Netherlands regulator imposes highest fine so far on illegal operator

The Dutch gambling authority Kansspelautoriteit has levied a hefty fine at Redcorp S.A. and Bluemay Enterprises NV, the two gambling firms behind Red Slots.com, saying the operator offered illegal games of chance focused on the Dutch market.

In parallel, the authority also reported that the Red Slots website informs that financial transactions are facilitated through a British subsidiary of Bluemay Enterprises NV, Megaton Ltd, a company that no longer exists.

The investigation was initiated between November 2014 and March 2015 following a Red Slots promotion for its weeronline.nl and nu.nl domains and determined that the unlicensed company flouted existing legislation for a second time by targeting the market in Dutch, depicted a Dutch Flag and offered a welcome bonus to Dutch consumers of Euro 3 following registration.

Each Curaçao-licensed company was fined Euro 13,000 back in October 2014, so were in no doubt about Dutch legislation, the authority said.

Given that this is the second instance of ignoring Dutch legislation, Kansspelautoriteit levied a hefty Euro 240,000 fine on each company for a total fine of Euro 480,000.

The penalty reflects the repeated offence, a statement said.

As the authority looks ahead to draft legislation currently sitting in Parliament which would, if enacted, facilitate payment and ISP blocking, Jan Suyver, chairman of the Kansspelautoriteit said: “We can only hope that the parliament adopts legislation quickly.”

Related and similar