Movers and shakers in the gambling world are determined to improve the industry’s image amid a wave of ’negative publicity’ and issues.

Several high-profile figures from the UK, involved in this year’s KPMG eGaming Summit, gathered for a Business News round table.

Their wide-ranging discussion was just as relevant for the island as it was for the UK.

lMicky Swindale, director, KPMG Isle of Man

l Lynda Atkinson, head of social responsibility, Genting

l Fiona Palmer, director of social responsibility, Remote Gambling Association

l Ben Haden, UK Gambling Commission

l Witek Wacinski, head of strategy, Ladbrokes Coral

l John Hagan, partner at Harris Hagan, City of London law firm specialising in gambling sector and chairman of the industry group for responsible gambling.

l Iain Corby, deputy chief executive, Gamble Aware charity

Chairing the hour-long event upstairs at 14 North restaurant on Douglas Quay, was Micky Swindale, a director at KPMG in the Isle of Man.

She said it was a pleasure to welcome the participants to discuss social responsibility in gaming and how best the so-called remote sector, which deals with online gambling, should respond to the increased regulatory interest in social responsibility measures.

This was an issue that also impacts the land-based sector.

Micky said it was a timely discussion because there had been plenty of comments in the media recently, particularly the many headlines about the record £7.8million fine from the UK Gambling Commission for online bookmaker 888.

888 was fined for allowing customers who had chosen to ’self-exclude’ to continue playing.

Micky, to get the ball rolling, referred to reports about the 888 fine and a ’common’ perception that the industry has a very poor record on social responsibility.

own goal

Iain Corby from the charity Gamble Aware said the industry needs to recognise that it is regarded as ’the gambling industry’ as a whole when any one company or operator was the subject of controversy.

He said: ’Anything that reflects badly on any particular sector within the industry, such as the remote sector, the public see that as the gambling industry as a whole.

’So where we have had quite a lot of unhelpful controversy, to some extent stirred up within the industry, I think that has ended up being something of an own goal.

’And this has contributed to people being quick to judge and to focus on failures and not on some of the successes that there certainly have been in terms of taking forward good responsible gambling measures and harm-minimisation.’

damaging

Industry lawyer John Hagan said: ’There is no doubt about the 888 regulatory settlement being damaging for the reputation of the industry as a whole and not just the online sector.

’I would not want to single out 888 because they are just the latest in a string of operators that have been the subject of regulatory settlements.

’These are not fly-by-night back street operators.

’These are the leading operators in our industry and this has to be emphasised before we even begin to discuss what the industry must be doing.

’As a bare minimum operators need to be complying with the legislation and regulation that applies.

’It cannot be acceptable, technical glitch or otherwise, to be carrying on and accepting play from self-excluded gamblers, in such large numbers, for a year.

’It is very unfortunate, it sets us back.

’There is so much good work being done by the industry, both as individual operators and as collaborators.

’And the media is not looking for good stories anyway. They are just not interested, the negative stories are more interesting and we as an industry are just not helping ourselves.

’In betting parlance, it’s an open goal.’

Micky said both men had touched upon some of the good work that had been done and she asked the delegates about the positives and why they are not coming to the public consciousness.

’What is the industry doing well?’ she asked.

Fiona Palmer of the Remote Gambling Association said there has been research going on for a year or two looking into player analytics, with the intention to help better understand the information available and how it can be used to improve identifying players.

This was particularly relevant in the online arena ’because this is where the big data question that comes into play’.

Through the charity Gamble Aware and consultants PwC, some gambling analytics research had been published signposting potential markers used to identify individuals and it is this type of work that could help operators.

collaboration

Fiona said: ’It demonstrates the collaboration that exists within the industry.

’Having worked in the industry myself for eight years, initially from an operator’s side, I have seen a change since the ’new’ UK point of consumption regulation came in during 2014 with regards operators working together.

’We all have to comply with the same regulations in the UK and therefore endeavour to work together to try to address and generate new ways of sharing better practice.

’It’s the classic ’’Rome wasn’t built in one day’’. It takes time to build up and test initiatives. It has to be said that operators will have different data sets and formats, so it can’t be assumed one size, in terms of a solution, fits all.

