Tombola cautioned in Sweden over information responsibility failings

Tombola International has received a warning from the Swedish Gambling Authority (SGA) for breaching gaming liability regulations relating to the display of information on its mobile and desktop sites. SGA officials began investigating the Sunderland-headquartered online bingo operator in March to ascertain its compliance with section 2 of the Swedish Gambling Act, relating to general guidelines governing operator’s information responsibility. The firm was found not to have included logos for self-testing of players and deposit and time limits, as well as self-exclusion from the logged-out mode on the company’s desktop and mobile adapted sites. Responding to initial inquiries from the SGA, tombola provided information and screenshots to confirm that the logos were included on the logged-in mode on both sites, later adding these to logged-out mode. However, the SGA continued its investigation and issued the warning after it found that links to relevant sections were not included in the addition. These were added earlier this month following further dialogue between the firm and the SGA. However, the regulator still issued the firm with a warning over the breaches. “The shortcoming that has existed has concerned only a small part of the information responsibility linked to gaming responsibility,” the SGA wrote. “These circumstances are, according to the Swedish Gaming Inspectorate, mitigating and shows that there was no intention from tombola’s side not to comply with the regulations or that it was about systematic shortcomings in the field of gaming responsibility. “The Swedish Gaming Inspectorate considers that the violation is not to be regarded as serious, but neither as minor nor excusable. Against this background, a remark is a sufficient intervention,” the SGA added. The warning is the third issued by the SGA in the space of a week after similar cautions were issued to Swedish-licensed operators Multi Brand Limited and More Tech Group for breaches of information responsibility guidelines. Multi Brand Limited, with operates the Multilotto brand, and More Tech Group, received the warnings for failing to display the required logos under Swedish laws.