Aspire Global hit with £250k Swedish fine over self-exclusion failings

Aspire Global’s Swedish facing subsidiary, AG Communications Limited, has received a SEK3m fine (£247,000) from the Swedish Gambling Authority (SGA) over its failure to connect to the Spelpaus.se self-exclusion database.

Aspire Global failed to connect to Spelpaus from the required January 1 date, citing failures in a third-party system which prevented the company from integrating with the Spelpaus.

In the interim, the company conducted a manual crosscheck of its records against Spelpaus listings every ten minutes, refunding any players who had accessed its sites while being self-excluded.

However, it was later discovered that this system still allowed 34 self-excluded players to continue gambling on the Aspire Global site due to disparities in the recording of national social security numbers.

On 8 January, Aspire Global temporarily closed access to all its Swedish facing sites while the issues were corrected, eventually completing the connection to the Spelpaus database on 15 January.

The SGA wrote to several operators including Aspire Global, Genesis Global, Lottoland and Tipwin after receiving complaints that players had been able to access sites despite self-excluding.

The SGA said a functioning connection to Spelpaus was of the “utmost importance to counteract social and economic damages of problem gambling”.

Responding to the ruling, Aspire Global acknowledged its infringement, adding that it shares Spelinspektionen’s ambition to promote a healthy gaming behaviour and “regrets the turn of events” which led to the fine being levied.