Matchbook owner Triplebet hit with UKGC fine as suspension continues

Matchbook owner Triplebet has been hit with a £740,000 fine from the Gambling Commission (UKGC) over failings in the operator’s social responsibility and anti-money laundering practices over a two-year period.

The exchange operator’s parent company Triplebet had its UKGC licence suspended in February following a comprehensive UKGC review of its operating practices, although the reasons for the suspension were not disclosed – until now.

UKGC investigators found Triplebet had not conducted adequate social responsibility checks on its top 10 Matchbook exchange customers. Detailing these failings, the UKGC said no source of funds checks took place, only identity and address checks, while no risk profiles were prepared on the customers.

In addition, investigators found that there was a “general failure” to record customer meetings, monitoring and interactions, as required under LCCP social responsibility standards.

Triplebet did not conduct any enhanced due diligence or source of funds checks on a customer who lost $714,000 over a 12-month period. In this case, checks were only conducted when the UKGC raised concerns about a family member who had been convicted of gambling-related offences.

Triplebet claimed that some or all of the players involved were professional gamblers who were a known low-risk category for money laundering. However, the operator was unable to provide evidence of this assessment to back it up, leading the UKGC to reject this status.

One of Triplebet’s major customers was a betting syndicate whose lead contributor was a professional gambler, who also held a beneficial interest in Triplebet itself. Investigators found that over an 18-month period from November 2016, the syndicate matched bets on the exchange totalling in excess of $55m, without any documented risk assessment taking place.

In response, Triplebet said that its actual customer was the lead contributor of the syndicate and that there was no obligation to conduct AML and source of funds checks. However, the UKGC panel found that as a consequence of failing to conduct these checks, gamblers had been permitted to gamble very large sums without due diligence.

By the time of the review hearing, the firm had suspended activity for all syndicates, pending due diligence checks. UKGC investigators found that Triplebet had permitted account-to-account transactions without recording or documenting the reasons for the transaction.

Between November 2014 and May 2018, approximately £3.2m and $2.4m were transferred from UK customers to non-UK customers, with £1.1m and $1.8m passing in the other direction.

In addition, there were examples of single customers being listed against different countries and/or making transfers between accounts in their own name.

Following UKGC intervention, Triplebet ceased account-to-account transactions for UK customers in May 2018. However, it did not ban such transactions for non-UK customers until January 2019.

In respect of social responsibility, Triplebet was found to have not conducted social responsibility checks on players gambling with large sums of money over short periods.

In one case, a player registered, played, self-excluded on the same day and then six months later registered again, subsequently losing a large sum in a single day before self-excluding again, all without the necessary monitoring or customer interaction.

In March 2018, Triplebet provided the UKGC with its social responsibility policy effective from November 2017. However, this was found to be a customer-facing document which did not comply with the Gambling Commission’s code.

Triplebet stated that a further social responsibility policy did exist but was unable to locate it. The UKGC revealed the operator then adopted an acceptable responsible gambling policy in June 2018.

Following the conclusion of this review, the licence was suspended, with additional conditions being attached to the operating licence and the imposition of a financial penalty.

UKGC CEO Neil McArthur said the regulator had repeatedly made it clear that adequate player protection and AML practices must be at the forefront of operator activities.

“We will not hesitate to use our regulatory powers, including the suspension and revocation of licences, if we need to do that to protect consumers and the public from gambling-related harm,” said McArthur.

“Any operator that doubted we were ready and willing to use the full range of our regulatory powers should think again. All operators need to learn the lessons from this case and our other enforcement cases,” he added.

Speaking about the suspension, Triplebet said it welcomed the conclusion of the two-year long review process and had already implemented all of the recommendations highlighted by the UKGC.

“We are committed to upholding every aspect of the UKGC regulations, and we are proud of all the hard work our teams have put in to get us to these final stages. We are excited about relaunching for our UK customers, who tell us they are looking forward to our return,” Triplebet added.