Home » OCW News » September 2009 » ASA Orders Halt of Betfair Email Poker Ads

ASA Orders Halt of Betfair Email Poker Ads

Date published: 23 September 2009

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The UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has been busy of late responding to complaints against gambling companies. Earlier this month the UK National Lottery was rapped on the knuckles, and last week it was the turn of online betting exchange, Betfair, for a 'misleading' poker email.

Betfair's poker email was deemed to be misleading as it contained a quote from top-rated Swedish poker player, Annette Obrestad, which may have suggested that she was 15 years old as opposed to her true age of 20. The confusion stemmed from the fact that her quote was signed with her online nickname, Annette_15.

According to the complaint lodged with the ASA, people who received the email promoting Betfair's online poker facilities may have misread the player's quote and thought that she was actually 15, and was thus irresponsible in that it might actually serve to encourage children and young people to gamble online.

The quote that appeared in the Betfair poker email campaign appeared as: 'Online experience is measured in games, not years. Join the new breed. Annette_15.'

The ASA upheld the complaint against Betfair and issued the following response: 'We considered that Ms. Obrestad's online handle (nickname) in the advert, 'Annette_15', together with text stating 'online experience is measured in game, not years', implied that Ms. Obrestad was even younger than she was (aged 20).

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'Because of that, we concluded the ad was likely to have particular appeal to children and young people, and that, by representing a successful young poker player with the implication she was 15 years old, it could encourage young people to gamble and was therefore irresponsible.'

As a result of its findings, the ASA informed Betfair that the email ad must not be sent out again in its current form and that it had a great responsibility to ensure that no one who is, or appears to be, under the age of 25 appears in any of its advertising, branding or marketing campaigns in Great Britain going forward.

Although Betfair disagreed with the ASA's ruling, the online gambling firm did apologize for featuring Obrestad and gave them its assurance that she would not be featured in its campaigns again. Interestingly, Betfair's also sponsors poker pros Sorel Mizzi and John Tabatabai, both of whom are under the age of 25.