The Gambling Commission has issued an update on its ongoing pilot for financial risk assessments, part of its broader efforts to improve consumer protection in the igaming sector. The pilot, designed to identify high-spending remote gambling customers who may be in financial difficulty, is currently entering its third and final stage.
In a detailed briefing authored by Helen Rhodes, Director of Major Policy Projects, the Commission clarified that the assessments are distinct from “affordability checks” and are not currently mandated by regulation. Instead, they aim to deliver a more targeted method for recognising financially vulnerable individuals without affecting customers’ credit scores.
During Stage Two of the pilot, approximately 1.7 million financial risk assessments were conducted across three credit reference agencies, linked to around 860,000 customer accounts. This represented a significant increase from Stage One, due to the design of the study, but does not necessarily reflect the scale of future implementation in a live igaming environment.
The pilot continues to demonstrate high feasibility for frictionless assessments, with 97% of cases in Stage Two completed without requiring customer intervention—an improvement over the 95% rate recorded in Stage One and significantly better than the 80% estimate outlined in the UK Government’s 2023 White Paper. Only around 3% of assessments were classified as “thin files,” showing minimal available data but no signs of financial distress, while another 3% remained unmatched.
Preliminary findings also suggest that customers flagged for assessment are disproportionately more likely to have indicators of financial stress. Compared to general UK population benchmarks, these individuals were between two and five times more likely to have experienced issues such as defaulting on payments or entering into debt management plans.
The Commission has now moved into the analysis phase of Stage Three, which will continue through the summer. The final evaluation will include efforts to refine targeting mechanisms, assess cross-agency consistency, and support operators in any potential future rollout.
NatCen remains the Commission’s research partner for evaluation and post-pilot analysis. The full results are expected to inform future decision-making on how financial risk assessments might be integrated into regulatory practices across the UK igaming market.
Director of Major Policy Projects, Helen Rhodes said: “These further findings from the pilot have helped us understand the extent that assessments could be conducted in a frictionless manner.
“Building on our staged approach to the pilot, we will now further explore data consistency across credit reference agencies, as well as how to support operators to identify the severity of financial difficulties that a customer may be experiencing and how they could support these customers.”
