Spelinspektionen Keeps on Fining Operators in an Effort to Stop Gambling Irregularities

Sweden has last year announced its plans to liberalize the gambling market by ending the state-owned monopoly and allowing foreign operators to apply for licenses. The interest was huge, and after the initial 22 interested parties, more and more continued applying for licenses to operate in the Swedish gambling market.

Spelinspektionen, the Swedish regulator, had the difficult task of verifying and approving these operators and issuing them the license to operate. The licenses were being issued in batches, and towards the end of 2018, the total number of licensees was announced. With the issuing of the new licenses, the total of operators which were allowed to offer their gambling services to the Swedish players was 65.

However, Spelinspektionen’s responsibilities include fining those who don’t adhere to the rules. That’s why lately, the watchdog has had its hands full since licensees seem to have forgotten the rules or have decided to bend them. For that, they are now obliged to pay massive fines.

Genesis and AG Communications have to pay $232,000 for breaking Sweden’s gambling rules on bonus terms.

The New Fines

After fining a number of companies, Spelinspektionen warned operators to abide by the rules. The regulator reminded operators to display the Spelpaus logo, the self-exclusion program, in addition to the logos of two other Responsible Gaming sites, and make sure players always have quick access to these programs. The regulator also warned operators to limit their bonus offers or else. Mandalorian Technologies and Betway were the two operators who were fined a month ago that had to pay $1.45 million as they were penalized over bonus terms violations.

More operators faced fines by the regulator recently. Two operators were fined by the Spelinspektionen a few days ago because they broke the rules on bonus offers. They were trying to bend the rules on bonuses, offering players more than just a Welcome Bonus offer. The Swedish gambling law states that licensees an offer a Welcome Bonus to new players, but that’s it. No other bonuses should be offered. AG Communications Ltd and the respected Genesis Global Limited seem to have missed the memo or chose to ignore it.

The two companies offered bonuses which are inconsistent with the law, and for that, they were fined with some huge fines, $232,000 in total. Genesis, which operates with CasinoJoy and Playamo Casino has to pay the bigger part, a fine of $180,000, while the operator behind Karamba and Casino Luck AG Communications has to pay $52,722.

Previous Fines Issued to Genesis and AG Communication

The irony is that these two companies were warned and even fined by the regulator for not abiding by the gambling framework, as stated by the Spelinspektionen.

In fact, Genesis has already paid $430,000 two months ago, for not linking its operations to the self-exclusion program properly. AG Communications paid $321,000 for the same problem. Spelinspektionen introduced the self-exclusion program the same day the newly reregulated market opened on January 1^st, 2019. Operators are obliged to adequately link their online casino sites to the self-exclusion site so that it would be easily accessible to those vulnerable from gambling-related harms.