Ladbrokes Coral fined £ 5.9 million against vulnerable players | Business

Ladbrokes Coral will pay a penalty of 5.9 million pounds, one of the heaviest imposed by the Gambling Commission, for its multiple failures when a problem gambler has lost hundreds of thousands of pounds.

"These were systemic failures in a large operator, which caused damage to customers and stolen money circulating in the company, which is unacceptable," said Commission Executive Director Richard Watson.

The regulator detailed a litany of Ladbrokes Coral transgressions, owned by GVC based on the Isle of Man, in order to fulfill its obligations in terms of social responsibility and prevent money laundering.

The failures include not having asked a customer about his source of finance for nearly three years because he had lost 1.5 million pounds.

Coral has not carried out any "social responsibility interaction" despite the obvious signs of problem gambling, such as logging into his account 10 times a day and losing £ 64,000 in one month.

In another case, Ladbrokes did not ask any question to a customer who had lost £ 98,000 in two and a half years, 460 deposit attempts on his account had been denied and had even asked the operator to stop sending promotions.

The bookmaker was also unable to provide proof of social responsibility interactions with a customer who had deposited more than £ 140,000 in the first four months of his open account.

The Commission stated that in one case Ladbrokes identified "significant concerns" about a client but continued to allow them to place large bets, adding that the defaults persisted even after the company should have been informed.

The failures occurred between 2014 and 2017, before GVC bought Ladbrokes Coral for £ 3.2bn.

As part of this settlement, GVC, the new owner of Ladbrokes Coral Group, will pay £ 4.8m for responsible gambling causes and will lose £ 1.1m to "affected parties" including victims of gambling. 39, indictable offenses, where the stolen money was used.

The penalties are for seven clients, but five more are being investigated by independent lawyers.

GVC will also review the top 50 clients for the years 2015-2017 to determine if it is possible to identify other failures and, where appropriate, give up more of their profits.

Kenny Alexander, its director, said: "Soon after the acquisition of Ladbrokes Coral as a result of ongoing meetings and investigations of the Gaming Commission, GVC clearly found that there was There have been historical breaches of compliance in some areas of operations.

"Working closely with the Gaming Commission and an independent law firm, GVC facilitated a thorough, timely and thorough investigation, culminating in today's settlement.

"These historical failures were unacceptable and, since the acquisition, I have been overseeing a systematic review of the expanded group's player protection procedures and those responsible for these issues have left the company."

The commission stated that GVC had cooperated with its investigations and "proposed a regulatory regulation on acceptable terms".

Labor MP Carolyn Harris, who heads a multi-stakeholder group on problem gambling, said, "I am pleased that the Gaming Commission has acted on this issue, but I am afraid they are not isolated cases.

"I think the industry is not doing a reasonable job of handling problem gambling or excessive gambling.

"Every day I hear about people and families whose lives have been ruined by the industry's quest for profit and its disregard for customers. Even if it's a substantial fine, for Ladbrokes Coral it's a little money and I'm doubling it to learn from it. "

GVC said it has made significant investments to strengthen its controls to ensure customers the opportunity to bet, including a five-fold increase in the number of employees dedicated to compliance and responsible gaming.

The commission has increased the level of financial penalties imposed on companies that fail to meet their licensing obligations during a series of scandals related to problem gambling.

This tougher stance has led companies such as William Hill, Ladbrokes, Paddy Power and SkyBet to pay millions of pounds in penalties for failing money laundering and gambling.

The heaviest penalty imposed by the industry regulator has led online casino company 888 to pay £ 7,000,000 in 2017, after more than 7,000 people voluntarily excluded from the site were allowed to continue trading. to bet.