’Trying to identify a uniform set of markers for harm is a huge step forward.’

evaluation

Ben Haden of the regulatory body, the UK Gambling Commission, said: ’I think from the Commission’s perspective, our frustration would be that matters haven’t moved fast enough.

’Evaluation is an absolutely key part, because unless everyone understands what the impact is of doing X or doing Y then we won’t continue to be able to refine and move forward.’

Industry lawyer John Hagan said: ’It helps to understand there is an independent responsible gambling strategy board in place which has set a plan for the next three years as to how all the stakeholders - industry and regulators - need to address responsible gambling and the industry is going to be judged on the progress that it makes against that plan over those next three years.

’There are no quick fixes; there is no silver bullet that allows you as yet to identify an at-risk gambler, let alone know the best way to interact with them.

’The technology and understanding is evolving all the time but there are no easy answers.

’There is a strategy in place but unfortunately we are behind the argument ... behind the public . . . perception of the issues the headlines are already here, the damage is being done, we have not caught up with the media agenda.

’We need to catch up with it and get ahead with it.’

Gamble Aware’s Iain Corby said: ’The real pressure will come from shareholders and investors who have seen large fines and heard that the gambling commission has very publicly said that it is changing its attitude.

’Until now, the first resort has been a voluntary settlement.

’The option to take away somebody’s licence, temporarily or in perpetuity, is still there.

’Now shareholders are going to be worried, going from some value to zero value - and wondering whether there will be a company there at all.

’We have now seen a couple of stories about operators who are rapidly re-thinking how they deal with affiliates. They have looked at their risk profile and I presume they have decided this is next on the list, an area they are worried about.’

Mr Corby said that, while they can cajole with the regulator, it is the investors who are the people who can ’really shift resources and focus on operators.

’And if I was part of the management team of a remote operator I’d be wanting to be ready to deal with that at the next board meeting or AGM.’

Micky Swindale agreed, saying the fine for 888 would be a ’massive chunk’ of money for the company.

Mr Corby said the remote sector may have been immature and has not yet learned the lessons.

Lynda Atkinson, from established gambling firm Genting, brought in a historical perspective.

She said: ’I’ve been in the business for a long time. I know what it was like [in the past] and it was highly regulated with what we could advertise and could, or could not, do.

’And then it opened up, not as much as some expected it would.

Lynda said with advances in technology things are moving ’far faster than ever envisaged.

’When you go back to the 1980s, they [the regulator] went in and they closed Playboy and Ladbrokes [casinos]which were operating outside the 1968 Gaming Act.’

She said the previous legislation dated back to 1970 and it was 10 years before the clampdown happened.

She recalled: ’I understand they walked into the London casinos, stopped the gaming and shut them overnight.’

’Nobody believes the regulator would take away a licence from a leading operator until it happens.’

starting line

Tough talking Iain Corby of the charity Gamble Aware raised the subject of how much money the organisation receives.

He said: ’I don’t understand why we struggle for the money we ask for [as a charity].

’We ask for 10 pence in every £100 of their [operators] gross profits.

’For me [it’s] the first cheque of the year you write, to get over the starting line towards your social responsibility.

’And then you should be going well beyond that, not necessarily with money but with all the other things you are going to do.

’Clearly the basic compliance of self-exclusion, of spotting people who have erratic spending levels.

’The woman in the case involving the recent large fine, there was no way she could have afforded the amount of money she was spending - over a million pounds worth of bets, £50,000 of which she had to steal from her employer.

’There has to be a basic system in place to look at the overall amount of spend. The anti-money laundering control should also have kicked in with that level of spend.

’It’s just astonishing that it got through the system.’

Ben Haden said: ’I think it is interesting to think how the industry can lead from the front. It needs to be much more front foot as an industry in this space, rather than being behind the curve a little bit.

’It probably goes beyond that to raising standards and being able to talk about it in a different way. There are a range of areas in which you can do that.

’It’s one of those tricky questions over a short period of time to get right.’

