The Governments 2025 budget has been announced, and whatever else you thought about it, it’s good news for the bingo industry.
The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, announced that the 10% bingo levy is to be scrapped from April 2026 onwards. That means bingo operators in the UK will only have to pay the levy one final time before it is abolished.
It was a mixed bag for the gambling industry in general, and I will fill you in on the details and what it means for the bingo industry below.
Bingo Halls Come Out On Top
While remote gaming duty is being ramped up to 40% from April 2026 and remote betting tax increasing to 25% from April 2027, high street bingo halls had much better news.
The bingo levy, which was reduced to 10% by George Osborne in 2014 and held there ever since, has been done away with entirely.
For the 2024/25 financial year this raised over £25 million for the UK government, so it’s a huge cost saving for bingo businesses up and down the country.
Bingo halls will still have to pay tax on profits from other game types, but any profits from income generated by in person bingo games will be safe from the bingo levy from the start of the 2026/27 financial year.
They will still have to pay corporation tax, but they will effectively be 10% better off when it comes to bingo related revenue. Any money made from gaming machines on the premises will still be subject to standard machine game duties.
Online Bingo Not So Lucky
This latest budget took direct aim at online gambling while attempting to limit the impact on non-remote and retail businesses.
That means online bingo sites had a much worse time of it.
All of their products are classed as remote gaming, so all profits made by online bingo sites – regardless of whether they were made from online bingo games or online casino games – will be taxed at the new 40% rate from 2026.
This is a huge jump from the 21% they were paying before, and online bingo players might notice a reduction in the quality of offers as a result – although it’s still way too early to say for sure.
The new rules will definitely cost online bingo companies more money though, and they will have to adapt somehow in order to deal with the added financial burden.
Remember, this doesn’t just apply to their bingo profits, but to their slots, their table games, live casino games, Slingo, scratch cards – everything.
Why the Difference?
It might seem unfair that one side of the industry has been given what amounts to a tax cut while the other has had their tax bill almost doubled.
Rachel Reeves explained that her approach was to target online gambling over in person gambling, because that is where the biggest issues come from in relation to problem gambling.
It’s also the side of the industry that is making the most money.
In person venues like bingo halls, betting shops, and high street casinos have been struggling in recent times, as people increasingly choose to stay home and gamble online.
Bingo halls in particular were closing at an alarming rate and scrapping the 10% levy is another way to help stabilise that side of the industry and hopefully reverse the high street bingo decline.