Part III, The Craft · Chapter 16

The Rulebook

Trade promotion rules in Australia: permits, terms and conditions, consumer law and privacy

The fine print that cost $13.5 million

Between July 2019 and August 2023, The Good Guys ran 116 store credit and StoreCash promotions. The idea was familiar to anyone who walked the appliance floor in chapter 1: spend a set amount, get credit back to spend in store. What the advertising did not adequately say was that, for many of the promotions, the credit only arrived if the customer had opted in to marketing and stayed opted in until it was sent, and that the credit could expire in as little as seven days. About 21,500 customers who had done everything right did not receive their credit by the date promised.

In September 2025 the Federal Court ordered The Good Guys to pay $13.5 million in penalties: $10 million for not disclosing the expiry periods, $1.5 million for the opt-in condition and $2 million for the late credit. The company admitted the conduct. The chair of the ACCC, Gina Cass-Gottlieb, put the lesson in one line: “If you promise a benefit, you must provide it within the time frame you’ve committed to.”

Read closely, none of the conditions was unlawful in itself. A promotion can ask people to opt in to marketing, with their consent, as chapter 11 described. A reward can expire. What the court punished was where the conditions sat. They were not in front of the shopper at the moment of deciding. Chapter 4 made the same point from the other side, with an offer whose catches were printed first: the conditions are part of the offer, and they have to be stated before the dream.

This chapter is about the rules that sit around every promotion in this book. They are not the fine print of the craft. They are part of it, and the best promotions are designed with them in the room rather than checked against them at the end. What follows is general information about Australian rules as they stood in October 2026. It is not legal advice, the rules change, and every promotion with real money in it deserves a review by someone qualified to give that advice.

Trade promotion lottery or game of skill?

The first question decides which rules apply: is the winner chosen by chance or by skill? A draw, an instant win, a one-in-seven, a winning moment, a scratch card: all chance. In Australia these are trade promotion lotteries, regulated by the states and territories under their gaming laws, and in some of them they need a permit. A competition where entries are judged against stated criteria, the classic answer in 25 words or fewer, is a game of skill. It is not a lottery and needs no permit, though it must really be judged, against the criteria published, and consumer law still applies in full. Where a promotion mixes the two, the safe assumption is that the element of chance brings the lottery rules with it, and it takes very little chance to do that: a skill competition that settles a tie by drawing a name is, for that purpose, a draw.

Two principles hold almost everywhere. Entry must be free apart from buying the product at its normal price: a fee to enter turns a promotion into something else. And the price must not rise to pay for the prize; South Australia says so in terms, and it is a good rule everywhere.

Do you need a trade promotion permit?

Permits depend on where the promotion is open and on the total value of the prizes. As at October 2026, in summary:

New South Wales. An authority is needed when the total prize value of a trade promotion lottery is more than $10,000, including online promotions open to NSW residents. An authority can cover several promotions and runs for one, three or five years. The rules of each promotion go to NSW Fair Trading at least ten working days before it starts, and if you run it for another business you need that business’s written consent first. Some prizes are off limits, including firearms, tobacco and vaping products, cosmetic procedures and liquor beyond set volumes. Advertising must not show children taking part or suggest that winning is certain. If the terms do not say how long an unclaimed prize is held, it must be held for at least three months.

Australian Capital Territory. A permit is needed when the total prize value is more than $3,000, and the lottery has to be approved by the regulator before it is advertised or run.

South Australia. A licence is needed for a major trade promotion, a draw with prizes of $5,001 or more, and for any instant prize lottery such as a scratch or break-open ticket, whatever the prize value. Every advertisement must carry the licence number, so the licence has to be in hand before the first ad runs. South Australia also sets conditions others do not: an independent scrutineer for draws above $30,000 in total prizes, winners not at the draw told in writing within seven days, publication of winners of prizes over $250 within 30 days unless they ask otherwise, at least 14 days for a winner to claim, an unclaimed prize kept for at least two months, records kept for at least three months, cash prizes over $1,000 offered by bank deposit, and no promotion longer than twelve months.