John Hagan replied: ’I heard a quote by Mark Twain which I thought was very apt: ’’It is never wrong to do the right thing.’’

’And I would like, with all due respect, to take the regulator out of the equation altogether.

’I think operators should be looking at their businesses, meeting the requirements that the regulator and legislation sets, and then they should be looking at their customer and saying: ’’What is the right thing to do by this customer? I need to have advertising that is honest, fair and not misleading. I need to have terms and conditions that they understand, I need to work as best as I can to recognise when a customer has a problem and know how to interact with that customer. And when I do fall foul of legislation or regulation, this should be an exceptional occurrence, attributable perhaps to individual human error or some unforeseen event or some procedural failing where lessons can be learned and improvements made in training or procedures to prevent recurrence.’’

’You are focused towards doing the right thing [for] the customer and the general public.

’That is your main focus of attention and everything else should flow and be alright from that point.’

Lynda Atkinson from Genting said: ’I think there are an awful lot of gambling businesses out there all vying for customers, land-based or online.

’You need to take care of that customer, you need to make sure they do know and understand what they are doing. To see they are playing within their means, so there is a long-term relationship with them.

’Not just a case of: ’’We’ve got him, now let’s take all his money and then move on to the next one’’.’

Iain Corby talked about the value to operators of keeping customers and the income stream for the different companies.

He referred to someone who came to an operator’s website or casino ’quite comfortably’ for the next 40 years of their life and is then replaced by some younger person ’who takes their spot’.

He said that even with 100,000 customers, companies would be looking at ’millions and millions when you value that income stream,’ he said.

Mr Corby added that operators had this money coming in ’indefinitely’ and he asked Witek Wacinski, head of strategy, at Ladbrokes Coral if he could comment on this and whether it is a strategy.

Mr Wacinski, said: ’Predictable recurring income is more valuable than choppy income’.

safe

Mr Corby added that another sure-fire way of bringing in income is making sure that customers ’feel safe’.

He said he would love to see more companies ’make a virtue’ of their social responsibility to customers.

’I suspect [if they did that in their marketing] they would reap the rewards.

London lawyer John Hagan reiterated his earlier point that companies should make sure they did something themselves for the customer rather than rely on the regulators or government to protect their customers - He commented that ’a lot of people don’t like the gambling industry and will never want to gamble.

They will walk past a betting shop or an arcade, or they will see someone gambling on their phone, and they are thinking: ’’They should not be thinking of doing that, where is the fun in that, they must have a problem.’’

’That is their perception, often because they do not like to gamble themselves’.

’Except the lottery of course!’ interjected Mr Corby.

Mr Hagan added: ’They do not perceive the lottery as gambling. The (gambling) customer is the one that you want to be having the good and responsible experience, the long and sustainable experience.’

Ben Haden from the UK Gambling Commission said it was interesting to look outside the gambling sector at other businesses who faced similar questions regarding their responsibilities within the digital revolution and how consumer centric they have to be.

’I’m interested where the industry looks outside at different industries with similar issues.’

Iain Corby pointed out that that CSR (corporate social responsibility) is these days taken seriously by all boards.

challenge

Fiona Palmer from the Remote Gambling Association said: ’We are a huge diverse industry, seen by the consumer as one single industry, and the challenge we have got is pulling ourselves together as one.’

They have started doing this through working with the industry group for responsible gambling.

A responsible advertising code is currently being reviewed, she added.

Lawyer Mr Hagan asked the operators how the best results could be achieved.

Lynda Atkinson from Genting said: ’It’s got to be all of us together, raising standards. And I do think it’s important we share what we have.

’We all want to raise standards because at the end of the day it only takes one operator to bring the industry down and to harm the public’s perception.’

She added there was always the danger of ’returning to square one’ if they did not work together.

problem gamblers

Mr Corby said he hoped operators could learn lessons from one another.

He said it was important that there would not be the ability for the ’problem gambler to shop around, or through a lack of co-ordination for them to camouflage their problematic play.

’Because one of the things we found was that if someone does all their gambling with one operator there is a good chance of spotting problems. But when they start to spread it around a bit, it’s very hard to spot a problem gambler.’

