Frequently Asked Questions

The Unity Lottery is a lottery platform which charities of all shapes and sizes can use to run their own fundraising lotteries. The Unity Lottery platform is administered by Sterling Management Centre Limited, a licensed External Lottery Manager (ELM) by the Gambling Commission.

The Unity platform enables charities and good causes to run their own weekly lottery costing £1 per entry, per week, to support their fundraising. The draw is run every Friday and each entry has the chance to win one of four amazing prizes, including the top prize of £25,000!

For every £1 played, at least 50p goes directly to the respective cause as profit. The other 50p is split between the prize pot and administration costs.

When players win a prize, this is covered by the Unity prize pot. This means that charities using Unity for their fundraising lotteries can offer a £25,000 jackpot and smaller prizes to their players.

Each £1 entry has a 1 in 63 chance of winning one of four fantastic prizes. Every entry in Unity has an equal chance of winning, no matter which charity is being supported or how many players that good cause has in their lottery.

Yes, every entry has an equal chance of winning, and the winning numbers are drawn at random.

For every £1 entry, players receive a unique 6-digit lottery number.

Every Friday, a winning number is drawn at random. Players must match the digits to win up to £25,000!

The lottery is a number match game. We generate a random 6-digit winning number sequence. If the player’s digits are in same positions as the digits in the winning number sequence, they win a prize!

For example, if the winning number sequence was 123456, the lottery number 163057 would be a 3-digit winning match; because 3 digits are positioned in the same place in the sequence.

3 digit match = 5 entries into the next draw*

4 digit match = £25

5 digit match = £1,000

6 digit match = £25,000

*If players would prefer to receive a £5 cash prize instead of 5 prize entries, they can opt for this by contacting the Unity helpline (0370 050 9240) or email address ([email protected]).

As all lottery administration is handled by Sterling Management Centre Limited, who provide the Unity Lottery platform, all lottery communications come from Unity.

You can view our lottery rules here. The purpose of these rules is to ensure that you are informed about the terms of playing your causes' lottery and to promote responsible gambling.

Yes. Charities and good causes operate their lotteries compliantly under licence from their local authority or the Gambling Commission, and all administration is handled by Sterling Management Centre Limited, a certified External Lottery Manager (ELM) with the Gambling Commission.

You can contact one of our friendly members of staff at the Unity Lottery helpline on 0370 050 9240 to discuss the lottery or your membership. (Lines are open 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday) calls are charged at your local rate.

Alternatively, you can contact Unity through our contact form.

The first thing to do is to choose the cause you would like to support! If you don’t know already, start here and find a cause to support.

Once you have selected your chosen cause, there are normally two ways to enter. From your cause's Unity lottery page, choose one of the following options:

• Enter online using Direct Debit or debit card payment
• Download a PDF sign up to print out and post to us using the freepost address if you wish to enter by Cheque. You can also use the PDF form to join by Direct Debit.

No. Your lottery number is randomly allocated when you sign up and stays with you for the duration of your membership in your chosen lottery. Once you have entered, you will be sent confirmation of your unique lottery number by post.

Yes. Each £1 lottery entry grants you 1 ‘chance’ to win a prize. In accordance to our commitment to responsible gambling however, we allow a maximum of 20 chances for each Friday draw. Please note that some lotteries stipulate a lower number of maximum chances.

The minimum age to enter a Unity lottery is 18.

If you are trying to submit your Direct Debit or Credit/Debit card details and you lose your internet connection, we advise you to contact our helpline on 0370 050 9240 to confirm if we have received your entry.

No. Unfortunately, Gift Aid cannot be claimed on funds raised through the lottery.

If you have signed up online, you will receive a welcome email which will detail confirmation of your entry into the lottery. From this point, or if you have signed up using a PDF sign up form, you will receive a confirmation letter within the next 21 days containing details of your lottery number(s) and our intent to claim funds if you have signed up by Direct Debit.

Once we have received your payment, you will be entered into each available weekly lottery draw as long as you have credit available against your lottery number.

Following registration, it is necessary to complete several administrative processes which include verifying your payment details with your bank, claiming the funds from your bank account and the funds being received.

The monthly cost breakdown of £4.34 for playing the lottery is based on paying £1 per week over a 52-week year. Direct Debits for this amount are collected once a month and sometimes there will be five weeks in a month, so the additional 34p is to build up credit to cover the fifth week in these instances.

The winning numbers are available every Friday afternoon here at www.UnityLottery.co.uk

There’s no need to claim any prizes if you win. We will send any winning cheques directly to your registered address! If you match 3 digits in the correct sequence, your winning prize of 5 additional entries will be automatically entered into the next lottery draw..

If you want to check your lottery numbers, you can contact our friendly helpline team on 0370 050 9240 (Lines are open 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday) calls are charged at your local rate.

If you want to cancel your lottery membership, please contact our friendly helpline team on 0370 050 9240 (Lines are open 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday) calls are charged at your local rate.

Yes. If you have changed your address, it is important that you notify us, otherwise, we won’t be able to send you your winning cheque. To inform us of an address change, please contact our friendly hotline team on 0370 050 9240 (Lines are open 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday) calls are charged at your local rate.

Responsible gambling means staying in control of how much time and money we spend on gambling. Responsible gambling means not spending more money or time than we can reasonably afford on gambling activities, keeping in mind all our other responsibilities in life.

To speak to someone about a gambling problem, contact the BeGambleAware confidential helpline on 0808 8020 133 or visit their website at www.gambleaware.co.uk for further information.

If you have any concerns, please get in touch with us on 0370 050 9240 or use our contact form, and we will endeavour to answer any queries you may have. (Lines are open 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday) calls are charged at your local rate.

If you feel you may be susceptible to gambling problems and would like to ask that you are excluded from the lottery, please download our self-exclusion policy.

Any good causes can set up a lottery using the Unity Lottery platform – if you would like to recommend Unity to a charity, please direct them to visit our website.

If you are fundraising for good causes, then we’d love to hear from you! Please visit our website.