those who have purchased tickets in the lottery/raffle of the change to the draw date. The notification may be through a number of channels including email, a telephone/text message, their website, newsletter and local newspaper.
External lottery managers
Registered societies may employ an external lottery manager (ELM) to run all or part of their lottery. ELMs must be licensed by us.