France’s gambling ombudsman Denys Millet got 1,373 requests for mediation in 2022, a fall of 20.8% per the third annual ombudsman task report from L’Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ).
Because the gambling ombudsman, Millet mediates disputes brought forward by players in opposition to licensed operators in France or those with monopoly situation – namely Française des Jeux (FDJ) and Pari-Mutuel Urbain (PMU). Here is with the plan of promoting an amicable settlement between the two entities.
Isabelle Falque Pierrotin, ANJ president, acknowledged that the connection between the regulator and the ombudsman has seen development within the realm of safer gambling to this point.
“Each and every the gambling mediator and ANJ are of their third year of operation, and this era affords
them satisfactory hindsight to non-public interaction in a serious review of their respective actions and their mutual family participants,” she acknowledged.
“Referring to these, it appears to be like to be to me that we non-public got made just trusty development and that our two missions beef up every other to enhance player protection.”
Millet acknowledged that this year’s report permits additional opportunity for added detailed diagnosis.
“After a itsy-bitsy over three years of operation of gambling mediation, the 2022 annual report affords me the chance to plan up a quantitative and qualitative review of the total modifications observed, but moreover to attain extra detailed diagnosis by execrable-referencing information similar to those touching on to the form of disputes and the of the mediation.”
Third annual report
A expansive majority of the requests for mediation in 2022 – 90.1% – had been connected to sports having a bet. This changed into resembling 2021, when the requests came to 91.5%.
Here is important in opposition to the selection of other requests- lottery games incurred trusty 5% of disputes filed, whereas casino games accounted for 4% and horse having a bet made up 1%.
In whole, 20% of the sports having a bet disputes had been taken in opposition to Winamax operators, 17% had been in opposition to Betclic and 14% had been in opposition to SPS Having a bet France. As properly as, 14% had been in opposition to FDJ and 11% had been in opposition to PMU.
For casino games, 73% of the disputes filed concerned Winamax, a first-rate upward push from 29% in 2021.
Meanwhile, for the six horse racing having a bet operators in France, disputes had been filed in opposition to four of them. An whole of 50% of the requests had been placed in opposition to PMU.
Admissible requests
The total selection of admissible requests made in 2022 changed into 744, whereas the total inadmissible requests totaled at 629.
In phrases of admissible requests, the number in opposition to Winamax fell sharply when put next to 2021. The report states that requests in opposition to Winamax hit 20% in 2022, when put next to 39% in 2021. This changed into due to the a diminished selection of repeat complaints and a fall within the selection of disputes in opposition to welcome affords.
In reference to the report, the ombudsman gave four primary strategies to operators to diminish complaints filed. First, he acknowledged to give players a cause their account is being blocked. Second, he inspired operators to diminish turnaround time for withdrawal requests.
He also suggested that operators give extra leniency in opposition to accounts that accidentally input information that does no longer match that on their identification documents, asking them to test the build additional and no longer without prolong finish accounts.
Lastly, he implored operators to be extra clear about deposit limits when the boundaries are build in inform to give protection to the player.
Closing week, ANJ launched that it planned to restrict role objects from being frail in gambling advertising and marketing in some unspecified time in the future.
