OASIS · Deadlines
OASIS exclusion: duration, minimum term and continuation
There are four clocks in an OASIS exclusion, and not one of them ends the exclusion by itself: the minimum period of three months or one year, the open-ended continuation that follows it, the week or month between an application to lift and its effect, and the six-year storage period for your data. Confusing the first with the last is the reason most English-language accounts of OASIS get the deadlines wrong.
By the Casinohafen deskUpdated: 9 October 2026Checked: September 2026
In brief
- Self-exclusion: minimum three months, but <b>one year by default</b> if you state no period.
- Third-party exclusion: minimum <b>one year</b>, with no way to shorten it.
- After the minimum period the exclusion continues indefinitely — the calendar does not end it, only a written application does.
- Lifting takes effect one week after receipt for a self-exclusion, one month for a third-party exclusion.
- Data are deleted six years after the exclusion ends; data from the 24-hour panic button within two weeks.
- All clocks start at the entry in the register, not on the day you signed or posted the form.
- Self-exclusion, floor
- 3 months (one year by default)
- Third-party exclusion, floor
- 12 months
- Lifting takes effect
- 1 week, or 1 month
- Data deleted
- 6 years after the exclusion ends
Clock one: the minimum period, and the two different floors
§ 8a of the Glücksspielstaatsvertrag — the interstate treaty governing gambling in Germany — states that the exclusion is for at least one year unless the person applying for a self-exclusion applies for a different period. One sentence, two consequences.
If you exclude yourself, you may name a shorter period, and the shortest the authority accepts is three months. If you name nothing, one year applies. If somebody else brings the case — the Fremdsperre, an exclusion applied for by a relative, a venue or a counselling service — the minimum is one year, full stop, and no request can bring it below that.
The distinction is deliberate rather than accidental. A self-exclusion stays a tool in the hands of the person using it, so the law lets them scale it. An exclusion imposed at someone else's instigation is an intervention in another person's affairs, and the longer floor is part of what makes it proportionate.
Where the "three months" myth comes from
Guides in English routinely report a flat minimum of three months for every kind of OASIS exclusion. That takes the shortest requestable self-exclusion period and applies it to the whole system. Three months is a floor you can ask for, one year is what the statute supplies on its own, and for a third-party exclusion one year is the floor.
Clock two: the part with no end date at all
Expiry of the minimum period does not end anything. It only makes an application to lift the exclusion admissible. Until that application is made and takes effect, the entry stands — for a further month, a further decade, or permanently.
That design reverses the burden on purpose. A fixed term would put everyone back into the market automatically on a particular morning, including the people for whom that morning is the worst possible day. Here, coming back requires a deliberate act at a moment of relative calm, and inaction leaves the protection in place.
It also means there is no maximum duration to argue about, and no need to renew anything. People who excluded themselves in 2021 and have done nothing since are still excluded today, and will be in 2030.
Clock three: the pause before a lifting bites
When the application to lift does arrive, it does not act at once. § 8b gives the lifting effect one week after the application is received in the case of a self-exclusion, and one month after receipt where the exclusion was brought by a third party.
An application that arrives before the minimum period has run is ineffective — not stored, not queued, not converted into an appointment. It has to be sent again after the date, and this third clock only starts from the arrival of the valid application. The whole procedure is set out on lifting an OASIS exclusion.
Clock four: six years of storage, and two weeks for the panic button
Lifting an exclusion and deleting the data are two different events. Under § 23 the personal data in the register are deleted six years after the exclusion ends. What the lifting changes is retrievability: from that point operators querying the register no longer see the entry.
The 24-hour lock triggered by the panic button under § 6i paragraph 3 runs on its own much shorter schedule. It ends automatically, with no application needed, and the associated data are deleted within two weeks of expiry.
Neither storage period is visible to anyone outside the system. Access to the register is confined to the operators obliged to query it and to the purpose of the admission check before play, so six years of retention is not six years of exposure.
