L & L to Pay £900,000 for Regulatory Failures

[Webzcas]

First off, kudos to @L&L-Jan for bringing this to my attention this morning.

Yes you read the title correctly, the UKGC have identified regulatory failings at L & L Europe to include unnecessarily delaying customer withdrawals.

Additionally the UKGC's findings uncovered AML failures. Result being that L & L have to pay a penalty of £900,000.

Sue Young, Executive Director of Operations at the UKGC, said:

As a regulator we expect consumers to be treated fairly.

A basic expectation is that when you have winnings you can withdraw those swiftly without hinderance from unfair terms and conditions or the operator failing to carry out checks at an earlier stage. That is essential to consumer trust.

There may be occasions where a gambling business can ask consumers for information at withdrawal to fulfil legal obligations, but this was not the case here.

We hope this case sends a clear reminder to the industry that, although much of our enforcement action frequently relates to anti-money laundering and social responsibility failings, we will not hesitate to act when we see incidents of gambling not being fair and open.

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[maxd]

Just my 2¢ -- personal opinion etc etc -- but £900k fine for asking for documents? Which, it should be noted, is exactly what the casino is supposed to do in a great many cases in order to not fall afoul of the UKGC requirements.

Why does "We hope this case sends a clear reminder" sound like the real purpose of this fine rather than punishing any actual wrong-doing on the part of L&L?

For the record L&L has been on the site for ... must be decades now, and we've seen no indication of any systemic problems with delayed withdrawals.

Would be good if the UKGC provided some actual proof or documentation. "We hope this sends a message" is pretty thin justification for a £900k fine.

- Max

 

[SYPlayer95]

Surprised to read this. I have had ABC pay out over £120,000 to me. 95% of this has been within minutes.

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

That’ll be lottomart fucked then!!!

 

[andysbetting1187]

Thats not a fine against L&L - its just @SYPlayer95 withdrawing his latest balance

 

[andysbetting1187]

Would be good if the UKGC provided some actual proof or documentation. "We hope this sends a message" is pretty thin justification for a £900k fine.

- Max

The big thing for me is that I have always found L&L responsible and fair in their approach (and if anything, a bit too diligent)

If they can fine them 900k, then there must be some mega fines coming in the future to a few other providers

 

[maxd]

I was reading an article in the Times of India (tbc) where the author was critiquing a part of Indian bureaucracy. It happened that the particular area of government he was talking about was primarily structured to catch and prevent cheaters, in this case Agricultural insurance claims.

The problem the author pointed out is that finding cheaters then becomes the means of justifying such a department. They can't come out and say "great year! no cheaters!" because nobody will believe them, they'll just assume they are kicking back and doing nothing. So they have to find people to crucify in order to show they are doing their job. And they do, surprise surprise, each and every year for 100+ years.

Somehow this sounded a lot like the UKGC fines to me: they have to find someone guilty and fine them to prove they exist and are doing a useful service. The pressure to look extra hard if at first they don't find a likely candidate will be overwhelming, not to mention scaling up the fines in order to make the headlines.

Given the stories I've heard regarding boardroom meetings with the UKGC I'd say the guy in the Times of India (tbc) pretty much nailed it.

 

[Wait!What?]

Somebody on the internet from Sweden was talking about how their Uncle was sent to jail for over 8 years for a minor offence. He was under the influence of alcohol and commited a crime. When the case ended the Judge in the closing statement(verbally) mentioned that- We know that you haven't commited a serious crime but we are punishing you just because we want to set an example for others.
I believe the L&L case is about setting an example for others and the UKGC wants them to live in fear.
These guys just got unlucky.

 

[Mr Wild]

The reality is that, in many cases, the underlying issue is that the UKGC believes an operator has failed to conduct sufficient affordability checks or has allowed customers to spend more than it considers acceptable. However, this does not necessarily constitute a breach of the LCCP.

Instead, these concerns are raised with the operator behind closed doors. The regulator then identifies other, sometimes relatively minor, technical breaches that can be used as the formal basis for enforcement action. Those are the breaches that get published, while the underlying concerns remain undisclosed.

 

[Jono777]

WTF! - My withdrawals (ok, ha ha) are instant and from what I read on here so are everybody else's.

As suggested these clueless clowns at UKGC are, apart from the odd 1% of the time, not fit for purpose.

My DoA deposits for the next 25 years may help cover some of it

 

[Reelsoffun]

I knew about this about a month ago from a reliable source, but out of respect to them I didn’t want to make public or comment before it was public, but I’m in agreement with the comments so far that it does seem a bit of a weak play by the UKGC but we never get to find out the juicy bits of what they failed on, or if it was really justified.

It does feel like the UKGC were just securing some funds for their Xmas party though at L&L’s expense, L&L may have lost their crown of never having had a fine, but they are still a good outfit to play at, nothing to see here.

 

[Reelsoffun]

I just wish the UKGC would fine casinos for more constructive things like stealing value from players when they reset games with persistence, then they might not be so keen to wipe out a players progress at a drop of a hat, yes I’m talking about you Videoslots.

 

[geordiecolin]

Well the UKGC has to get its funding from somewhere

 

[SYPlayer95]

I just wish the UKGC would fine casinos for more constructive things like stealing value from players when they reset games with persistence, then they might not be so keen to wipe out a players progress at a drop of a hat, yes I’m talking about you Videoslots.

VS has been fined before and will be fined again. They can't follow their own rules and terms, nevermind the UKGCs.

 

[Lemon]

I reckon the UKGC just spins a wheel every November to decide who will fund their Xmas holidays.

 

[andysbetting1187]

I reckon the UKGC just spins a wheel every November to decide who will fund their Xmas holidays.

Same with HMRC but they keep landing on me.

 

[Lemon]

Same with HMRC but they keep landing on me.

They call it the Pacman approach...

 

[andysbetting1187]

They call it the Pacman approach...

View attachment 228418

Thank you @Lemon that really cheered me up today

Ive also just filed my last HMRC letter in the shredder. I keep telling them that I don't want to be friends

 

[cheekymonkey]

They do claim to have 2 million players (mental) and I'm guessing they get time to pay as well, so it should be affordable to them.

This took me down another rabbit hole though as I started delving into who actually runs the UKGC, what exactly they do and how much they get paid and stuff. Will leave that for another day though.

 

[CongoGB]

I'll put my hand up to being one of those who would make a WD, it never be immediate - sometimes a few hours, sometimes half a day. Then while waiting for that, if I had won some more with remaining balance, I was unable to do a second WD.

One of the reasons I ended up excluding from L&L.

They may have great support here from Jan, but sometimes it's not all sunshine and rainbows for everyone.