Paddy Power Betfair has agreed to pay £2m for failing to step in quickly enough when customers appeared to be problem gambling.
The Gambling Commission identified instances where the bookie did not intervene soon enough to customers engaging in harmful gambling behaviour, including when one customer staked £86,000 in just over two weeks but “no manual review of the account took place”.
Betting firms are required to have systems and processes that monitor concerning gambling activity.
Flutter Entertainment, which owns Paddy Power Betfair, said it takes customer safety seriously and believes the issues highlighted by the watchdog will not be repeated.
The Gambling Commission said a compliance assessment last year uncovered social responsibility failures at the firm where customer interactions “fell far short” of what is required.
It said that while Paddy Power had systems in place to identify problem gambling, the examples of failures uncovered showed “the velocity of spend, increasing deposits, overnight gambling, and changing betting patterns did not appear to be identified by the licensees or acted upon until the next day”.
It gave another example of a customer that went on intense betting sprees, one of which lasted nearly eight hours. The customer placed more than 300 bets for a total of £20,000.
Another customer deposited £25,000 in 25 days “before being interacted with”.
John Pierce, commission director of enforcement at the Gambling Commission, said the size of the payment “reflects the seriousness of the failings identified”.
“These failings should never have occurred,” he said.
“While the licensees co-operated fully with the investigation, accepted the failings early and implemented an action plan quickly, this immediate response is the minimum we expect from operators when serious shortcomings are identified.”
Mr Pierce added: “Over-reliance on automation and failure to intervene when clear harm indicators are present exposes consumers to unnecessary risk.”
Four operators trading under the names Paddy Power and Betfair – PPB Entertainment, PPB Counterparty Services, Betfair Casino and TSE Malta – will pay the money as part of the settlement.
The £2m “payment in lieu of a financial penalty” is the second time in two years that Paddy Power Betfair has faced regulator action.
The company was ordered to pay £490,000 in 2023 for sending promotional push notifications to vulnerable customers, who had signed up to exclude themselves.
A spokesperson for Flutter’s UK and Ireland business said: “Flutter takes its safer gambling responsibilities incredibly seriously and we firmly believe that we lead the industry in player protection.
“Customer safety is our number one priority and there is no suggestion that any of the customers reviewed by the Gambling Commission experienced any harm.
“Our controls have evolved significantly and we recently introduced a next generation customer safety platform, with the vast majority of checks now happening in real-time.
“As such, we are confident that the issues highlighted by the commission in its public statement would not be repeated today.”
