Compliance Updates

UKGC Imposes £780,000 Fine on Buzz Group

Published

2 years ago

December 17, 2021

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Buzz Group, which operates buzzbingo.com, has been fined £780,000 by the UK Gambling Commission for failures relating to social responsibility and anti-money laundering procedures.

Buzz Group also received a formal warning for the failures which occurred between October 2019 and December 2020.

Social responsibility failures included: financial triggers not sufficiently identifying at-risk players as they were set too high. One customer was able to deposit £22,400 in five days without the operator conducting a meaningful interaction within that period.

Systems not sufficiently identifying at-risk players. Two customers won large amounts of money gambling, yet the operator failed to consider the increased risk of gambling harm to those customers despite the customers displaying high levels of spend.

Not carrying out effective customer interactions with customers who gambled aggressively over short periods of time. One customer deposited and lost £12,400 during a six-day period but the operator’s only record of a customer interaction simply stated customer was ‘coping well in COVID-19’once a decision to interact with a customer had been made staff did not always sufficiently follow the requirement of the operator’s own customer interaction procedure to check the customer was comfortable with their gambling levels, if they felt in control, and then discuss responsible gambling tools and support resources.

Anti-money laundering failures included: triggers prompting source of funds (SOF) checks being over reliant on open source or anecdotal information such as staff relying heavily on assurances provided verbally by customers during interactions.

In one instance the operator placed reliance on a large customer win as the SOF for the customer’s future gambling spend without considering that it might not be recycled winnings and that it may be the proceeds of crime

Multiple alerts needed to be activated before a customer AML interaction took place. One customer was able to hit nine financial alerts before their account was suspended pending an AML interaction. The operator keeping insufficient records of AML interactions with customers and it was often not clear what had been discussed during those interactions.

The case against Buzz Group Ltd, like other recent enforcement action, was the result of planned compliance activity.

Helen Venn, Commission Executive Director, said: “As a regulator we expect all operators to effectively implement policies and procedures which make gambling safe and crime-free. Every single gambling business should be aware that we do check that these are in place and are being adhered to. If they are not, we will take action.”

Compliance Updates

PGCB Fines Casino $125,000 for Underage Gaming Violations

Published

2 hours ago

May 28, 2024

GamingAmericas.com

pgcb-fines-casino-$125,000-for-underage-gaming-violations

The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB) has approved a consent agreement presented by the Board’s Office of Enforcement Counsel (OEC) during its public meeting resulting in a fine of $125,000 against Wind Creek Bethlehem LLC for 10 incidents in which underage individuals gained access to the gaming floor at the casino it operates.

The incidents, which occurred over a 20-month period at Wind Creek Bethlehem in Northampton County, involved 11 individuals between the ages of 18 and 20.

A copy of the approved consent agreement offering more details is available upon request through the Board’s Office of Communications.

The Board also acted to ban, or leave intact an earlier ban, of three adults from all casinos in the Commonwealth for leaving minors unattended in order to engage in gaming activities:

A male and a female patron were placed on the Involuntary Exclusion List after leaving a 5-month-old unattended in a running vehicle while the outside temperature was 47 degrees in the parking garage of Harrah’s Philadelphia Casino & Racetrack in Delaware County for 30 minutes while he gambled at a table game.
A female patron’s request to be removed from the Board’s Involuntary Exclusion List for a 2017 incident in which she left a 4-year-old unattended while in Rivers Philadelphia Casino was denied. The child was unattended for 15 minutes in a non-running vehicle in the parking lot while the outside temperature was 95 degrees.

The Board’s actions serve as a reminder that adults are prohibited from leaving minors unattended in the parking lot or garage, a hotel, or other venues at a casino since it creates a potentially unsafe and dangerous environment for the children. Leaving minors unattended at a Pennsylvania casino also subjects the offending adult to criminal prosecution in addition to exclusion from all Pennsylvania casinos. To complement the efforts by casinos to mitigate this issue, the Board created an awareness campaign, “Don’t Gamble with Kids”.

