Raffle, tombola or prize draw: what the words actually mean
Most people use the three words interchangeably, and most of the time that does no harm. But the law doesn't use any of them. The Gambling Act 2005 says an arrangement is a lottery "irrespective of how it is described", so renaming your raffle a prize draw changes nothing. What changes things is three questions, and this page answers them for each word.
It covers England, Wales and Scotland, where the Gambling Act applies. Northern Ireland has its own law.
The three questions that decide it
- Does anyone pay to enter?If not, it isn't a lottery at all. If they do, it is one, whatever it's called.
- Are the prizes won by chance?A draw, a drum or a wheel is chance. So is a "skill" question almost everybody gets right: the Act treats a question that wouldn't stop a significant proportion of people as chance too.
- Where and when are tickets sold, and by whom? This decides which of the lottery exemptions you fit, and whether you need to register with your council.
Prize draw
In everyday use a prize draw usually means one that is free to enter: a brand giveaway, a survey incentive, a staff thank you. A genuinely free draw isn't a lottery, so the Gambling Act doesn't apply and there's nothing to register. If you're a business, the advertising rules still do, including the requirement to pick winners at random and keep evidence that you did.
Two things turn a prize draw back into a lottery:
- Charging for entry.A charity "prize draw" at £2 a ticket is a lottery, exactly like a raffle.
- A free route that isn't really free.If there's a paid way in and a free one, the free one must be by ordinary post or something no more expensive and no less convenient than paying, it must be publicised so entrants are likely to see it, and free entries must be treated exactly like paid ones in the draw.
If you're running a free one, there's a free terms and conditions generator and a guide to picking the winner fairly.
Raffle
A raffle almost always means paid, numbered tickets with the stubs drawn later, often from a hat or a bucket. Because people pay and win by chance, a raffle is always a lottery. The word tells you nothing about which rules apply. Where and when you sell the tickets does.
| How the raffle runs | What it is legally |
|---|---|
| Tickets sold only at an event, while it's running | Incidental lottery. No registration, within the limits below. |
| Tickets sold beforehand or online by a charity, club or society | Small society lottery. Register with your council first. |
| Sold only to colleagues at the same workplace | Work lottery. Conditions here. |
| Sold only to members of a private club or society | Private society lottery. |
| Run by a business for its customers, on its premises | Customer lottery. Can't be used for fundraising or profit. |
The first two cover almost every community raffle, and the guide to the rules goes through them properly.
Tombola
A tombola is usually a stall: you buy a ticket from a drum and win straight away if its number matches one on a prize. It's still a lottery, because you pay and win by chance. The Gambling Commission's own example of an event lottery is a tombola in the interval of a community theatre's Christmas panto.
The reason tombolas rarely cause trouble is that they almost always fit the incidental lottery exemption without anyone trying: tickets are sold at the event, by definition. The conditions are:
Incidental lottery
- It runs alongside an event, commercial or not, but isn't the main reason for holding it.
- Tickets are sold only on the premises, while the event is taking place.
- It's run wholly for a purpose other than private gain: the school, the church roof, the club's kit.
- No more than £500 of the takings goes on buying prizes, and no more than £100 on costs. Donated prizes cost you nothing, so they don't use up the £500.
- No rollover: nothing carried forward to a later draw.
The same conditions explain why there's no such thing as an online tombola under this exemption. Once tickets are sold anywhere other than at the event, it's a different kind of lottery.
The other words people use
- Lucky dip. Pay, rummage, win something by chance. The same analysis as a tombola.
- Sweepstake.Pay to be given a horse or a team at random. That's a lottery too; the Gambling Commission's example is an office Grand National sweepstake run as a work lottery, which can raise money for a good cause or simply pay out in prizes, but can't make a profit.
- 50/50 draw. Half the takings to the winner, half to the club. Still a raffle in law, with a particular trap when tickets go on sale early.
- Competition.A genuine test of skill, judgement or knowledge that a real share of people would fail isn't a lottery. A question with an obvious answer tacked onto a paid draw is.
Six real examples, sorted
| What people call it | What it is |
|---|---|
| Tombola stall at the summer fair | Incidental lottery. Nothing to register. |
| Raffle at the club's annual dinner, tickets sold on the night | Incidental lottery. Nothing to register. |
| PTA "prize draw", £2 a ticket through an online link, drawn at the fair | Small society lottery. Register with the council first. |
| Free Instagram giveaway run by a café | Free prize draw. No Gambling Act, but the advertising rules apply. |
| Office Grand National sweepstake | Work lottery, if everyone works on the same premises. |
| "Competition" with a paid entry and the question "what colour is the sky?" | A lottery. The question doesn't count as skill. |
Where Prize Desk fits
Prize Desk never takes money, so it doesn't change which of these you're running. Whatever you call it, it can collect entries through one link, draw the winners on a wheel with a cryptographic random number generator, issue a certificate recording how the draw was made, and let each winner pick their own prize from what's left. It's free and needs no account.
Sources, checked for this page: the Gambling Act 2005 section 14 for what a lottery is, Schedule 2 for free entry routes, Schedule 11 for the exempt lotteries, as amended by the Exempt Lotteries Order 2016, the Incidental Lotteries Regulations 2016 for the £500 and £100 limits, and the Gambling Commission on lotteries you can run without a licence.