One of the first things every direct marketing manager learns is that competitions and free draws are useful promotional tools. However, they must be framed in such a way that they cannot be labelled "illegal lotteries" by nit-picking guardians of the public good.
A law banning such lotteries was introduced aeons ago to stop the poor spending more than they could afford on entering privately run draws that they only had the remotest chance of winning. And, of course, that legislation is still required today because although it is now OK for people to spend more than they can afford on a draw they have only the remotest chance of winning, the lottery we have is a state-run enterprise and the Treasury doesn't want any rivals.
You may or may not have read the small print of the Gambling Act 2005, which comes into effect in a year's time. I confess I haven't. But it seems our legislators were concerned that the existing law was a bit muddled about the distinctions between lotteries, prize competitions and free draws.
Officially, the difference is that a competition should require the winners to demonstrate some level of skill.
Now, it's true that the amount of skill required to enter some competitions hovers just above the zero mark. Personally, I suspect GCSE examination board specialists are hired to devise questions absolutely everybody will get right.
What the new Act says, however, is that in a properly run competition, the skill element must be sufficient either to deter a significant proportion of the target audience from entering or to eliminate a significant proportion of those who do. Whereas most marketers, when devising a competition, probably want to maximise responses.
The Gambling Commission is charged with monitoring the situation. Its current thinking is that organisers should know their target audiences well enough to be able estimate how many of them have a propensity to enter competitions. This may require some market research.
It is understood the commission has its eye on the inane prize contests run by certain television programmes and that require entrants to phone in on premium lines. It may be correct to suspect that these are little more than the illegal lotteries it wants to eliminate. However, it should resist the temptation to bring in catch-all regulations that add costs and red tape to the relatively harmless area of promotional marketing. Common sense may prevail, but would you bet on it?
Ken Gofton is a freelance journalist who has covered the marketing industry for more than two decades.