The Gambling Commission highlighted a series of failures at Entain’s online and popular businesses, which came after the government announced a review of gambling laws that led the industry to promise improved controls to tackle addiction and prevent money laundering. The “totally unacceptable” incidents, which prompted Entain’s second regulatory settlement, included having just one chat interaction with a customer who spent long periods of gambling in the middle of the night over 18 months, pocketing £230,845. Another customer who had been banned from betting with Coral due to concerns about his bets was allowed to set up another account under a different Entain brand and deposit £30,000 a day. A third person was allowed to deposit £742,000 in 14 months without proper checks on what he could afford, while another person, known to be living in social housing, was allowed to deposit £186,000 in six months without adequate checks. Subscribe to Business Today Get ready for the business day – we’ll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertising and content sponsored by external parties. For more information, see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and Google’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. The incidents took place even as gaming industry lobbyists pushed back against proposals such as strict affordability controls, claiming the industry was already socially responsible. A gambling white paper, which contained a series of similar reforms aimed at tightening gambling laws, was due to be published in June but has been delayed, to the dismay of campaigners, while the Tory party chooses a new leader. The commission’s regulatory settlement with Entain includes terms forcing the company to implement an “improvement plan” to strengthen controls designed to prevent money laundering and address gambling addiction. “This is the second time this operator has broken the rules in place to make gambling safer and free from crime,” said the regulator’s chief executive, Andrew Rhodes. “There have been completely unacceptable anti-money laundering and safer gambling failures. Operators are reminded that they should never make commercial reasons for compliance. “They should know that we will be watching them very closely and further serious breaches will make the removal of their license a very real possibility. We expect better and consumers deserve better.”
