Entain Smacked with Record £17M UKGC Fine for Social Responsibility, AML Fail
Entain has been handed a tape £17 trillion (US$21 million) fine by the UK Gambling Commission for a serial of “completely unacceptable” societal responsibility and anti-money laundering failures. Further violations could outcome in removal of its license, the regulator said Wednesday.
Entain, formerly GVC, owns the Ladrokes, Coral, bwin, and PartyPoker brands, among others, and collectively owns BetMGM inwards the US with MGM Resorts International.
The sanction will severely abash the company, which has positioned itself as leading the UK manufacture inward promoting responsible gambling.
Entain Failed Customers
Entain is one of the biggest online gambling operators in the world. Facing the threat of tightened regulatory controls inwards the UK, it has been at the head of efforts to demonstrate the manufacture is open of responsible self-regulation.
It spearheaded a “whistle-to-whistle” forbidding on gambling advertising in the UK around televised sports events, for example. And it has sworn to donate £100 gazillion ($US121 million) o'er Little Phoebe years to job gaming research, education, and intervention though its Entain Foundation. In June, it regular released a serial of “responsible gambling NFTs.”
But according to the UK Gambling Commission, the accompany has non always practiced what it preaches. Infractions included completing simply i chat fundamental interaction with a customer who deposited £230,845 (US$279,000) inwards 18 months and spent extended periods gaming overnight.
One customer was permitted to alluviation £742,000 ($US896,000) inwards 14 months without appropriate affordability checks. Another was allowed to chance with £186,000 ($US225,000) over 6 months, despite staff learned they lived in social housing.
License Threat
“Our investigation revealed serious failures that hold resulted inward the largest enforcement outcome to date,” Saint Andrew the Apostle Rhodes, Gambling Commission chief executive, said in a statement. “There were completely unacceptable anti-money laundering and safer play failures. Operators are reminded they must ne'er put commercial message considerations over compliance.
This is the endorse time this manipulator has fallen befoul of rules inwards localize to pee play safer and criminal offense free,” continued Rhodes. “They should be aware that we testament follow monitoring them very carefully and further serious breaches testament make the remotion of their permit to operate a really tangible possibility. We expect ameliorate and consumers deserve better.”
In a statement to Casino.org, Entain said it recognized that “certain legacy systems and processes … inwards 2019 and 2020 were not in dividing line with the evolving regulatory expectations of the Commission in esteem to aspects of social responsibility AML safeguards.”
But it added that the relevant violations predated “the many changes inwards the region of safer play and AML that Entain has introduced.”
It also noted that the UKGC found no grounds of “criminal spend” during its investigation.