Done Bros (Cash Betting) Limited, operating under the name Betfred, has agreed to pay £3.25 million (€3.8m or $4.25m) following an investigation by the UK Gambling Commission, which uncovered failures in social responsibility and anti-money laundering practices.
Under the terms of the settlement with the Commission, the operator, responsible for managing 1,750 betting shops, will make the financial contribution.
Social responsibility failures
The identified social responsibility failures consisted of:
- Insufficient controls to safeguard new customers, monitor high-speed spending, and oversee play duration, which exposed customers to significant losses without adequate safer gambling interaction.
- Assumptions that winning customers were not at risk of harm, resulting in a lack of safer gambling interactions with a customer who placed bets totaling £517,499 over a two-month period.
- Lack of evidence regarding the evaluation of individual customer interactions and poor record-keeping practices, hampering the effectiveness of future interactions.
AML failures
The anti-money laundering failures included:
- Inadequate record-keeping and the establishment of high financial alert thresholds.
- Failure to consistently obtain necessary identification and Source of Funds (SoF) documentation from customers when thresholds were met.
- Excessive reliance on open-source information without taking additional steps to verify customers’ SoF information.
These breaches occurred intermittently between January 2021 and December 2022.
Kay Roberts, executive director of operations at the Commission, said: “In recent years there’s been a public focus on online gambling but this case illustrates how important it is for us to continue our drive to raise standards across the whole industry.
“Gambling is a legitimate leisure activity enjoyed safely by millions but it is vital that every single operator – either online or offline – has in place effective safeguards to prevent harm or crime.”
The full £3.25 million settlement will be allocated to socially responsible causes.