UKGC Completes Stage 1 of Its Financial Risk Assessment Pilot
The United Kingdom Gambling Commission (UKGC), the region’s regulatory authority, has announced it has now completed Stage 1 of its pilot scheme on the effectiveness of the financial risk assessments that may be introduced as part of the changes to the current Gambling Act in the jurisdiction. It was designed to test if gaming operators are able to carry out frictionless checks on gamblers during gameplay.
LISTEN TO THIS ARTICLE:This is the first of three stages the UKGC will undertake to evaluate how the White Paper Gambling Act review proposals work in the gambling industry. The purpose of Stage 1 was to see if high spending players are vulnerable to financial risks and at harm from gambling activities. This system uses credit companies to assess whether players are able to sustain losses at high levels. The UKGC boasts these checks are frictionless which allows the majority of players to continue gambling while the assessment is carried out in the background.
The pilot exercise is proving to be worthwhile in testing how financial risk assessments might work in practice and explore practical implementation issues before final decisions are made. Taking a staged approach to the pilot means that issues identified in the first stage can be explored further, such as data consistency across credit reference agencies where appropriate and data accuracy from operators
The UKGC and stakeholders in the gambling industry are trying to focus on vulnerable gamblers and highlight these individuals at an early stage so they can b offered help and support tools.
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Findings of Stage 1 Financial Checks
The results of Stage 1 analysed 300,000 player accounts and carried out more than 530,000 assessments. The findings from the UKGC stated the financial assessment process was successful 95% of the time, with credit reference agencies able to perform a check on the player and return the findings to a gaming operator.
The UKGC says it will now move on to the next 2 stages, which it hopes to complete by April this year. Stage 2 of the pilot entails evaluating the speed with which credit reference agencies can return a financial risk assessment to a gaming operator request.
The final part of the process is Stage 3, and this part of the pilot will review the first 2 stages and identify any data issues or performance issues in the process that can be refined and improved.
A key part of our work will also be to further support operators to consider how financial risk assessments could be put together with other information about indicators of harm which the gambling businesses already have, to support customers in as frictionless a manner as possible.
At the end of January the UKGC opened a new consultation period on the proposed changes to the Gambling Act set out in the White Paper review in the region.
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