Swedish Appeal Court Upholds SEK44 Million Penalties on bet365 Subsidiaries While Leaving Licences Intact

Sweden’s Administrative Court of Appeal has upheld SEK44 million in penalties against bet365’s local operations but confirmed that the operator’s licences will remain in force. The case centred on the design of deposit limits and the adequacy of responses to indicators of harmful gambling. Spelinspektionen had characterised the shortcomings as serious and systematic, yet corrective steps taken during the inquiry limited the outcome to warnings, fines and enhanced oversight.

The penalties stand at SEK40 million for Hillside (Sports) ENC and SEK4 million for Hillside (Gaming) ENC. Those figures represent a reduction from the regulator’s original 2023 demands of SEK65 million and SEK14 million. The lower amounts followed a Supreme Administrative Court clarification that statutory penalty caps must be calculated on net rather than gross turnover. The appeal court accepted the revised calculations while leaving the underlying findings on compliance undisturbed.

Case Background and Specific Violations

The conduct at issue ran from 1 January 2019 to 19 April 2022. Customers were permitted to select a “no limit” deposit option. bet365 asserted that an internal technical ceiling of SEK500 million applied, but the regulator determined that a limit invisible to the customer failed to meet licensing standards requiring a player-chosen cap. The inquiry also criticised the speed and substance of customer-care interventions once risk signals appeared. As reported by Casino Beats, Spelinspektionen viewed these failures as warranting potential licence review, though remediation avoided that sanction.

Ongoing obligations now include mandatory review of any customer losing more than SEK10,000 in a month, heightened protections for players aged 18 to 24, and tighter monitoring of those who resume gambling after self-exclusion. These measures underscore that regulators expect controls to be both visible to the customer and effective in practice, not simply documented.

Where the Risk Lies

The decision leaves open the question of how strictly authorities will interpret “meaningful” deposit limits in future examinations. Operators face the limitation that technical safeguards invisible to players will not suffice. Corrective action can preserve market access, yet the combination of financial penalties, formal warnings and perpetual monitoring raises the cost of regulatory missteps. Swedish licensees should therefore treat visible, customer-centric controls and prompt behavioural intervention as non-negotiable elements of continued operations rather than optional features.

Reporting: Casino Beats

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