Transparency and Fairness in Safer Gambling Policies

Recent IBAS Case Study – Transparency and Fairness in Safer Gambling Policies

Background

IBAS recently considered a claim from a customer of an online casino. The customer was seeking winnings of just over £25,000 from bets placed on a game of ‘bonus’ roulette with a total value of £525.00.

The casino explained that as a safer gambling measure, they routinely applied a default monthly loss limit on customer accounts. Anyone losing in excess of £1,000 in any calendar month would be unable to gamble further without a satisfactory, positive interaction with the company’s safer gambling team. These loss limits could be changed following discussions with any customer, but the £1,000 limit was always applied as a default.

In this case, the customer’s total stakes of £525 took him fractionally (50p) over his default loss limit. If the customer had gambled directly with the company through its own, in-house casino games, those bets would have been rejected immediately on that basis. However, the game he played was supplied by a third-party and because he had the full funds to pay for the bet in his account, the third-party game provider accepted his bets.

It was only when details of those bets were relayed by the game provider back to the casino that the breach of the loss limit was detected. The casino therefore froze the bets and refunded the stake money to the customer’s account. All of this happened in a relatively short space of time.

In the meantime, the game of roulette had concluded, the customer’s bets had been successful (and boosted by a bonus multiplier) and he anticipated £25,000 in returns. When he received only a refund of his stakes he complained – first to the company and then IBAS. The customer argued to IBAS that the bet was accepted and confirmed in the usual manner.

The dispute posed an interesting challenge to our Adjudication Panel.

Balance of Safety, Transparency and Fairness

There is no doubt that expectations for gambling operators to put safer gambling at the heart of their thinking have led to substantial positive changes. Although IBAS does not pass judgement on whether a business has acted safely – that is a regulatory decision for the Gambling Commission – we applaud initiatives designed to prevent excessive losses without intervention.

Our Panel was satisfied that the process of cancelling and refunding the winnings bets was automated and not driven by the successful outcome of the bets. The Panel was satisfied that the business did not act deceptively or intentionally unfairly and that its processes were motivated by a genuine intent to prevent unaffordable gambling. The Panel had no reason to question that the company’s system was designed to return the stakes even if the bets had been unsuccessful.

The Panel also established that the customer had at no time been informed that a loss limit had been applied to his account. He could not have anticipated that his bets would be or even might be rejected on safer gambling grounds. Nor did the customer receive any indication when requesting and placing the bets that they had been or might be rejected for any other reason. In fact, he was told that they had been accepted.

As a result – and taking into account that £524.50 of the total stake could have been placed without breaching the loss limit had the customer been warned – the Panel adjudicated that cancelling the customer’s winning bets was unfair and that they should be reinstated.

Recommendations to Remote Gambling Operators

• There may be circumstances where the application of certain loss limits or other safer gambling measures/markers are more effective if not brought to customers’ attention, but in general we believe it is preferable for account holders to be kept aware of all restrictions that apply or might apply to their account. UK Government advice on unfair contract terms warns that if a term is likely to surprise a consumer, then reasonable efforts must be made to bring that term to the individual’s attention. Our Adjudication Panel accepted that the news of the loss limit and the cancellation of the disputed bets would have genuinely surprised this customer.

• Following this example, we advise all remote operators to liaise with any third-party game suppliers and conduct tests on existing and newly introduced products to ensure that attempts to place bets which might breach loss or spend limits will be blocked at submission rather than needing to be corrected afterwards.