Fiona replied: ’It’s about setting minimum standards.’

Witek Wacinski from Ladbrokes Coral said: ’Responsible gambling has to be at the heart of everything we do, from product development to dealing with the customer.

’I wish we could be living in a world where CSR (corporate social responsibility) would be a competitive advantage to any operator.

’But in order to achieve that, a level playing field needs to be enforced for all operators so that those who do the right thing, are not less competitive than the operators who are less scrupulous and taking advantage.’

Mr Hagan referred to a responsible gambling week coming up between October 12 and 18.

www.responsiblegamblingweek.co.uk

’That is intended to be a national conversation [including the Isle of Man] about responsible gambling, and conversations between operators and their customers, amongst customers and between customers and their friends and families.

’There will inevitably be a lot of negativity around but there will be a hugely positive message this year raising awareness of what it means to gamble responsibly and of the tools which are available to help people gamble responsibly as well as how to access help and support if needed.

’If you are driving a car you wear a safety belt; it’s not just for fast drivers, it’s for everyone.

’It’s the first time the industry has come together as one voice to talk about what responsible gambling means.’

funding

Micky Swindale welcomed the initiative as she pointed out a pile of recent press cuttings on controversies in gambling.

Micky added ’it does amaze me’ to hear that organisations such as Gamble Aware struggle to get funding ’because that seems to me to be an easy way to be seen to be supporting’ those who are fighting against [gambling] problems.

Witek Wacinski from Ladbrokes Coral said: ’Gambling industry can be controversial -

but the media reactions the industry gets, can also be partly a sign of the times, a polarisation of media, of opinions, and writing headlines for clickbait.’

John Hagan claimed the mistake at the moment is that we are having the ’wrong conversation’ in the public arena.

’We are having a discussion about the characteristics of specific products which, by the way, are all legal and operated under legislation, instead of how we help people to gamble irresponsibly and how we help problem and at risk gamblers’.

big picture

He said discussion would move from one product to another. ’It might move from FOBTs (Fixed Odds Betting Terminals) to online. Another day it might be casinos.

’We need to look at the big picture. How you help people to gamble responsibly.’

Witek pointed out: ’Problem gamblers are not limited to any one particular product.’

Iain Corby added that it is all about staying ahead of regulation. ’Regulation is often a blunt instrument,’ he said.

’At the same time, the regulator is at its best when it is not really having to do anything because people are so scared of the iron fist that they want to be one step ahead.’

John Hagan said: ’Who knows customers better than Ladbrokes, Genting, Sky Betting & Gaming? They know their customers better than the Gambling Commission does. So they are the ones who should know when there might be an issue. They should know how to communicate with their customers and not have the Gambling Commission telling them.’

Ben Haden from the Gambling Commission replied: ’I take your point completely. I agree with that. The less regulating we have to do the better because what it means is the consumer is safeguarded and the market’s working effectively.’

Iain Corby said: ’People have to accept that one big component of evidence is public opinion and you’re always at risk of going past the tipping point in terms of public opinion, whether it is on one particular product or on gambling as a whole.

’At which point politicians feel they have to do something. We are for example seeing a lot of noise from the Labour Party at the moment which is not just focused on one product. They are wanting to ban sponsorship of shirts for instance.’

John Hagan said one thing the industry does not want to be involved in is politics: ’I’ve been doing this for 20 years and almost every time any time politics bumps into gambling it ends badly for the gambling industry.’

Fiona Palmer said informed customers who make an informed choice are what is needed.

She said the operator should be able to guide them with the right tools and not be afraid to talk to them about potentially difficult conversations at times.

’All the awareness at the moment, as we said earlier, is that the press are only hearing the negative stories.

’The Responsible Gambling Week is great timing and is key.’

John Hagan said the great British public does not want a nanny state. People choose to play and gamble and this should be an informed choice, just as other people might choose to drink alcohol, with knowledge and understanding of the potential harm and how to gamble responsibly.

