Machines on 2p and 10p coin, and 20p coin?

[pennymachines]

Nobody will be taking the GC to court because laws have been passed dictating what the process is.

Well, as I said, you could if you had the time, courage and resources - and were convinced your interpretation of the Gambling Act was better than theirs!
Pub chain Greene King challenged the Commission in court last year. Guess who won...

I asserted earlier that a machine which never pays more than the original stake is not classed as a gaming machine. Delving further into the Gambling Act 2005, I'm not sure this is correct. It would be exempt from Machines Game Duty, but I see nothing which explicitly excludes it from the Act's definition of a gambling machine. A training in law is required to fully understand the legislation and common sense is no substitute.

The legislation says that if a spring snaps on your 1930s Allwin Deluxe, you may be able to apply for a £25 single machine permit (instead of a gaming machine technical operating licence) in order to legally replace it. When the Gambling Commission receive your application they, "will carry out checks to ensure that you qualify for a single machine permit".

As BP says, the GC regulates but doesn't create the regulations. They invited some of us to meet them in 2013 because they were sympathetic to our plight and sought some accommodation to free themselves and ourselves from the burden of pointless bureaucracy. They recognised the legislation was hostile to operators and collectors of vintage slot machines as an accident of its catch-all drafting and seemed to think there might be a way forward. Apparently they concluded that nothing short of an Act of Parliament could solve the impasse, because our correspondence ceased. After that, to borrow BP's metaphor, we were disinclined to poke the tiger to see if it was asleep.

[malcymal]

Mm seems some things are changing? Not looked into what you put PM but did notice no tax if prize is less than that staked ie a polo sweet allwin on 20p play should be ok? The packets of mint polos are 10 tubes a pound at many shops. Also excludes domestic use which is sensible. Penny type cranes should be ok.with cheap under the stake prizes. Is this why many of the seaside arcade machines now only pay out tickets for a future prize...you need hundreds of tickets for a little silly prize?

Regarding tickets, talking with a couple of arcade owners in local area, the move to tickets was not for any tax incentive. It was mainly about attitude of players, in particular families and the downturn of people going into arcades as feeling cheated. My friend Dean, owner of Pagham Amusements, told me once he was rather disheartened that a lady said to him, "You never win anything in a place like this, no reward of anything", which is why you see kids, mums and dads shovelling buckets of 2ps into coin pushers to win plastic toys, bundles of tickets on the playfield etc., not to win 2ps but to knock off something tangible to give the illusion of winning. We played ticket machines at the weekend, won about 2000 and swapped them for some cheap money box probably costing less than a quid, but of course likely paid over a tenner to get the tickets; operator profit is higher. The changes in law nearly crippled Dean as a few years back the tax was based on the profit but then it changed to the coin entering machine regardless of profit.

[tammy]

Thank you pennymachines for your reply which was very well and clearly put. It's a shame nothing tangible as yet came of that meeting but probably helped put some foundations for the future. I personally are now sceptical about meetings of high officials, after being at a couple myself. They often can have one person that seems sympathetic to your cause on the table, but afterwards you realise it was all decided before you went there and just to make you think you were being heard... It's the bad guy, good guy setup to fool you. I do hope something comes of it... It might be a good time to now sympathetically keep pestering them before the fire goes cold??

Enjoyed the last letter too, about the tickets put out of machines... makes you wonder if a few sweet allwins might be the answer. I have a beautiful six sided allwin with 1 central cashbox. It has 3 different win a sweets ie polos, chocolate bars and a nice win a chew converted to the little chocolate Neapolitans that you get in restaurants. The other 3 sides are various win coins. A number of them already just seem to work either with old penny or 10p and the others would convert with a bit of cardboard were coin comes into machine. I made it sectional a number of years ago because of its size and put a light in it so all the topflashes light up. Might sell in near future, but wouldn't be cheap.

[coppinpr]

Three or four years ago, if you remember, we did manage to get quite a high ranking MP (who collected machines himself) to make an attempt on our behalf at a time when the Gov was looking at getting rid of obsolete laws to save money. He did manage to push our cause to the highest level of the dept involved but we eventually got a letter from the minister involved to say there was already provision in place to accommodate us...the single machine licence. In other words they didn't even bother to work out what we were asking for.

[badpenny]

In short.
The GC is the keeper of laws passed by act of parliament.

To change those laws would require another act of parliament. The PM and her cabinet have rather a lot on their plate at the moment, consequently no ministry is going to adopt our cause, even if they wanted to (which they don't).

The other way is a private members' bill. Forgetting for the moment most private members' bills rarely get to the required number of hearings in order to be merely heard, let alone adopted. And recently they couldn't even get an essential one regarding upskirting through …… we have no chance.

It would be next to impossible to get an MP to act on our problem (as coppinpr quoted above, even a fellow collector was only prepared to pass it on to someone else in the relevant department). And why would it be next to impossible to get an MP to act on our problem?

Because any MP's interest is only the next election and their success in it. So they need to keep the people who elect them happy, and that's not us.

In the whole of the UK there's probably no more than a few hundred of us, not the hundreds of thousands to warrant a change.

We all live in different constituencies, so are not even voting for the same MP.

Any MP who backed us about something which was not for the greater good of their own constituents would lose their seat when their own electorate dumped them for doing so.

In my view the only liklihood of a favourable change in the law (for us) would be if The GC were to be restructured, probably due to not being fit for purpose. That might happen if new technology or demands on their services threatened their ability to adapt to a new threat in the industry. A refocus on their core activity might cause them to propose to their paymasters that a better use of resources would be stop fanning around chasing wooden boxes with a ball bearing in them and use the staff to better use.

However I'm not holding my breath as ……..
I'm not aware of any future threats to The GC's core activity.
Even if any do come along, issuing those £25 a pop one off licences is still an income stream and are probably quite profitable being only half a day's work every month.

BP

[tammy]

WHERE THERES A WILL THERES AWAY!
I personaly myself wouldn't get too involved quoting laws. When peoples attitudes and thoughts change, things in life can happen over night. I am now in retirement and have seen it many times over my years. Even from goverments, once they want to really do something, they can cut all the red tape and make something happen. Teachers at schools with their rules once they see something different, often take a completely different approach.
Its happening with the mass new housing approach in our country, things seem to be swept to one side. Whether this is a good thing or not, when you look at many of of the areas that will be built on.
Brexit and the EU..if the EU wanted it to happen then things could be sorted out in days..for were theres a will theres a way, but sadely the EU they just seem to use rules as excuses.
Many people in life get the rules belt for them at times, especially when people feel something is right.
I will put this as my last comment on this subject.
Happy Collecting!