Unibet hit with $1 million AUD fine for gambling self-exclusion rule breaches

Unibet has been fined just over $1 million (AUD), or around $650,000 (USD), for breaching a gambling self-exclusion rule.

The penalty of $1,014,120 (AUD) was levelled against the gambling company for failing to close down the accounts of 954 customers who registered with BetStop, the National Self-Exclusion Register (NSER) in Australia.

An investigation from the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) uncovered the failure, revealing more than 100,000 contraventions of the Interactive Gambling Act 2001 (IGA rules). Good practice states that accounts need to be closed as soon as possible after registering on the NSER.

45 accounts remained open for more than 190 days, including several customers who had registered on the NSER on the very first day it became available. Although none of these customers were able to place bets, the accounts need to be fully closed in order to comply.

Unibet also offered betting services to 45 customers after their registrations ended, using old accounts that should have been closed down in the first place. The ACMA found evidence that those customers were able to place thousands of bets, with one customer placing more than 1,200 on their old account.

The IGA rules state that accounts need to be closed down as soon as possible, with more contraventions placed against companies for every day that the account remains open. Once a self-registration ends, the customer should need to open a new account, rather than be able to log back into an old one.

“Our investigation found very serious breaches by Unibet over a sustained period of time,” ACMA member and gambling lead Carolyn Lidgerwood said. “Taking, in some cases, 190 days to close accounts is clearly unacceptable and does not reflect the decisions made by Unibet customers to seek support to help them not gamble.

“The NSER rules are also there to ensure that people are making a clear and deliberate choice to recommence gambling. That is not the case if they can simply access old accounts.”

Although the investigation recognized that no bets were made from the accounts and no marketing communications were sent while customers were self-excluded, the behavior of Unibet was still against the IGA rules.

In addition to the first financial penalty imposed by the ACMA for breaches of NSER rules, the ACMA has accepted a two-year court-enforceable undertaking from Unibet, which commits Unibet to a comprehensive independent review of its compliance systems, as well as any necessary implementation of recommended improvements.

Unibet has voluntarily issued refunds to affected customers who were able to access accounts that should have been closed.

Featured image: Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

The post Unibet hit with $1 million AUD fine for gambling self-exclusion rule breaches appeared first on ReadWrite.