UK Casino Licensing

The UK Gambling Commission exists in order to protect players and to ensure they can gamble safely. The organisation’s main goal is to make online casinos completely fair for all and free from crime, so that all players can enjoy visiting them.

Types Of License

The following types of license available from the UK Gambling Commission are: a bingo operating license; a casino operating license; a general betting operating license; a pool betting operating license; a betting intermediary operating license and a lottery operating license. For each different product and service the casino offers, the appropriate license will be required; this is why some online casinos have more licenses than others.

In order for the UK Gambling Commission to grant an online casino a license, the commission will ask the following sorts of questions:

Who’s the owner of the company and what role in the company does the applicant have? What is the financial history of the owner of the company and the applicant and are there enough funds in place for an online casino to run successfully? Is the applicant trustworthy and are other key people in the company trustworthy? Do the applicant and other key people in the company have enough relevant knowledge and experience to successfully run an online casino? Does anyone involved with the company have a criminal record?

Full Checks Carried Out

These questions are asked so the commission can find out all the necessary information about the casino so they can make the right decision about whether that casino should be granted a license or not. Even if the commission receives satisfactory answers to all these questions, there are still several things the online casino has to be doing to receive a license. They have to carry out know-your-customer checks, or KYCs to ensure all customers are over the age of 18 (customers will be required to provide an ID document such as a birth certificate or a passport) and that all customers’ personal and financial information is correct (customers will usually have to provide a utility bill and a scanned copy of any cards they’ll be using).

Online casinos will also carry out these checks to ensure that people who have previously opted for exclusion from the casino can’t register and that known criminals and fraudsters can’t register.

UK Gambling Commission

While the UK Gambling Commission works to ensure all online casinos are safe and fair, it is not a customer service centre. You should only contact the UK Gambling Commission if you suspect an online casino of acting illegally and you have tried, but failed, to get the problem dealt with elsewhere. The commission only deals with issues to do with a casino’s licensing. If you have general queries about a casino or wish to make a complaint that’s got nothing to do with the casino’s licensing, you should not contact the UK Gambling Commission.

The UK Gambling Commission also ensures there are closed loop policies in place; these policies mean that when you make a deposit, you have to withdraw at least however much you deposited using the same method before you can use another payment method to withdraw any winnings. This is to prevent money laundering.