Responsible Gambling: Help in Your Province

Slots are built to return less than they take over time. That is not a secret; it is how the maths of every game on this site works. Treating play as paid entertainment, with a budget you choose in advance, keeps it that way. When it stops being entertainment, help in Canada is free and confidential, and the services below are the ones whose details we could confirm from public sources.

Ontario: ConnexOntario

ConnexOntario is funded by Ontario's Ministry of Health and answers 24 hours a day, free of charge, for mental health, addiction and problem gambling. Call 1-866-531-2600, text CONNEX to 247247 or use the chat on its website. It serves people in Ontario; residents of other provinces have their own lines below. OLG's PlaySmart site (playsmart.ca) also has responsible gambling information and budgeting tools, and points to ConnexOntario.

British Columbia

The Gambling Support BC Line is 1-888-795-6111. BCLC's GameSense Advisors can also be reached through BCLC Customer Support at 1-877-706-6789.

Quebec

Jeu : aide et référence answers at 1-800-461-0140.

Other provinces

We have not been able to verify the help lines and self-exclusion programs for Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and the Atlantic provinces, so we do not print numbers we cannot stand behind. Your provincial lottery corporation's responsible gambling pages list local services. Wherever you are, Gambling Therapy offers free online support for gambling problems in many languages, and Gamblers Anonymous runs meetings worldwide.

Warning signs

• Spending more time or money than you planned, more than once.
• Chasing losses by raising stakes or playing longer.
• Borrowing, using money meant for bills, or hiding play from people close to you.
• Feeling restless or irritable when you try to cut down.
• Thinking about gambling when you are doing other things.

One or two of these is a reason to pause and set firmer limits. Several together are a reason to talk to one of the services above.

Practical limits that work

Set a monthly entertainment budget in CAD and a deposit limit to match it in your account settings. Add a session time limit; slots, especially with autoplay, make time disappear. Never play to recover a loss, and never play when you are upset, tired or have been drinking. Keep gambling separate from savings and from credit.

Self-exclusion

If you need a longer break, Ontario's BetGuard program excludes you from every regulated Ontario site with one registration. Elsewhere, self-exclusion is arranged with the operator or the lottery corporation. Our self-exclusion page explains the options and terms.

Protecting minors

Gambling sites are for adults only. If children use your devices, keep casino accounts logged out, do not save passwords in the browser and consider parental-control software that blocks gambling sites.

Frequently asked questions