Official language: Dutch
Population: 16,440,113
Currency: Euro (EUR)

Current Exchange Rate
1 GBP = 1.0681 EUR
1 USD = 0.6754 EUR

Bingo in Netherlands
Bingo is popular in the Netherlands, but commercial games, or games played for personal profit, are illegal. The only legal bingo games that can be played are charity games. For many years, underground bingo halls operated throughout the Netherlands, but the Dutch police have slowly shut them down. The few halls in Amsterdam were the last to go – they were tolerated for many years, but today, there are no commercial bingo halls left.

Charity bingo in the Netherlands still thrives. The maximum prize for any game is €350. Since gambling tax on winnings (a huge 25%) is only applied to wins of €454 and up, bingo prizes are not taxable by law. There are several charity bingo halls in Amsterdam and in other cities throughout Netherlands.

Online Bingo in Netherlands
Online bingo in the Netherlands is not popular for several reasons. First, even though online gambling is legal there, players can only gamble at Dutch internet gambling sites. The government, however, has not given out any licenses to operate Dutch internet bingo sites or any other online gambling site. Even Holland Casino, which controls all gambling in the country, had their request for a license denied in 2008 by the Dutch Senate.

While the EU is trying to force the Dutch government to do something about the gambling monopoly they run, there is not much to be done in the mean time. In fact, the Dutch government leads one of the most proactive campaigns against illegal internet gambling in the world. They do not want Dutch players using foreign sites and try very hard to stop it. It still happens – Dutch players spend millions of euros every year at foreign internet gambling sites – so players who really want to play online bingo games will find a way.