The UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) has fined Petfre (Gibraltar) Limited £2.87 million for social responsibility and anti-money laundering failings.
According to the Commission, the operator – which runs betfred.com and oddsking.com – has received the fine and an official warning for the failures, which were found after the organisation launched an investigation into the firm.
The Commission found that Petfre had no controls in place to prevent large levels of high velocity spend by new customers, with one customer allowed to lose £70,000 over a 10-hour period just one day after opening their account.
What’s more, the operator set safer gambling interaction triggers too high and when customers’ spend increased considerably, Petfre failed to conduct a safer gambling account review in a timely manner.
Petre also failed to carry out source of funds checks on a customer who deposited £210,000 of stolen money and lost £140,000 within a 12-day period in November 2017.
The Commission found that Petfre failed to take into account the money laundering and terrorist financing (MLTF) risks connected to its business and failed to implement appropriate policies, procedures, and controls to manage and mitigate MTLF risks.
The operator also reportedly failed to ensure that its policies, procedures, and controls were implemented effectively and failed to thoroughly implement the measures described in the Money Laundering regulations.
Leanne Oxley, the Gambling Commission Director of Enforcement and Intelligence, said in a statement: “This is a further example of us taking action to investigate and sanction alarming failures.
“We expect this gambling business and all other licensees to review this case and look closely to see if they need to make further improvements to demonstrate active compliance. Where standards do not improve, tougher enforcement will follow.”
The news comes after Betway was fined for marketing appearing on the children’s pages of the West Ham United Football Club website. Meanwhile, Spreadex was fined £1.36 million and Smarkets was fined £630,000 for multiple failures.
