Dutch Supreme Court upholds KSA fines
Operators challenge KSA right to levy fines in unlicensed regulatory environment
The Dutch Council of State, the highest administrative court in the Netherlands, has upheld earlier decisions by the Dutch Gaming Authority (KSA) to issue financial sanctions against three operators for offering egaming to Dutch citizens.
In November 2013, Onisac Limited and Mansion Online Casino Limited were each fined €150,000 for targeting Dutch consumers without a license from June 2012 -August 2013 in violation the Betting and Gaming Act.
The providers appealed the sanction decision, first with the KSA in 2014, but the KSA dismissed this appeal because “because the games of chance offered illegally are addictive and there are no guarantees that the companies make sufficient efforts to prevent addiction and excessive participation in the Netherlands”.
A subsequent appeal against this decision was dismissed by the Court of The Hague in July 2017, which reaffirmed the earlier decision but allowed the firms to take the appeal further to a higher court.
This latest appeal centred on whether the sanctions were in contravention of EU law in respect of the free movement of good as services across EU borders, as well as whether the KSA had the authority to impose fines against operators, given that no licensing regime existed for online operators at the time or since.
The administrative law division of the Council dismissed this assertion, calling the appeal “unfounded” confirming that the fine was proportional to the nature of the offence and that the KSA was within its rights to levy the fine.
A further appeal by another firm, Co Gaming Limited (which was previously known as Come On Europe) was also dismissed on the same basis. Co Gaming Limited were fined €180,000 in July 2014 under the prioritisation criteria, also having its appeal dismissed by the KSA.