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Managing Online Gambling Debt: Strategies and Support

Although offshore online gambling has been available to Canadians for some time, the arrival of legal online gambling across Canada has ramped up to become a problem for many of those logging into the web to place bets virtually.   A recent piece in the West Island Blog by writer Joe Arazi commented that experts in the field are concerned many gamblers underestimate their losses while overestimating their wins. And one of the classic signs of problematic gambling is chasing losses.  This ties in with concerns that a gambling addiction often starts with overspending. The result is (understandably) psychological distress, relationship problems and financial strain. Even more interesting is the statistic cited that suggests online gambling is primarily male oriented — among the online gamblers in Canada, over 80 percent are men. Only 17.6 percent are women.

Addictive behavior, specifically online gambling addiction, is a difficult discussion to have with someone you have just met.  And when our Farber professionals meet with someone for the first time (during a free consultation) we must quickly determine what issues have been factors in the debt problems our client is grappling with.  Often, the obvious problematic behavior might appear to be a gambling addiction, with online gambling becoming more prevalent lately.  But the underlying problems are often more subtle and are only coaxed out after some serious conversation.  

An excellent example of this is a recent consultation one of our Trustees had with a debtor who attended his office for advice on tackling a large debt load.  After reviewing the person’s financial affairs, the individual was asked how he had managed to over-extend himself to the tune of more than $60,000 in lines of credit and credit card debt. The client admitted the reason for racking up the debt was an addiction to gambling, specifically, repeatedly visiting online gambling sites with the goal of winning big. On probing further, however, the client shared with the Trustee that the underlying reason he frequented online gambling sites was to cope with the grief of losing three close family members within a six-month period.  

How did this process play out?  Well, it was interesting.  One of the first steps our client took was to contact the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) at his place of employment.  His EAP is set up to assist employees with personal problems that might adversely impact their ability to fulfill their work responsibilities and might be affecting their overall health and well-being. The EAP staff referred him to a local counselling service to help deal with the grieving process and to prevent his grief from creating specific triggers that would cause further gambling episodes. Then, through qualified counselling, he was able to recognize he had a problem, and the necessary treatment was to somehow find out what was causing the propensity to gamble. 

Having received counselling to deal with the root cause of their personal gambling problem, he still found himself faced with over $60,000 of debt. And that is where our team of Farber professionals came in.

We knew we could assist in his financial recovery process. Instead of having to file a personal bankruptcy, we explained to him the benefits of filing a consumer proposal, which was a contract to settle his debt load. Once the consumer proposal was accepted by his creditors, he ended up paying a manageable monthly payment of $600 over a period of five years. 

Along with the filing of the consumer proposal, our client also took the following steps to aid in his recovery from gambling addiction:

  • Relinquished control of all credit card and lines of credit facilities (this was automatically done through the filing of the consumer proposal)
  • Installed anti-gambling software on his personal computer, and any kind of device (tablet or cell phone) that had internet access to any online gambling site
  • Implementation of a dual signature process for bank withdrawals on all personal accounts
  • Arranged for all employment income to go into a bank account controlled by his spouse
  • Learned to manage the triggers that drove him to the online gambling sites in the first place

The most important lesson we can learn from this example is that those caught in the trap of online gambling (or gambling in general) have resources available to assist them out of the debt hole they have found themselves in. 

Our team of Farber professionals will partner with you and assist you (or a loved one) who might be facing a comparable situation. Just click below to arrange a FREE CONSULTATION that will help you focus on strategies to deal with the debt, with the goal of helping you get back on-track financially.  

Posted

12th July 2016

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