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William Hill fined £19.2m by UK gambling regulator for ‘widespread’ failures
Sarah Taaffe-Maguire
Business reporter @taaffems
Tuesday 28 March 2023 07:23, UK
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British gambling company William Hill has been hit by a record £19.2m fine by the UK gambling regulator.
Three gambling businesses owned by the company will pay the sum for “widespread and alarming” social responsibility and anti-money laundering failures, the Gambling Commission said.
The entities who will pay the fines will be WHG (International) Limited, which runs williamhill.com and will pay £12.5m – Mr Green Limited, which runs mrgreen.com, which will pay £3.7m; and William Hill Organisation Limited, which operates 1,344 gambling premises across Britain and will pay £3m.
It is the largest settlement in the Gambling Commission’s history.
Failures identified by the regulator included allowing a customer to open a new account and spend £23,000 in 20 minutes, all without any checks.
Another social responsibility failure identified was failing to conduct any checks and allowing a different customer to open an account and spend £18,000 in 24 hours.
A third customer was able to spend £32,500 over two days, also without any checks.
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Due to “ineffective controls” 331 customers were able to gamble with WHG (International) Limited despite having self-excluded themselves with Mr Green.
Anti-money laundering failures allowed customers to deposit large sums without appropriate checks.
A spokesperson for William Hill parent company 888 said: “The settlement relates to the period when William Hill was under the previous ownership and management.”
“After William Hill was acquired, the company quickly addressed the identified issues with the implementation of a rigorous action plan.”
The company was purchased by 888 from Caesar’s Entertainment in July 2022.
“The entire group shares the [Gambling Commission’s] commitment to improve compliance standards across the industry and we will continue to work collaboratively with the regulator and other stakeholders to achieve this.”
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