Ladbrokes Coral Fined Almost £6M For Failures To Protect Vulnerable Gamblers

Ladbrokes Coral, one of the UK’s largest bookmakers will pay a huge penalty of £5.9M imposed by the UK Gambling Commission, over multiple failures to protect vulnerable gamblers and stolen money being used through the business.

Fulfil Responsibility

Isle Of Man based GVC, who now own Ladbrokes Coral , have been issued demands to fulfil it’s social responsibility in protecting vulnerable gamblers and prevent money laundering, both deemed unacceptable.Richard Watson, Executive director of the Commission said,“ These are systemic failings at a large operator, which resulted in consumers being harmed and stolen money flowing through the business and this is unacceptable.”

‘Social Responsibility Checks’ Not Carried Out

One customer lost £1.5M over a three year period with no questions asked as to where such funds were obtained. Coral carried out no ‘social responsibility interactions’ after the customer was using his account up to ten times in a day, losing £64,000 in one month.Another example saw a customer lose £98,000 in two years despite hundreds of deposit attempts had been made and declined, the customer also requested the operator to stop sending promotional material.Furthermore, the commission found no evidence the operator had carried out any social responsibility interaction after another customer lost £140,000 in the first month of opening a new account.‘Concerns’ were raised by Ladbrokes about a customer who had been depositing large amounts, but continued to let the customer make large deposits.The findings took place from 2014 and 2017, this was before GVC acquired Ladbrokes Coral. The penalties relate to seven customers who were deemed vulnerable with a further five more being investigated.GVC will pay £4.8M to causes relating to responsible gambling and a further £1.1M to ‘affected parties’, this will include victims who had money stolen and used to place bets.When GVC acquired Ladbrokes Coral they were fully aware of the significant findings in the breakdown of historic compliance failures in certain areas of the company.After working closely with the commission and other independent solicitors, GVC have delivered a thorough, prompt and far-reaching investigation, this directly led to the settlement.GVC Chief executive Kenny Alexander said,“ These historical findings were unacceptable and since the acquisition I have overseen a systematic review of the enlarged group’s player protection procedures and the individuals responsible for these problems have exited the business.”  

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