Remote customer interaction and requirement remains in a soft corner after the Gambling Commission announced to make them effective on September 12, 2022. Many operators expressed hesitation in doing so over the technical difficulties. A new update now announces only a part to get into effect on the pre-decided time day.
Social Responsibility Code Provision 3.4.3 was published in April. The code highlighted the need for remote operators to do all they can to identify customers at risk of harm.
Guidance was published in June this year, and the entire set was originally scheduled to go live on September 12, 2022.
Now that there is an obstacle on the way, only a part of it will be taken live on the said date. As for the remainder, the Commission will take time to draft a consultation with the experts and implement it on a fresh timeline.
While the full compliance will not go live, most of it is still set to go live on September 12, 2022. This includes the following requirements:-
- Para 3 – Taking actions on time after the vulnerability indicators have been identified while considering the Commission’s approach to vulnerability as set out in the guidance.
- Para 10 – Preventing marketing tactics, especially the ones that mention bonus offers with a strong indicator of causing harm to the users.
The sections that will not be brought into immediate effect are Para 2 and Para 1. They would instead be taken up in the consultation process based on the operators’ experience from April to September.
The consultation process is tentatively scheduled to start in the last days of September. It will go on for six weeks before the Commission finalizes the final content of the guidance. Provided everything works in the revised timeline, the Gambling Commission will publish the guidance later this year, probably by December. Following this, the guidance will be effective by February 12, 2023.
Several pieces of recent gambling news indicate the same timeline; however, it is up to the Gambling Commission and operators to publish the final guidance on time.
The idea of the Gambling Commission is to protect the users from potential harm that may severely affect them. A set of new rules that were planned to be implemented in September are:-
- Monitoring at least one indicator to identify the gambling harm.
- Take timely action after flagging the indicators.
- Bring in an automated process to strongly indicate the gambling.
- Prevent marketing the services to those customers who have been identified to be at risk.
- Evaluate that operators do the needful by interacting at least at the level of problem gambling.
- Present the interaction to the Commission when the routine casework is in process.
- Comply with the implemented guidance set every time.
Andrew Rhodes, the Chief Executive of the Gambling Commission, had earlier highlighted that some operators were not doing their best to assist during the guidance implementation.