Working out your own dates
All four clocks start from the entry in the register, not from the day you signed the form and not from the day you posted it. The law sets no processing time for an application, so no honest source can tell you how many days lie between the two; the written notification you receive when the entry is made is what fixes your date.
Take a worked example. Someone applies for a self-exclusion and asks for three months, and the entry is made on 4 March. The minimum period ends on 4 June, and an application to lift sent before that date achieves nothing. Sent on 5 June and received on 8 June, it takes effect on 15 June. The data remain in the register until six years after the exclusion ended.
Change one variable and the picture changes entirely. If the same person had left the duration field blank, the minimum would have ended on 4 March of the following year. If a relative had brought the case instead, the floor would have been one year and the pause before release one month rather than one week.
What the calendar does not touch
The deadlines above govern the exclusion and nothing else. The cross-operator deposit limit under § 6c — 1,000 euro per calendar month across all German-licensed operators combined — attaches to the person and runs independently: an exclusion does not reset it, and a lifting does not restore an old figure. Raising your own limit takes effect only after a seven-day protection period, while lowering it is immediate.
Nor do the deadlines bind anything outside the licensed market. An operator without a German licence is not connected to the register at all, so no period of any length has an effect there.
And a date on a form is not a treatment plan. The Bundesinstitut für Öffentliche Gesundheit (BIÖG) runs a free, anonymous line on 0800 1 37 27 00, Monday to Thursday 10:00 to 22:00 and Friday to Sunday 10:00 to 18:00, with information at check-dein-spiel.de.
Step by step
| Step | What happens | Who acts | Time frame |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Entry | Start of every period. You are informed in writing of the exclusion and of how it can be ended. | RP Darmstadt or operator |
| 02 | Minimum period, self-exclusion | The period you requested; three months is the shortest available, one year applies if you named none. | — |
| 03 | Minimum period, third-party exclusion | No reduction possible. | — |
| 04 | Open-ended continuation | The exclusion runs on until a valid application to lift it arrives. | — |
| 05 | Application to lift | Written, signed, with an ID copy. Filed earlier, it has no effect. | Excluded person |
| 06 | Lifting takes effect | Self-exclusion one week after receipt; third-party exclusion one month. | RP Darmstadt |
| 07 | Panic-button data | The 24-hour lock ends automatically; its data are deleted shortly afterwards. | RP Darmstadt |
| 08 | Deletion of the entry | Personal data in the register are deleted. | RP Darmstadt |
Frequently asked
Does the period run from my application or from the entry?
Is the minimum really three months for every kind of exclusion?
Can I ask for an exclusion longer than a year?
What happens the day my period expires?
How long is my data kept after the exclusion ends?
Does the 24-hour panic button follow the same rules?
Does an exclusion reset my deposit limit?
Sources
- Glücksspielstaatsvertrag 2021, § 8a — minimum period, the one-year default, open-ended continuation, written notification of the person concerned.
- Glücksspielstaatsvertrag 2021, § 8b — lifting on written application; effect one week or one month after receipt.
- Glücksspielstaatsvertrag 2021, § 23 — the register, categories of data and deletion six years after the exclusion ends; § 6i paragraph 3 — panic button and the two-week deletion period; § 6c — deposit limit.
- <a href="https://rp-darmstadt.hessen.de/sicherheit-und-kommunales/gluecksspiel/spielersperrsystem-oasis/spielerinnen-und-spieler" rel="nofollow noopener">Regierungspräsidium Darmstadt — OASIS, questions and answers for players</a>.
- <a href="https://rp-darmstadt.hessen.de/presse/bilanz-2025-mehr-als-fuenf-milliarden-abfragen-ueber-das-spielersperrsystem-oasis" rel="nofollow noopener">Regierungspräsidium Darmstadt, 2025 balance</a> — 367,000 active exclusions, around 60,000 applications processed.