René Jansen reveals KSA investigating duty of care failings
The KSA’s chair spoke at the Amsterdam Gambling & Awareness Congress.
The Netherlands.- René Jansen, chair of Kansspelautoriteit (KSA), says the Dutch gambling regulator has begun an investigation of operators that it believes have failed to implement their duty of care to players. Speaking at the Amsterdam Gambling & Awareness Congress 2022, he said the KSA also aims to introduce mandatory limits on gambling spend.
Dutch players must set a deposit limit when they create an account to gamble, but there is no limit on how high that can be. Jansen says this has led to players setting unrealistically high limits that they would never expect to reach.
However, Jansen added that he believed some gaming operators were failing in their duty of care to Dutch customers and said that a “broad investigation” was now in process to probe how they implement that duty.
He told the conference: “We have seen other excesses that raise questions about how providers deal with their duty of care. I am talking about excessive financial losses for players – tens of thousands of euros – in a short period of time, without any decisive action being taken by the provider. The KSA has therefore launched a broad investigation into the implementation of the duty of care.”
However, Jansen noted that KSA data shows no suggestion of an increase in the number of people gambling in the Netherlands since the regulated online gambling market opened in October last year.
He said: “The amount of players don’t seem to have really increased compared to the earlier illegal period. There are 563,000 accounts being played with, and many players have multiple accounts.”
He added that there were not yet any reliable figures on the impact on gambling harm but that the National Alcohol and Drugs Information System should soon have statistics on treatment for gambling addiction. He noted that many people don’t seek treatment and welcomed the government’s announcement of a survey on gambling behaviour to create a “more complete picture”.
Jansen also mentioned the issue of gambling advertising in the Netherlands. An explosion of ads after the opening of the regulated market has led to an upcoming ban on all non-targeted gambling advertising.
Jansen said: “The opening up of the market and the number of providers trying to secure a place often leads to a kind of ‘overkill’ in an initial phase, before normalisation takes place. That is why there has been and will be intervention in various areas, both by the Minister and by the KSA.”
Dutch report finds KSA capacity “too limited” to tackle illegal gambling
A report commissioned by the Dutch government has found that the capacity of the KSA was “too limited” to deal with illegal online gambling adequately. It said that stakeholders feel the regulator should do more.
Conducted by the consultancy Kwink Groep, the report assesses the KSA’s activity between 2017 and 2021, which coincided with the run-up to the launch of regulated online gambling in October last year. It found that while the KSA has devoted enforcement resources to eradicating illegal online gambling, many stakeholders believed it should do more to stop unlicensed operators.
Last week, the KSA reported that it had to have words with several licensed gambling operators over advertising during the FIFA World Cup. It said it had found operators breaching marketing rules by advertising on sites offering free-to-play prediction games for the tournament in Qatar.
Meanwhile, the regulator has ordered online gambling operators to cease offering cashback bonuses. It says such offers are banned under Dutch law because it is believed that they promote excessive participation.
