UKGC Issues £650,000 fine to Videoslots Limited for AML and Social Responsibility Failures
Published on by Zena Grantham
20 November 2025
Videoslots AML Failures have led to the online gambling operator facing a £650,000 fine after a United Kingdom Gambling Commission investigation uncovered Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and social responsibility breaches.
Videoslots Limited, who operate videoslots.co.uk, mrvegas.com and megariches.com, also received a stern warning and is required to undergo a third-party audit to ensure it is effectively implementing its AML and safer gambling policies, procedures and controls.
System Failures
The UKGC investigation found the failures stemmed primarily from systems which failed to identify harmful gambling practices. While Videoslots’ monitoring systems applied a monthly deposit limit for customers, that limit applied to a calendar month and did not include the customer’s initial deposit.
One customer lost £5,000 in a month despite a £3,000 monthly deposit limit, and another lost £5,000 in less than 24 hours despite the same limit. Another customer lost £7,500 over 18 days despite having a £2,000 monthly deposit limit.
Among Videoslots AML failures, weaknesses in the operator’s monitoring systems, which did not flag customers at risk of gambling harm. In one case, a customer lost £6,550 over three days within a two-month period without receiving any intervention.
Over-Reliance on Algorithms
AML/Countering Terrorist Financing (CTF) failures included gaps in associated policies and procedures, record management omissions, and an over-reliance on an algorithm to identify and monitor customer behaviours that, in some instances, appeared ineffective when tested.
In one case, a customer deposited and gambled heavily over a 16-day period, using digital pre-payment vouchers worth more than £75,000 to fund their account. After gambling, the money was spread across four different bank accounts. The same customer also accessed their account from outside Great Britain on several occasions.
Despite multiple high-risk indicators, the customer’s automated AML risk score failed to reach the threshold that would have prompted a timely request for source-of-funds information. This led to unacceptable delays in reviewing the account and resulted in a lack of effective due diligence and oversight.
One of the major failings was an inadequate automated scoring system, which failed to flag the customer’s activity as high risk. Staff assumed the transactions were funded through recycled winnings, despite having no evidence to support that conclusion or to explain the customer’s unusually complex pattern of deposits and withdrawals.
In another case linked to the Videoslots AML failures, a customer’s risk profile was not escalated despite a month of heavy deposits and withdrawals. The operator assumed the funds came from previous wins and failed to carry out any checks or customer interactions to confirm the source.
The Importance of AML/Social Responsibility
John Pierce, Commission Director of Enforcement, said: “Operators are required to have effective Social Responsibility and Anti-Money Laundering policies, procedures and controls as a condition of holding an operating licence. In this case, the operator’s monthly deposit limits proved ineffective in practice, and AML controls were not applied to the standards we expect.
“The investigation identified a serious example where pre-paid digital vouchers had been used for gambling without effective oversight and early intervention. The over-reliance on an algorithm to monitor risk meant that the customer was able to carry out a high volume of deposits and transfer the proceeds of gambling to multiple destination accounts, with insufficient or untimely checks or with no robust source of funds verification.
“Alongside this, the acceptance of digital vouchers as a method of payment also requires robust controls from a safer gambling perspective, particularly where it is possible to purchase digital vouchers using credit or crypto via third-party websites.”
He continued: “Open-loop payment systems are high risk in nature because they could enable anonymous deposits and make it harder to trace funds. In this case, the licensee failed to implement timely customer interactions and did not conduct enhanced customer due diligence until the customer had reached significant spend thresholds – such failings are unacceptable.
Operators must review how open-loop payment systems, such as prepaid digital vouchers, are managed in a gambling environment, as they are high-risk and pose operational challenges for effective monitoring. Whilst our position on the use of open-loop payment systems has not changed, we have updated our risk information on our website to reflect our concerns about digital vouchers.”