LOTTOLAND.CO.UK OPERATOR FINED £760K FOR SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY & AML FAILINGS

EU Lotto, the operator of lottoland.co.uk, has been hit with a GB£760,000 fine and formal warning, after a Gambling Commission investigation uncovered social responsibility and anti-money laundering failures. 

The failures are said to have occurred between October 2019 and November 2020, and include failing to spot markers of potential gambling harm, insufficient financial and affordability checks, and inadequate interaction with customers regarding potential harms. 

Anti-money laundering issues included failure to effectively review or analyse bank statements provided by customers to prove addresses, failure to restrict accounts following source of funds requests, allowing customers to register debit cards belonging to third-parties, and relying too heavily on threshold triggers. 

Helen Venn, Commission Executive Director, said: “This case, like other recent enforcement action, was the result of planned compliance activity. All operators should be very aware that we will not hesitate to take firm action against those who fail to meet the high standards we expect for consumers in Britain.”

Nigel Birrell, CEO of Lottoland, commented: “Lottoland is fully committed to ensuring the highest standards of compliance, including its anti-money laundering and social responsibility obligations in all of the jurisdictions in which it operates. The Gambling Commission fine was related to legacy issues around some of our compliance controls which have now been addressed. Lottoland  has extensive compliance measures in place and we are confident that our current policies and processes meet all relevant standards. 

“Remedial action taken included significantly increased investment in our compliance function, more than doubling headcount, alongside a host of other initiatives including bringing in third party support, enhancing training and a review of key policies. In addition, we recently committed to building our individual processes into an automated system to improve the system even further.”