UKGC suspends Bet-At-Home licence + SGA upholds Betway, Betfair & SkillOnNe fines as authorities come down hard on operators. (Image by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels)
What a crazy day in the iGaming licensing authority realms. Both the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) and Swedish Gaming Authority (SGA) are in the news for suspending licences and/or dishing out large fines.
UKGC Suspends Bet At Home UKGC licence
In the UK iGaming and sports betting market bet-at-home.com has had its UKGC licence suspended in accordance with section 118 (2) of the Gambling Act 2005. Now, this one must be serious because we have seen fines dished out for similar infractions, but for a full suspension, the company must have some gaping holes in its policies.
Those policies are related to anti-money laundering and social responsibility failings. That said, the term innocent until proven guilty springs to mind, but it seems the UKGC have already found Bet At Home guilty as the suspension comes with ‘further investigation’.
I am pretty sure there will also be ‘failure to properly check for problem gambling’ thrown in there too as we have seen with other brands also suspended or fined under the same contraventions mentioned by the UKGC.
Last month Jumpman Gaming Limited has to pay a £500,000 and Progress Play Limited a £175,718 fine for similar offences. Neither was met with a licence suspension. For now, we’ll have to wait for the investigation to shed some light on to just why the UKGC suspends Bet-At-Home licence.
Past UKGC Fines Resulting in Huge Fines
We know both licensing authorities mean business when it comes to toeing the line under their respective frameworks. We only need to look back to February to see the UKGC’s wraith when online gambling sites break the rules.
Notably, in the February incident was BetVictor – caught out for multiple infractions resulting in a £2 million fine. The UKGC states in that report that BV Gaming Limited, the Bet Victor operator, failed to adequately identify and act upon potential problem gamblers. This led the UKGC investigation team to another issue, which was the lack of anti-money laundering (AML) checks. To top off the list of violations, the company was also in breach of the social responsibility code provision.
Also, in January this year, Rank Digital Gaming (Alderney) Limited found itself on the wrong end of a £700,000 UKGC fine for the same transgressions as BV Gaming Limited minus an AML charge. Joining Rank Digital Gaming (Alderney) Limited in the same month was Annexio (Jersey) Limited, which caught £612,000 in fines. This time the company was in breach of AML regulations, failing to identify problem gamblers, and for Social Responsibility Code violations.
Moral of the story: It is no secret that the UKGC takes problem gambling, social responsibility, and AML issues seriously. A noteworthy theme all online gambling operators should take note of is that the UKGC is undergoing reform, and these issues are often at the top of the list for discussion. See the full UKGC Bet-at-home suspension report here.
SGA Upholds Fines Dished Out to 3 Major Gambling Companies
Over in Sweden, three operators were under the cosh, and all three are well-known brands across the European iGaming scene. Betway, Betfair, and SkillOnNet have all escaped licence suspension but picked up some pretty heft fines under Sweden’s Gaming Act. All three appealed to the Supreme Administrative Court and after a long 2-year wait, all three failed to have their fines struck.
Betfair: The fine issued to Betfair was handed a $520,000 fine for offering illegal bonus deals. However, that fine eventually dropped to $95,000 after the appeal. The issue was different to Betways and SkillOnNet as it wasn’t related to bonus offers. It was regarding accepting bets from underage individuals in a football match between Vasalunds IF and FC Djursholm. The oversight by Betfair in all fairness was a tough one to spot. If more than 50% of the players on the pitch are under 18, the betting market must not be available. In the end, the appeal to reduce the fine was not due to the obscurity of the laws involving the age of the football players, but because Betfair’s earnings from the match were overestimated in the original fine.
Betway: According to the SGA investigation, Betway was guilty of offering illegal bonus deals in 2019. While there was a prohibition on online gambling, the licensing authority was able to satisfactorily prove Betway continued to offer bonuses. A costly mistake that landed the company a $470,000 fine. Betway did manage to reduce the amount by $20,000 and has since appealed to have the remaining $450,000 struck through further appeal. However, this week the SGA upheld its decision and the fine stands. If you are one for irony, BetWay recently won an award for being the Best Online Casino in The Nordics 2022 (Operators).
SKillOnNet: Although a formidable company when it comes to offering responsible gambling tools and a solid collection of online casinos running on its platform, this is not the first time has found itself in hot water with one of its many licensing authorities. The SGA found SkillOnNet guilty of offering bonus deals to Swedish players in 2019. Its fine was the largest out of the 3 companies. It came in at $1.3 million because the bonus dealer came via multiple online casino brands under the operator’s wing. There was an argument put forth claiming the SGA’s rules for bonus offers are not clear, but the SGA was clearly not moved judging by the size of the fine.
SkillOnNet may have come under fire with the SGA, but it is a highly reputable company. The company operates in the UKGC, under the MGA, the SGA, and just last year entered the US iGaming market.
