Gambling company In Touch Games has been fined £6.1mln by the Gambling Commission for customer handling and money laundering failures.
“This £6.1m fine shows that we will take escalating enforcement action where failures are repeated, and all licensees should be acutely aware of this,” said Kay Roberts, executive director of operations for the Gambling Commission.
In Touch Games, which owns online casinos cashmo.co.uk and bonusboss.co.uk, failed to check up on one flagged customer for seven weeks.
The company was cited for “accepting a customer’s word,” when they claimed to be earning £6,000 a month after being flagged, the investigation by the Gambling Commission found.
Gambling companies are required to flag a customer for behaviours including extended periods of play, erratic play patterns, large spending or gambling during unsociable hours.
The Gambling Commission enacted “stronger and more prescriptive” rules for dealing with flagged customers in September last year.
The Halesowen-based company also failed to follow the Commission’s guidelines on “money laundering and terrorist financing risk assessment.”
In Touch Games failed to note customers who were beneficiaries of a life insurance policy, involved in high-risk jurisdictions or were politically exposed.
In one example the gambling business ignored its own policy by not requesting a source of funds for a customer who deposited and lost £10,000 in a year.
The company has faced fines twice before for regulatory failures - £2.2mln in 2019 and £3.4mln in 2021.
“Considering this operator’s history of failings, we expected to see significant improvement when we carried out our planned compliance assessment.
“Disappointingly, although many improvements had been made, there was still more to do,” Kay Roberts stated.
“Considering this operator’s history of failings, we expected to see significant improvement when we carried out our planned compliance assessment. Disappointingly, although many improvements had been made, there was still more to do,” Kay Roberts stated.