The Gambling Commission has today published a report into enforcement action that it has taken against operators over the past year. The report can be downloaded below and a short explanatory video featuring the Commission’s CEO Neil McArthur can be viewed on YouTube.

The report is essential reading for all gambling operators licensed by the Commission because it highlights the current top six priorities in terms of the Commission’s regulatory concerns (as evidenced by public statements listed on the Commission’s “Lessons learnt – compliance failings” webpage), namely:

1. Anti-money laundering
2. Customer interaction
3. Self-exclusion
4. Unfair terms and practices
5. Marketing and advertising
6. Illegal gambling

On the Commission’s website, Neil McArthur is quoted as saying:

• “We want operators to pay attention to the lessons set out in this report. We want them to focus on ways to make gambling fairer and safer for consumers in Great Britain”
• “We also want gambling businesses to collaborate and to invest the same amount of resources into data, technology and research into building better protections for consumers, as they do to creating new products, or advertising and marketing campaigns”
• “This is a call to action to the leaders of operators to set the tone from the top, to lead a culture of compliance that puts doing the right thing for your customers first, and to strive to continuously raise standards for consumers.”

UPDATE: In our subsequent website posting entitled “How to avoid regulatory enforcement action by the Gambling Commission”, we have recommended that gambling operators save themselves a lot of time, trouble and (potentially) money by conducting their own regulatory self-checks by posing to themselves a series of good practice questions set out within the Commission’s report.