Players with a deposit of more than £500 per month will be checked for solvency. The rule will come into force on August 30. The regulator believes this approach will provide better protection for vulnerable individuals, but the main reason is to address the inconsistencies in spending checks that exist in the sector.
The maximum deposit threshold for verification will be reduced to £150/month in February 2025. At the same time, players spending more than £25k/year on gambling will have to prove that they can afford to gamble on such money by providing financial statements.
The innovation was discussed last year and even then it met with massive resistance from the players. Thus, many consider the verification procedure unpleasant and regarded it as excessively overstepping personal boundaries.
The regulator, taking into account the concerns of the gambling community, is trying to simplify the verification process. It is reported that operators will only use publicly available customer data, without touching on personal details – such as job title.
However, it is clear that even £500/month is too low a threshold to interfere in the financial affairs of a customer, let alone £125/month. The situation is exacerbated by the limit on slots bets introduced in February, which the authorities predict will result in a £210m drawdown in the gambling sector.
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