The major gambling regulator in the UK revealed that it has reached a £1.3-million settlement with White Hat Gaming after the watchdog found the gambling company’s anti-money laundering and social responsibility policies inadequate.
A previous assessment of the online gambling business that was carried out by the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) has resulted in some changes of the operator’s approach to social responsibility and prevention of money laundering violations. The regulator’s assessment, which came as part of the ongoing compliance work of the UKGC, identified certain failures in the way the licensee identified and handled consumers who were considered at higher risk of becoming problem gamblers or being involved in money laundering schemes.
As revealed by the UK gambling regulator, inadequate social responsibility and anti-money laundering procedures of White Hat Gaming ended up with some failures.
The shortcomings involved the accounts of seven customers at four of the gambling company’s websites – 21casino.com, dreamvegas.com, grandivy.com and hellocasino.com and were found after a compliance assessment carried out by the UKGC in March 2019. Then, in January 2020, the regulator informed White Hat Gaming that t had started a review of its online operating licence.
Violations of AML and SR Policies Not Intentional, Gambling Regulator Says
The company was found to have not checked the source of funds of a customer who lost £70,000 in three months. It also had ineffective interaction with another customer who generated a £50,000 loss in six hours only, and with a third individual who lost £85,000 in a bit more than an hour.
As far as the anti-money laundering policy failures are concerned, White Hat gaming was found to have permitted one customer to lose £70,000 in about two years although the online gambling operator had what it described as limited knowledge of the player’s source of funds. There was also another case, in which White Hat asked a customer to provide it with some evidence for their source of funds after they lost £55,000 in two years but, unfortunately, did not manage to properly confirm the bank statements which the customer had provided.
The UK gambling watchdog revealed that the gambling company had been cooperative at the time when the investigation was held. Furthermore, the regulatory body shared that it found no evidence suggesting that the company had committed the aforementioned violations intentionally.
Under the terms of the announced regulatory settlement, White Hat Gaming is to pay £1.3 million instead of a financial penalty, with the due payment set to be directed towards the National Strategy to Reduce Gambling Harms. Apart from that, the online gambling company had agreed to participate in an ongoing programme aimed at improving and enhancing its anti-money laundering procedures and social responsibility policies.
The improvements that are set to be brought by the company to its policies and procedures include an increase in safer gambling interactions with consumers, implementation of automated prevention of further spending once a customer hits their limits, regular reviews of anti-money laundering procedures and more extensive source of funds customer checks.
- Author
Olivia Cole
