Bookmakers are now asking customers if they are losing sleep over gambling losses as part of new affordability checks according to the Racing Post.
The publication reported that the former Conservative MP Laurence Robertson, who was part of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Racing and Bloodstock during his time in parliament, was asked if his gambling losses, which amounted to £30 over three months, were causing him to lose sleep.
Speaking on the latest episode of The Front Page Show, Lee Mottershead, Senior Writer for the Racing Post, also revealed that former British Horseracing Authority Board Member Ben Gunn had his account with William Hill limited, this time for winning £670 on one race.
“It raises the question for me as to why would you bet on racing?” said Racing Post Reporter Jonathan Harding.
“If you win too much money there’s the risk of restrictions and if you lose even a small amount of money, there’s a risk of being asked for personal information. We’re in this frankly ludicrous halfway house where we have checks but don’t and no one knows what the lay of the land is.”
This question asked of Robertson is part of affordability checks operators are now mandated to take with some customers as part of the UK Gambling Commission’s pilot programme on the measures. Robertson was chosen given that he is deemed to be a politically exposed person and, by law, is subject to enhanced financial risks.
From the outset, the horse racing industry has been strongly opposed to affordability checks, predicting a downturn in turnover due to the regulations. In December, UK Racing called for an immediate intervention on affordability checks as ministers were notified of a “£3bn deficit” in online betting turnover on horseracing.
Even the Chair of the BHA, Joe Saumarez Smith, has not been immune to the problems caused by the checks. In an earlier episode of the Front Page Show, Chris Cook, Racing Post’s Senior Reporter, spoke about how the BHA head was blocked from his Betfair account for nine days following a conversation with the operator.
In the conversation he made an offhand remark about suffering from cancer which triggered the operator to suspend his account, citing the need for a conversation with Betfair’s safer gambling team.
Although scheduled, Saumarez Smith was never contacted and his account was only reinstated after Betfair was contacted by The Racing Post.
Reflecting on the experience of Saumarez Smith, Racing Post Journalist Scott Burton suggested that this may lead to others being “less candid” with bookmakers due to fears over their account being restricted – reducing the effectiveness of the checks.
He said: “[Saumarez Smith] happened to mention it almost as a kind of throwaway line that he was undergoing treatment for cancer.
“It certainly wouldn’t encourage me, or I suspect anyone else, to be all that candid with anybody on the phone in that circumstance if you think it’s going to result in this kind of situation where he was unable to use his account for nine days. So I think that’s quite worrying in terms of what does or doesn’t constitute a fair amount of information for your bookmaker to have.”
