bet365 Sweden: SEK44m Penalties, No-Limit Deposits

Sweden’s Administrative Court of Appeal has upheld SEK44 million in penalties against bet365’s two Hillside companies, while the operator’s Swedish licences remain in place after corrective action. The case concerns both player-protection responses and a deposit-setting option that let customers choose no limit.

Hillside (Sports) ENC faces a SEK40 million penalty and Hillside (Gaming) ENC a SEK4 million penalty. The companies’ appeals did not overturn the warnings or fees, which stem from failures involving customer care and mandatory deposit limits.

What Sweden’s bet365 case was about

The case covered conduct between 1 January 2019 and 19 April 2022. During that period, customers could select a “no limit” setting instead of choosing a numerical deposit cap. Spelinspektionen, Sweden’s gambling regulator, said the arrangement did not meet the country’s licensing requirements.

bet365’s position was that a hidden technical ceiling of SEK500 million applied. The regulator concluded that a ceiling customers could not see or set for themselves did not fulfil the requirement for a player-selected limit. The inquiry also examined how quickly the companies acted when customers showed signs of harmful gambling.

Spelinspektionen characterised the failures as serious and systematic, making licence review – potentially including revocation – a possible outcome. The companies took corrective steps during the regulator’s examination, however, and the response was limited to warnings, financial penalties and further requirements rather than loss of operating licences.

The dispute sits within a wider enforcement focus on whether operators move beyond automated messages when customer activity indicates risk. Evolution’s £6 million UK settlement is another recent example of a gambling supplier facing financial consequences over regulatory compliance, although the facts and licensing issues differ.

How the SEK44 million outcome was reached

The current penalties are lower than the amounts first set by Spelinspektionen in 2023, when it imposed SEK65 million on Hillside (Sports) ENC and SEK14 million on Hillside (Gaming) ENC. The Administrative Court reduced the fees in June 2024 to SEK40 million and SEK4 million respectively, and the appeal court has now left those amounts in place.

The reduction followed a Supreme Administrative Court ruling on how the statutory cap for gambling penalties should be calculated. The earlier calculation used gross turnover; the court’s interpretation required net turnover instead, lowering the maximum available fees. The appeal court agreed with the reduced amounts, while maintaining the warnings against both companies.

The appeal outcome therefore confirms two parts of the enforcement case: the companies remain liable for the reduced penalties, and the regulator’s findings on deposit limits and customer care stand. The case was not resolved by the companies’ argument that an unseen technical ceiling made the no-limit choice compliant.

Monitoring requirements continue

The corrective measures include mandatory review of customers who lose more than SEK10,000 in a month, along with further steps to protect vulnerable players and young adults aged 18 to 24. The companies are also required to pay closer attention to customers who return to gambling after self-excluding.

For operators, the enforcement turns on both the design of controls and what happens after risk indicators appear: a deposit limit must be meaningful to the customer, and customer-care measures must address the behaviour they are intended to mitigate. The appeal court’s decision leaves bet365’s Swedish businesses operating, but the warnings and ongoing monitoring requirements remain alongside the SEK44 million bill.