ProgressPlay Limited has been fined £1m by the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) for compliance failures related to anti-money laundering and social responsibility.
Following a UKGC compliance assessment, a warning has also been issued to the operator, who is expected to undergo a third-party audit within six months of a licence review being concluded to ensure the implementation of AML and social responsibility policies, procedures, and controls.
Operating 134 websites, ProgressPlay has now faced enforcement action from the UKGC for the second time in three years, as the operator paid a £175,718 fine for social responsibility and AML failures in 2022.
The Commission noted that the breaches took place over various dates between August 2021 and August 2024.
John Pierce, Director of Enforcement and Intelligence at the UKGC, commented: “Gambling businesses must have robust policies and procedures in place to protect consumers and ensure appropriate anti-money laundering controls are maintained. These measures must be actively implemented and regularly tested to confirm their effectiveness.
“This case marks the second time ProgressPlay Limited has been subject to enforcement action by the Gambling Commission. Its failure to meet AML obligations, along with the gaps identified in its social responsibility processes, are unacceptable.”
According to the UKGC, AML failures by ProgressPlay included:
- An appropriate Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (MLTF) risk assessment was not conducted and appropriate controls to minimise MLTF risk were not implemented.
- Not considering all business-associated risks, failing to take a sufficient risk-based AML approach.
- Transactions carried out during customer relationships, such as verifying source of funds, were not sufficiently scrutinised to ensure transactions were consistent with the casino’s understanding of the customer, their business activities, and their risk profile.
The Commission also stated that the operator’s social responsibility failures included:
- Not having adequate systems and processes in place to monitor customer activity at the point of account opening effectively, early identification of potential gambling-related harm or the implementation of appropriate interventions was at risk.
- Employing a customer interactions policy which didn’t adequately address the elements of identify, act and evaluate set out in the Remote Customer Interaction section of the Licence Conditions and Codes of Practice.
- Not implementing adequate processes to understand the impact of individual interactions and actions on a customer’s behaviour, the continued risk of potential harm, and whether further action is needed.
In addition, the Commission said that ProgressPlay cooperated with the investigation and took corrective steps to address the failings identified.
“As part of the regulatory outcome, ProgressPlay is now required to undergo an independent third-party audit to assess the adequacy of its compliance arrangements across these areas,” Pierce added.
“Operators should be in no doubt: repeated regulatory breaches will result in increasingly severe enforcement action. We urge all operators to examine the failings identified in this case and take proactive steps to strengthen their own systems and controls.”
