Last week, Casino News Daily produced an article on Skrill’s practice to target potential online casino players, sports bettors, and forex/binary options traders among its existing customers via email marketing. In the current article we intend to pay a bit more attention on the fact that it seems regulators are unaware or unwilling to consider the issue.
Many would agree that practice is wrong on an uncountable number of levels, particularly given the fact that as an online gambling affiliate Skrill used to promote an operator that has been listed as a rogue one by reputable websites such as Latest Casino Bonuses and Casinomeister.
The Issue in a Nutshell
Skrill, known to be one of the world’s most popular providers of online payment services, has also been acting as an iGaming affiliate for several years now. Put otherwise, the company has been taking advantage of the fact that it has been handling its customers’ funds to promote different online gaming and sports betting websites.
It has recently come to our knowledge that the company has also been targeting potential players and bettors via email marketing. In other words, it has been sending encouraging emails to its existing customers, inviting them to try one gambling website or another.
Being trusted with people’s funds brings great responsibility. However, it is rather questionable whether Skrill has been responsible enough towards its customers.
As mentioned above, Skrill used to promote Burnbet, which has been branded as one of the roguest operators in the iGaming space due to the use of pirated gaming content and the recent death threats it threw at the Latest Casino Bonuses team for trying to expose its criminal practices.
It seems that Burnbet’s banner was quietly removed from Skrill’s Exclusive Bonuses section in the days after the publication of our original, as pointed out by GPWA forum members.
Who Regulates Skrill?
As a financial services provider and a UK-headquartered company, Skrill is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), UK’s government-independent financial regulator. The FCA claims on its official website that “[It aims] to make financial markets work well so that consumers get a fair deal”
an appropriate degree of protection for customers.”
However, it does not seem that the FCA considers Skrill’s practice to email-market gambling services to its customers an inappropriate one.
Gambling carries a high level of risk, particularly when not regulated, promoted, and engaged in in a responsible manner. It is of the utmost importance that a casino player or a sports bettor makes an informed choice over whether to play/bet or not and it is just as important that they are targeted with promotional materials in a proper manner.
As an advertiser and participant in UK’s iGaming industry, it seems that Skrill’s promotional activity falls under the purview of the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and the UK Gambling Commission. On the other hand, as an affiliate, Skrill promotes UKGC licensees, but it is not a licensee itself, so its link to the regulator is not a direct one.
Looking back to the company’s role as an advertiser, its activity needs to be monitored by the ASA. The UK’s advertising watchdog monitors and regulates broadcast and non-broadcast activity via the CAP Code. And the Code’s Gambling section reads as follows:
The rules in this section are designed to ensure that marketing communications for gambling products are socially responsible, with particular regard to the need to protect children, young persons under 18 and other vulnerable persons from being harmed or exploited by advertising that features or promotes gambling.
Sending emails to its customers, Skrill needs to realize that there might be people with problem gambling behavior among those, people who would consider their emails as a trigger to their gambling-related issues. And it also stores such people’s money, which is the actual issue here.
Although as an affiliate Skrill does not do anything different from other affiliates in the iGaming space, it is important to note that it has greater power than other affiliates. It has the power to handle funds that belong to a large group of customers and it uses that power to encourage them into gambling these funds away.
GPWA members have informed that they have brought the matter to the ASA’s attention and that it has responded in the following manner:
“Your complaint appears to be related to the advertiser’s business practices and as such falls outside of our remit. Therefore we would not be able to assist you with regards to this.”
In other words, this apparent conflict of interest does not seem to be falling under its purview. However, it is rather curious who, after all, regulates Skrill and its business model that combines the provision of financial services and the promotion of online gambling services.
One of the UKGC’s main principles involves the fair and socially responsible provision of gambling services. In this case, the Commission’s intent to implement this strategy in all aspects of the gambling industry is hampered by other regulatory bodies’ denial of Skrill’s morally wrong gambling advertising practice and their lack of interest in taking proper actions.