Victoria. No permit, but conditions. The cost of entering, such as a call, a text or postage, cannot exceed $1 including GST. Prizes must be paid or handed over within 28 days of the draw. Winners of prizes over $1,000 must be published, and if that is done online it stays up for at least 28 days. Records are kept for three years.

Western Australia. No permit is needed if the promotion meets every condition in Schedule 5 of the state’s gaming regulations; one that does not needs a permit. Among the conditions: no longer than twelve months, the draw within a month of closing, a phone or electronic entry costing no more than 55 cents, and, for a promotion run through electronic media, the terms lodged with the regulator before it starts.

Northern Territory. A permit is needed when total prizes are more than $5,000. A national promotion that already holds a permit from another state may not need a separate one in the Territory, which is worth confirming for each promotion.

Queensland and Tasmania. No permit for a trade promotion lottery at any prize value, though the general conditions of each state still apply.

This is why the terms of a national draw carry a row of permit numbers. The Great Northern promotion in chapter 13 listed three: ACT, NSW and SA. Thresholds, fees and conditions change, so the list above is a starting point to be checked against each regulator before every promotion, not a substitute for doing so.

Competition terms and conditions: what they must say

The terms are the contract between the promoter and every entrant, and the regulator’s first document if anything goes wrong. Good terms are complete, consistent with every piece of advertising, and written so that an ordinary entrant can follow them. At the least they set out the following.

The promoter’s name, ABN and address. Who can enter, with any age, residency or employee exclusions. When the promotion opens and closes. How to enter, the qualifying purchase and any limits on entries. Every prize: how many, its description and value, and any conditions on taking it. How the winner is chosen, with the date, time and place of a draw, or the criteria and judges of a skill competition. How winners are notified and published. What happens to an unclaimed prize. How personal information will be used. And the permit numbers that apply.

Two traps are common. The first is the one The Good Guys fell into: a condition that matters to the shopper buried in the terms instead of shown where the decision is made. If a condition would change whether someone takes part, such as an opt-in, an expiry date, a claim deadline or a requirement to keep the receipt, it belongs on the promotion itself. The second is the clause that gives the promoter absolute discretion to change anything. Since 9 November 2023, unfair terms in standard form consumer contracts can attract the same penalties as other breaches of consumer law, and a promoter’s right to change the prize or the rules at will is worth reading with that in mind.

Consumer law: the promise must be kept

The Australian Consumer Law applies to every promotion, permit or not. A promotion must not mislead or deceive, and it must not make false representations about a prize, its value or the chance of winning. One provision speaks directly to this book’s subject. As the ACCC puts it, it is illegal for a business to offer a gift, prize or other free item to promote a sale if it has no intention of providing it, if it fails to provide it as offered, or if it is not provided within the time specified. That was the basis for the late-credit penalty against The Good Guys. The maximum penalty for a company for a breach is now the greater of $50 million, three times the benefit obtained, or, if the benefit cannot be worked out, 30 per cent of turnover during the breach period.

The law is not the only cost. In 1999 McDonald’s in Australia ran Monopoly McMatch & Win. The rare pieces were switched from the year before, and pieces from 1998 looked almost identical to the new ones; McDonald’s said the valid pieces carried codes customers could not see. People who believed they had matched a prize were turned away, hundreds complained to the ACCC, and the ACCC announced that it would take McDonald’s to court. More than 5,000 customers joined a class action. According to the law firm that ran it, the court found for McDonald’s. The company won, and still spent the best part of two years in a dispute with its own customers about its own promotion. Chapter 13 called fame a multiplier; so is confusion. A promotion is only as clear as the least clear thing a shopper can see.

Gift cards, vouchers and cashbacks

Since November 2019, most gift cards sold in Australia must carry an expiry of at least three years and cannot be charged fees after they are issued. Promotional cards are treated differently: a card given free as part of a promotion, supplied with a purchase as part of a temporary marketing promotion, or given by one business for use at another can carry a shorter expiry. That flexibility is useful, and it brings the same trap The Good Guys fell into. A short expiry is allowed; a short expiry the shopper was not told about is not.

Cashbacks carry the plainest obligation of all: pay what was promised, to everyone eligible, by the date stated. The engine in chapter 5 is where that promise is kept, and a claim process that loses eligible people is a legal exposure as well as a bad experience.

