Aus FB group being investigated for raffles

Fresh off the presses an aus fb group is being investigated by an government agency. This agency is a proper authority and not a can kicker.

www.vcglr.vic.gov.au/

www.vcglr.vic.gov.au/gambling-and-gambling-related-offences

Penalties can include:

  • 2 years imprisonment
  • 100 penalty units (18k)

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I hope other Razz groups take notice. This was bound to happen eventually.

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Taking bets on how this goes.

DM for details.

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Two randoms pls. Thx

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Iā€™ll take ā€œNothing will changeā€ for $20

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AU Facebook groups are obsessed with raffles, itā€™s bizarre. They will often grossly overvalue items too. Was recently seeing tins of soda with Pokemon print on them being raffled off at $2 a spot, with 10 spots available, when the sellers were picking them up for $2 ea at their local Asian grocer.

The best part about these practises, is that as soon as someone calls out their bs, youā€™re labeled a ā€˜haterā€™, or problematic for not ā€˜spreading positivityā€™.

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I donā€™t use Facebook and Iā€™ve only just recently got round to starting up a separate Instagram for Pokemon stuff - I had no idea of the extent of this whole raffle thing until I started following some other Pokemon accounts on Instagram. Itā€™s quite insane.

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Could Mystery Boxes be next?

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Lmaoooooo man I felt this one coming. Gotta love Australian double standards though. Google ā€œmatch fixing Australiaā€ thereā€™s dozens of scandals related to this from Soccer to eSports betting. So tough and regulated on all things betting and gambling, yet theyā€™re one of the only, if not THE only, Western country that allows solicitation and customer service for online gambling sites lol. Every major online bookie or slot site has their customer service call centers out in Melbourne and Sidney lol. Anyways this was bound to happen, it was getting out of hands and everyone thinks flipping Pokemon cards and running IG ā€œstoresā€ are all happyland until the tax man comes knocking on your door. Thatā€™s the next step when some people get a nice lesson on capital gains and taxes :blush:

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Hmm, I dont see what is wrong with it, I would never gamble on like poker or roulette or raffles for that matter. But if you would want to take part what is wrong with it?

Nah doubt it, bundled third-party products are legal as is. BUT, MJ Holdings and all the other guys who repack stuff follow strict guidelines in terms of packaging and labeling and respecting licensing agreements. I guess maybe The Pokemon Company might crack down on Mystery Boxes for being unlicensed, but I donā€™t think the products break any or enough regulations to force the Gaming commissions to get involvedā€¦

Itā€™s gambling and gambling is regulated. Plain and simple lol. Unless youā€™re selling raffle products for or under a licensed charity or non profit, you and I canā€™t go out collecting 10$ from 1000 people every week and guaranteeing 10 prizes a week and pocketing the difference, even if we did everything by the book and paid the appropriate taxes and suchā€¦

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Itā€™s unregulated, unlicensed gambling.

Casinos are heavily regulated to ensure that the house edge isnā€™t so extreme that itā€™s impossible to win. With no regulation in place, the host of a raffle could just walk away with the money, directly award the item(s) to their friend or some alt account, or include so many tickets that they make an absolute fortune whilst the chance of anyone winning becomes impossibly small. Regulations exist to prevent things like that from happening.

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Aussie raffles have always been rip offs to locals anyway, just because of import fees and lack of supply here on product seems to drive greed. Iā€™ve seen many ā€œunweighed by meā€ packs go for prices over box fresh unweighed and close to heavy weight prices.

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Seems logical, thanks for explaining. I am not really into gambling so I did not know it was this heavily regulated.

Makes me remember the banning of loot boxes in games here in Belgium, and the discussion about card packs being gambling for kids

Iā€™ve started kicking around on Instagram and I couldnā€™t believe all the raffles! Would assume itā€™s only a matter of time before that gets noticed by governments.

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good thing, i literally unfollow every single user that does this stuff. I still remember like 2 years ago when someone named SchoolBoyChad scammed thousands of dollars out of this procedureā€¦

I dont get how people continue to join them, jesusā€¦

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