Compliance Updates

MGA Provides Information on Updates Made to Audit/Review Process

Published

3 hours ago

May 28, 2024

Niji Narayan

mga-provides-information-on-updates-made-to-audit/review-process

Reading Time: 2 minutes

The Malta Gaming Authority (MGA) has provided information to its Approved Audit Service Providers and current and prospective licensees about the updates made to the Audits section on the Authority’s portal, and the related Audit/Review process.

“The Malta Gaming Authority (the Authority) would like to inform its Approved Audit Service Providers and current and prospective licensees of minor updates made to the Audits section on the Authority’s portal, and the related Audit/Review process. The following information outlines the considerations to be made for the auditing process, and the submission of reports for any of the System Audits, System Reviews and/or Compliance Audits engagements, hereinafter referred to as the ‘Audits’.

“After receiving approval from the Authority, the appointed Service Provider has sixty (60) days to complete System Audits and System Reviews, and ninety (90) days for Compliance Audits. The completed Audit report must be submitted electronically through the Authority’s portal. Should the appointed Service Provider identify any instances of non-compliance during this review period, the licensee should be notified, and the licensee is strongly encouraged to address and rectify any identified issues within their documentation and/or systems throughout the Audit period.

“In such circumstances, the Approved Service Provider must conduct fresh audit checks of the identified non-compliances and appropriately mark such checks within the Audit Report as ‘Resolved at Audit Stage’, if deemed to be compliant. Furthermore, the ‘Partially Compliant’ status can be used if an audit check is found to be partially compliant with the Regulations.

“In view of these changes, the Authority has added two new External Audit Conclusions statuses, these being ‘Resolved at Audit Stage’ and ‘Partially Compliant’, for the Service Providers to be able to report the Audit findings accordingly.

“Should there be any instances of non-compliance which cannot be resolved within the Audit deadline, the licensee may request a one-time extension of the Audit deadline to resolve and re-audit the identified systems and/or documentation issues. The request of such an extension would need to be accompanied by a summary of the issue/s, and a plan of rectification. The extension is at the Authority’s discretion, the time-frame of which shall be determined by the Authority.

“It is important to note that the Authority retains the right to reject an Audit Report if it is unable to arrive at a conclusive review outcome due to a significant number of instances of non-compliance.”

The post MGA Provides Information on Updates Made to Audit/Review Process appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.

Compliance Updates

Danish Gambling Authority Updates Requirements for Reporting Game Data

Published

1 day ago

May 27, 2024

Niji Narayan

danish-gambling-authority-updates-requirements-for-reporting-game-data

Reading Time: 2 minutes

The Danish Gambling Authority (DGA) has updated the requirements for reporting game data.

Interested parties can comment on the update before the final version is issued. Comments must be sent to the DGA no later than Monday the 10th of June 2024. Comments must be submitted by using the contact form.

The DGA expects the updated requirements for reporting game data to come into force in 2025. The final date has not been determined. A possible transition period will be described in connection with the issuing of the updated requirements for reporting game data.

Changes

Several linguistic adjustments have been made and some guidance texts have been added/adjusted. In addition to this, the following significant changes and additions should be mentioned:

Addition of a requirement that bets on fixed odds must be reported as independent transactions
Addition of requirements for reporting on odds for betting
Added requirement for reporting event information incl. list with country codes and sports
Added requirements for reporting odds on bets as well as specific requirements for reporting partially closed bets and Spreadbetting
Clarifying the handling of reporting for the betting exchange/BetExchange
Exception where SpillerInformationIdentifikation does not have to be reported for land-based betting has been removed after the introduction of the requirement for Player ID
Adding requirements for reporting RNG used for Virtual Fixed Odds
Adding a requirement that a casino session cannot be interrupted in the middle of a move, as well as a description of how “a move” is defined
Clarification of different poker types and how they are reported
Adding requirements to win lists in poker tournaments and manager games
Clarification of downscaling of pool games
Adding new requirements for providing test data for Jackpots
Clarifying the handling of changes to reported data. Including specific clarification of the distinction between changes to the game result and correction of error reporting.