Privacy, consent and the Spam Act

Chapter 11 covered the data a promotion collects. The rules underneath are worth restating. Tell people at entry what will be collected and why, and use it only for that. Ask for marketing consent separately from entry, not bundled into the terms. Every marketing message must identify the sender and carry a working unsubscribe, and an unsubscribe must be honoured; in 2020 Woolworths paid a $1,003,800 infringement notice for emailing people who had unsubscribed. One gap is worth knowing. Most businesses with an annual turnover of $3 million or less sit outside the Privacy Act for now, an exemption the government has agreed in principle to review. The Spam Act has no such exemption: it covers anyone who sends a marketing message.

Privacy law is also moving. The Privacy and Other Legislation Amendment Act 2024 gave the privacy regulator new powers to issue infringement notices, created a right to sue for serious invasions of privacy, which took effect in 2025, and set December 2026 for a Children’s Online Privacy Code and new transparency rules on automated decisions. For promotions, the practical effect is the same as the good practice in chapter 11: collect less, explain it plainly, keep it safe, and never surprise people with what you do with it.

Alcohol promotions and the ABAC code

Much of the evidence in this book comes from liquor, and liquor promotions answer to an extra rulebook. The ABAC Responsible Alcohol Marketing Code applies to competitions and brand activations as well as advertising. A promotion must not encourage drinking beyond the national guidelines, which the code expresses as more than four standard drinks on any day or ten in a week, and must not challenge or dare people to drink. It must not have strong appeal to minors, which reaches to prizes and branded merchandise made mainly for young people. Age controls must be used wherever they are available. And point-of-sale material started by a retailer is outside the code only where the producer has no reasonable control over it, which matters more as retailers run more promotions themselves (chapter 14). Venues and bottle shops also answer to state liquor promotion rules; in New South Wales, guideline GL4001 is aimed at promotions that encourage irresponsible drinking, appeal to minors or go against community standards.

In practice the code shapes the prize as much as the copy. A prize built around drinking, rather than around the occasion, is the first thing a reviewer will question.

The gambling line from 2027

Chapter 3 mentioned a change that has since become law. In August 2026 the federal parliament passed the Interactive Gambling Amendment (Gambling Reform) Bill, with its trade promotion changes expected to start on 1 January 2027. The target is lottery-style businesses that operate under the trade promotion exemption while selling, in effect, a chance to win: paid memberships or subscriptions that buy entry into a run of draws for cars, houses and cash.

Under the new law, a promotion keeps the trade promotion exemption only if its sole or primary purpose is to promote trade, it is incidental to supplying goods or services, entry costs nothing beyond the fair price of those goods or services, and it is not part of a system of continuous or repeated draws offered on an ongoing basis. The ordinary promotion in this book, buy the product and enter the draw, sits comfortably inside that line. A promotion where people pay to be in the draw, or are signed up to draw after draw, does not. If a design is drifting toward the second, the brief has stopped being a promotion.

The Rulebook Checklist

Chance or skill, and therefore which rules apply. Permits for every state and territory where the promotion is open, checked against current thresholds, with each state’s lodgement, notification and publication dates in the plan. Entry free beyond the normal price, and the price unchanged. Terms complete and consistent with every ad. Any condition that would change a shopper’s decision shown on the promotion itself. Prize and reward dates you can meet, with the engine to meet them. A privacy notice at entry and marketing consent asked separately. For alcohol, the ABAC code, including the prize. For anything with recurring paid entry, the gambling line. And a review by someone qualified, before launch, not after the first complaint.

Where this leaves the brief

Every rule in this chapter maps onto a fader from chapter 6. Permits and the gambling line set where Liability and Venue can go. Disclosure is Friction, placed in plain sight. The promise to deliver is Belief, kept. Seen that way, compliance is not the department that says no at the end. It is one more setting on the board, decided in the same room as the creative and the engine, early enough to change the design rather than delay the launch.

The next chapter turns to the machine that is now in every planning room: what AI can do for a promotion, and where the dark art still needs a person. The last puts all of it in one place: the tools, the questions and the checklists that turn the book into a way of working.