Netherlands Regulator Issues Record Fine to Gammix Limited

by Philip Kelly, Compliance Analyst

The Dutch Gaming Authority (KSA) land a record breaking €19.7 million fine (c.6.5% of its estimated Dutch turnover estimated at €302.7m) on Malta-based online casino firm, Gammix Limited, for offering unlicensed gambling to players in the Netherlands. It appears that lessons haven’t been learnt as this is the second time the casino firm have been in the limelight, with a previous fine of €4 million in 2023 for similar violations.

Gammix powers 21 different online casinos, with several of them being available to Dutch players. However, Dutch law states that an operator must have a licence to supply online gambling to users within the Netherlands, a requirement Gammix failed to adhere to.

Investigations revealed that the company’s websites could be reached from a Dutch IP address and there’s nothing preventing both Dutch postal addresses and phone numbers being used at registration, even though no Dutch operating licence was held. For further proof, the KSA created accounts on multiple Gammix websites using registration information from the Netherlands and depositing €20 in each from Dutch bank accounts.

As well as the above, the company failed to uphold both due diligence and responsible gambling requirements, resulting in a lack of age verification methods and creating opportunities for players to partake in autoplay and turboplay features, encouraging excessive and harmful gambling behaviours.

René Jansen, KSA chairman, has commented: “Dutch players must be protected: that is why we are cracking down on illegal offers.

“We see that illegal providers often pay little attention to the player and do not adhere to a duty of care.

“We also see with this provider there was no clear age verification. That is extremely harmful. We will therefore continue to take sanctions, even if providers repeatedly make mistakes.”

Gammix Limited have advised that providing a service to the Netherland market was not the aim and have hit back at the KSA, branding their “mystery shopper” style of investigation as unlawful.

The Malta-based firm has six weeks to pay for the penalties, however, this is believed to be unlikely having failed to pay the previous €4 million fine. Phil Pearson, director of Gammix Limited, called the fine “outrageous and unsubstantiated” and vowed to continue fighting against it, noting “When we received the first notice of a possible penalty, we reached out to them to say we have blocks in place,” Pearson highlights. “We also asked for any information they had that was material to the investigation, to ensure we remained in compliance with all guidelines – a request they appeared to ignore.”

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