British Bookmaker Warned by Danish Gaming Authority
Bookmaking giant bet365 has been reprimanded by the Danish Gaming Authority. The operator allowed a customer to deposit DKK190,000 without performing affordability checks.
Bookmakers Warned by Danish Regulator © Pixabay.
The Danish Gaming Authority has warned Stoke-based bet365 for breaking the rules on customer due diligence procedures as part of the country’s Money Laundering Act.
The Danish regulator revealed that the bookmaker had allowed a “young player” to deposit over £21,000 over the course of a year without the proper checks being performed.
This lack of checks, which are mandatory under Dutch licencing laws, meant that bet365 did not have sufficient knowledge of where these funds came from, meaning they could have originated from criminal activity.
The Danish Gaming Authority said the player’s young age and the amount of money deposited should have alerted the operator, who should have queried where the funds came from and whether this level of gambling was affordable for the customer. In addition, the regulator has stated that the online giant should have queried the customer’s income levels.
In a statement, the Danish Gaming Authority said: “Since Hillside [bet365] had not conducted investigations on the player, there were also no notes on the player,”
“The Gambling Authority notes that the rules on customer due diligence procedures, duty to investigate and duty to list are absolutely fundamental in the Money Laundering Act, and violation of the rules leads as a clear starting point to injunctions or reprimands or, in serious or repeated cases, to police reporting.”
Despite bet365 failure to perform source of funds checks, the regulator decided not to fine the company as it was satisfied that the operator had tightened up its procedures.
“The prosecution does not entail any duty of action for Hillside, as Hillside has subsequently introduced new business procedures for customer knowledge procedures and investigation.”
It is the second time Spillemyndigheden has highlighted failings by operators in recent months.
In February, Reel Denmark received a warning for breaking the Anti-Money Laundering Act’s rules on know your customer (KYC) measures.
In this case, Reel Denmark allowed a customer to deposit more than a quarter of a million pounds (£270,342) between 2019 and 2020 without checking if the funds were proceeds from criminal activity.
Reel Denmark’s breach only came to light when the regulator performed a random spot check on the company in 2021. As a result of Spillemyndigheden’s investigation, the operator requested data on the player’s income and employment. As a result, they concluded that the customer could afford to deposit such a large amount, despite the funds being deposited being more than they earned once the tax was deducted from earnings.
The Danish Gaming Authority assessed that Reel Denmark had breached Know Your Customer measures by not seeking funding sources earlier. The regulator also states that the operator should have requested additional information on the customer’s circumstances as the data on income and employment alone wasn’t sufficient to disprove the suspicion of money laundering. Therefore Reel Denmark was found to have breached the rules for failing to investigate.
Ultimately the reprimand was issued as Reel Denmark should have suspected that the account’s funding could have been due to money laundering. Therefore, the matter should have been reported to the Money Laundering Secretariat.
Like bet365, Reel Denmark escaped a financial penalty as the regulator was satisfied that the operator had introduced new business procedures for KYC measures.
