A new study has shown that two bingo clubs on average are closing each month in the UK and in the last five years the country has lost 152 bingo clubs at the detriment of local communities. The research also show that profits have taking a significant downturn since the smoking ban in July 2007.

In addition to declining admissions following the change in legislation preventing customers smoking inside, the industry had to deal with low revenues as smokers spent bingo breaks outside rather than spending money in gaming machines and cash bingo games. According to the data fruit machine revenues declined by around one third to £575 million, however some of this decline would have been down to changes in legislation making certain machines not lawful in bingo clubs.

The report suggests that five years ago the UK had 678 bingo clubs and this has fallen to 526 with 25 closing last year.

Accountants Ernst & Young have suggested that even more clubs are now closer to the 1,000 visits per week “tipping point” and further declines in admissions could result in them closing.

According to the report industry profits have gone from £250 million in 2006 to £125 million last year. In the same period bingo players at land based clubs have also halved to 2.5 million players.

At the time of the smoking ban there were many industry experts predicting that a lot more clubs would close especially given the increased competition in online bingo and the subsequent changes in the tax laws. Therefore as the industry has seen less than a 25 percent decline in the clubs over the last five years and there were clubs that would have closed anyhow regardless of the smoking ban things are not as bad as they may have been. Lets not forget there were clubs closing each year prior to 2007. I wonder in five years time how many online bingo sites will have closed down? If they find themselves having to pay 20% tax and adhere to the strict constraints of the Gambling Commission more than half will close over night no doubt.

Paul Talboys of the Bingo Association suggests that bingo clubs cannot attract punters with big jackpots because profits are taxed more than other gambling.

Talboys claims cutting tax would save ¬thousands of jobs however realistically in the current economic climate the government are unlikely to make any tax concessions. The industry can only unite and hope that the government review the tax structure so that online bingo face similar licensing and tax obligations as land based bingo clubs.

According to the Conservative MP Brian Binley: “Tax policy discriminates against bingo.”

On a positive note land based clubs are up beat about the future with many clubs reporting a positive start to 2011. In addition there have been significant acquisitions recently within the industry and it would seem there are plenty of interested parties to acquire UK bingo clubs going forwards.