Westpac Group, one of the largest banks in Australia, has added more functionalities to its digital gambling block feature in order to provide its customers with more ways to suspend their gambling transactions in real-time. Under the most recent changes, the bank’s digital feature will become available for more than two million personal debit card customers of BankSA, St. George and Bank of Melbourne.
Earlier in 2021, Westpac officially announced the launch of app functionality that offered its customers the opportunity to suspend themselves from making deposits to online gambling platforms. The new feature, which was unveiled in April 2021, came as part of the Aussie bank’s efforts to help the authorities tackle the spread of problem gambling online.
Catherine Fitzpatrick, the Director of Customer Vulnerability and Financial Resilience at Westpac, explained that the new digital feature will make sure customers are provided with support when they need it most. Ms Fitzpatrick further noted that the gambling payment block functionality of the bank’s mobile application has already been turned on by more than 30,000 customers since it was rolled out in April.
Problem gambling remains a serious problem in communities around Australia, especially with the lengthy lockdowns that took part because of the coronavirus pandemic. During the lockdown periods, a significant increase in online gambling participation rates has been registered, so the new digital feature provides the bank’s customers with better and more flexible management options for their gambling expenditures in real-time.
Gambling Payment Block Feature Already Used More Than 30,000 Times, Westpac Says
Westpac further revealed that during the latest updates of the bank’s app, a gambling block is now applied to all of its underaged debit card holders by default in an effort to help the bank prevent underage gambling.
Financial Counselling Australia’s Director of Policy and Campaigns, Lauren Levin, explained that an increasing number of people in Australia have become worried about both their financial state and gambling habits at the time of the coronavirus pandemic. She confirmed that the Covid-19 crisis and the extensive closures of brick-and-mortar venues have resulted in a rise in gambling participation rates, so the implementation of a gambling transaction block is an excellent idea.
Ms Levin further noted that recent research found that the more often a person participates in gambling activities, the bigger the risk of becoming addicted to gambling. According to her, this is what makes the bank gambling block feature an excellent tool for people who are worried about the scale of their gambling.
As revealed by Westpac at the time it rolled out its gambling block functionality, the new option is available on both personal debit and credit cards. In order to activate the feature, they need to enter the Card Services menu or simply call the bank’s Customer Care team. At the time when the Aussie bank announced the implementation of the new gambling block feature, it revealed that more than 2,500 of its customers have already used it.
- Author
Olivia Cole
