Coral Pay Over £870k for Anti Money Laundering Mistakes

Gala Coral pay hefty fine for failure to adhere to anti money laundering guidelines.

One of the world’s leading gaming companies Gala Coral Group were forced to surrender more than £840,000 they had earned from a single UK bettor as they were found to have failed to adhere to anti money laundering and know your customer policies.

The UK Gambling Commission recently finished an investigation of a high value punter who has wagered considerable funds with Coral Racing and Coral Interactive businesses.

The inquiry showed that the man in question had stolen around £800k from another bank account that he later used to fund his gambling habit.

He has since been sentenced to three years in prison, but not before he squandered £846,664 at the Gala Coral businesses. The punter was a retail Coral customer since 2012 and he wagered online between January 2014 and January 2015.

The Coral staff were aware of his hefty bets, but they believed he was an electrician coming from a wealthy family. The bookmaker even invited their high-profile customer to a number of hospitality events, but they failed to conduct a proper background check and instead trusted his word.

Coral eventually noticed the huge discrepancy between his income and value of bets he was placing, but they failed to act on it and were eventually found guilty of failing to report the suspicious activity.

Coral Decide to Surrender the Earnings

Gala Coral confessed that the company had failed to follow the UK Gambling Commission’s anti money laundering and know your customer protocols, but maintained they had improved their operations in that regard.

As a gesture of good will, the company decided to surrender the £846,664 it had earned from the punter in question, while paying another £30 to cover the UKGC investigation costs.

Gala Coral is certainly not the first major operator to have been found guilty of failing to follow the UKGC guidelines, as Paddy Power, Caesars Entertainment UK and Mecca Bingo were all forced to pay hefty fines for similar infractions.