Financial limit prompts

Why the prompt arrives before you have deposited

The obligation is RTS 12A, and it is not subtle. A customer must be "prompted to set a financial limit as early as possible." For most people, that means the dialogue appears during registration or immediately after it, well before any money leaves a bank account. The Gambling Commission wants the question asked while the customer is still sober about the commitment, not after a losing streak has set in.

Operators do not get to bury the prompt on a settings page three clicks deep, either. RTS 12C requires that the link for setting a limit be "clearly visible and accessible" on both the homepage and the deposit screens. If you are topping up, the route to the limit is meant to be on the same page. The aim is to make the friction of setting a ceiling lower than the friction of ignoring it.

Free text, not a dropdown

One of the sharper changes sits in RTS 12B: "financial limits must only be offered using free text." That bans the practice of presenting a menu of pre-set amounts. An operator cannot steer a player towards £50, £100, £250 and hope the lowest figure goes unclicked. You type the number yourself, whatever it is, and the limit applies across your whole account with that operator. The same requirement makes clear that the ceiling is account-level, so every product under that brand's licence — slots, sportsbook, live casino — falls under the single number. If you set £30, you have £30 across the lot.

The free-text rule will shift again. From 30 September 2026, RTS 12B extends to gross deposit limits and a hard block on further deposits once the limit is reached. That block is not instantaneous in every case, though: the standard 24-hour cooling-off period applies, meaning an increase you request today still takes a full day before cash can flow again.

A decrease is immediate; an increase is not

This is the one that matters if someone is trying to pull themselves back. RTS 12D states plainly that "all customer requests to decrease a financial limit must be actioned immediately." You hit the lower number, and the system must tighten the valve at once. No cooling-off window, no delay. A player who decides mid-session that enough is enough can bring the ceiling down and be protected from their own next impulse.

Raising a limit is the opposite. The 24-hour cooling-off rule means a request to loosen the restriction is never fulfilled on the day it is made. That asymmetry is deliberate. It gives the operator no room to present an increase as a casual click, and it gives the customer a night to reconsider. For some people, that single day is the difference between a manageable loss and a disastrous one.

The six-month review, and your own reminder

Even after a limit is set, the system does not go quiet. RTS 12D also requires operators to prompt every customer to review their limit at least once every six months. The customer can choose a shorter interval if they want more frequent nudges. That means the prompt you see today is not a one-off gate; it will reappear, and you can set its rhythm.

The operator cannot switch off the reminder cadence, and the customer cannot be opted into a longer gap than six months. If you want a review every month, you can have it. If you leave it at the maximum, the site still has to ask again by the time half a year has passed.

Opting out is an action, not a default

RTS 12E closes off a loophole operators used to exploit. Setting a limit must be presented as the default path. Opting out requires an active choice by the customer, not a pre-ticked box that skips the whole thing. And for any account that does not have a limit, the operator must prompt a review at least once a year. Silence is not an option.

The clock on the annual prompt started on 31 October 2025. Anyone who has been playing without a ceiling since then will eventually see the nudge, and they will have to make an active decision to stay unlimited. The Commission's language makes clear that "opting out requires an action by the customer." Passivity keeps you in the limit-setting flow.