GPWA Times Magazine - Issue 46 - February 2020

DON’T BANK ON COMMISSION t’s been a tough couple of years for affiliates. Whether it’s the challenges posed by more restrictive gambling, consumer and data laws and regulations, keeping up with ever-evolving technology which has seen traditional SEO superseded by SMO and the dulcet tones of Alexa, or the growth of social media driving a shift from traditional affiliate acquisition to ambassadors and influencers. Whichever way you look at it, life as an affiliate has been getting more difficult and the margins are getting increasingly tighter. For those affiliates operating in the European, and in particular, the U.K. betting and gambling space, things are about to get even more challenging as, for the first time ever, the finance sector starts to take on the mantle of social responsibility in the face of growing anti-gambling public and political sentiment. Alongside the recent U.K. Gambling Commission consultation on the use of credit cards in the online sector (a change which has already prompted the support of at least one political party), and the recent move by some U.K. banks to offer customers the opportunity to block gambling transactions on their bank cards, comes a new initiative that sees two of the biggest banks taking an even more proactive approach to player protection and responsible gambling. In November 2019, HSBC Bank announced the launch of a new self-service tool to “help and support our customers in managing what they spend on gambling.” It’s described as a “new feature that allows (customers) to voluntarily add or remove gambling restrictions on (their) accounts.” While HBSC is not alone in adopting the principle of a customer being able to block gambling transactions, what makes its approach different is that the new initiative is the result of a collaboration with GamCare, making it much more sophisticated than the gambling transaction blocking offered by competitors. Not only does it look to mirror the mechanics and regulatory requirements of the self-management player protection tools offered by operators, but for the first time it sees a financial institution take an active role in the monitoring and identification of problem gamblers. The new application allows customers to take control of their spending by applying blocking restrictions on individual cards on Things are about to get evenmore challenging as the finance sector starts to take on the mantle of social responsibility in the face of growing anti- gambling public and political sentiment . G P W A t i m e s . o r g 34