KPMG director Micky Swindale claimed the gambling industry should not end up being like the tobacco industry with their products being hidden from view in shops behind ’cupboards of shame.’

brave decisions

Iain Corby said: ’I think the industry is going to have to make some brave decisions in terms of long term value and survival.’

Lynda Atkinson said customers of the company she works for are starting to accept that the company will talk to them about how they play, along with all the due diligence needed before they begin.

’And they are expecting that. They are starting to see that it is something that has to happen.’

But she also took the view that customers themselves have to be prepared to take some responsibility for what they do - much in the same way they might decide to drink too much or if they are a shopaholic.

Fiona Palmer said the timing of the messaging is crucial but pointed out that ’we are all human.’

Witek Wacinski of Ladbrokes Coral said he agreed with a point made by Ben Haden about the importance of operators knowing their customers.

Witek said: ’I would agree, that is the holy grail, to know your customers well’.

The GDPR - General Data Protection Regulation - which is coming in the next few months was mentioned.

Iain Corby said: ’I think we need to do a lot more work on what the boundaries are actually going to be before writing off any options there because knowing your customer really well, particularly when opening an account, is critical for the online industry.’

Micky Swindale said that the responsible gambling week in October was going to actively involve the public. But she also felt the industry needed to work together behind the scenes as well.

Mr Corby said there was still the need for an all-encompassing body to cover everyone.

Fiona Palmer of the Remote Gambling Association (RGA) pointed out that there is the desire in the industry to work on improving things.

She said that as a collaborative project a new initiative called "GAMSTOP®" will mean coming together and will require ’extreme commitment’ in the industry.

’It has started with the RGA, to kick the project off. We have made big strides forward and we are aiming for GAMSTOP® to be live by the end of the year. So a lot of work is going on out there.

’GAMSTOP® is working with the [Gambling] Commission on communications to make all relevant operators aware that the commission knows who has signed up.’

Fiona said it will help consumer choice and provide an additional self-help responsible gambling tool for consumers.

She explained that online gambling customers can at present self-exclude themselves by going to each individual operator they gamble with. But then potentially they could then open new accounts with other companies.

GAMSTOP® and the ’big red button’

’What GAMSTOP® is going to provide is effectively like a ’big red button’ over and above all this. If a consumer wants to go to a single website to block themselves from all online gambling in the UK, they can press the ’big red button’ and it will block them.

’Consumers use self-exclusion not necessarily for the right reasons; they might have had a disagreement, or might find one operator more attractive.’

She reiterated the big red button was there to block yourself from all British licensed operators.

John Hagan said that was something that had been wanted.

Fiona stressed: ’It will be delivered.’

John Hagan: ’When this was asked for it was seen by the industry as being extremely challenging.

’This is a tangible sign of progress and something the public can understand very easily. That is an example of industry doing the right thing and is unquestionably a positive story.’

Fiona said all relevant operators will be given guidelines as to when and how to promote GAMSTOP® on their websites and the wording to include in their terms and conditions.

And Fiona explained that they will also be working with groups such as the charity Gamble Aware and other interested organisations.

She said it had taken a long time to get where they were with the project.

Fiona: ’We have had great collaboration and input from the industry. Personally, I’m truly excited by what we are going to deliver.’

Iain Corby of Gamble Aware, sounded a note of caution: ’I think it’s a great achievement but we cannot be complacent.’

But Mr Corby said there appeared to be a real commitment for this new initiative.

Fiona said the operators will all come from different backgrounds and with different technologies and set-ups.

She said: ’This has got to work.’

Micky said it was good news and a ’very public indicator of the remote industry coming together and doing it itself, and not expecting the Gambling Commission to put the control in place for them.’ She welcomed it.

Ben Haden, from the regulator, said GAMSTOP® could create the appetite for the industry to look forward to doing other things in the future.

’This is progress and a sign of moving forwards.’

From left to right, Micky Swindale, KPMG, Lynda Atkinson, Genting, Fiona Palmer, Remote Gambling Association, Ben Haden, UK Gambling Commission, Witek Wacinski, Ladbrokes Coral, John Hagan, law firm partner and Iain Corby, Gamble Aware

Around the table: