Raffles on facebook?

Watch_with_Mother

Ive seen a few pages on facebook doing this, the prizes are actual items and not money usually. They usually have about 100 numbers and people pay per number then they use a random number generator to select the winner. I was wondering if it is legal to do this? Ive looked online and cant find a very clear answer. I dont know if it would be legal to do this on my facebook business page and I wouldnt want to get into any trouble.

Scarpacci

I've never heard of such a thing running on Facebook myself.

Anyway, according to Facebook rules all giveaways and contests have to be run within an app on Facebook. They can't be based on people liking a page or a post or commenting. The winners also must be contacted outside of Facebook. So their rules may pose a problem, although a lot of companies do tend to ignore these.

I think the fact people are paying for entry to a random draw with no skill involves would mean this is a lottery. I don't think it would be legal to run without the relevant license.

paddyrg

I would also challenge how random a random number generator was...

LianneCarlaS

Breaks Facebooks rules (when they find people they shut down the whole page but there are so many pages a lot don't get found) and there are laws on gambling.

patman99

Facebook is based in the USA, so UK Law does not apply. However, US Law does, and over there it is not legal to run or access online 'gambling' sites. Facebook will more than likely shut-down such sites quickly in order to avoid yet another costly pay-out.

simplydevine05

It is classed as gambling and UK Facebook has to follow UK rules and it isn't allowed. There are a lot of rules about running give aways and competitions on Facebook, for example you cannot ask people to like your page in order to enter, but there are thousands of businesses doing just that. If you get caught though you will be removed.

Scarpacci

patman99 wrote: »

Facebook is based in the USA, so UK Law does not apply. However, US Law does, and over there it is not legal to run or access online 'gambling' sites. Facebook will more than likely shut-down such sites quickly in order to avoid yet another costly pay-out.

But the UK-based Facebook user will still be running an illegal lottery here, so UK law does apply to the user. Essentially, any promotion run on Facebook from this country really should be set-up to comply with both UK and US law.