Ladbrokes Coral supporting pillars underpinning safer customer play

There is a lot of pillar talk going on at GVC, parent company of Ladbrokes Coral, with a similar intention to the Seven Pillars of Wisdom in the Book of Proverbs, namely how to maintain a well-ordered house.

In the case of the bookmakers’ parent, the pillars are in place to ensure company-wide progress on the path to safer gambling in post-FOBT land.

In Proverbs, Wisdom is personified as a woman, and in the house of Ladbrokes Coral that is Grainne Hurst, GVC director for responsible gaming strategy.

“Safer gambling is now a non-negotiable part of the way we work at GVC,” she says. “It’s about recognising the mistakes of the past and learning from them.”

Seven Pillars introduced by GVC to help responsible gamblingCredit: Matt Cardy

Hurst is clear in drawing a line between previous attitudes and the company’s forward-thinking position. “Even though GVC wasn’t involved in the FOBT debate, obviously Ladbrokes Coral were,” she says.

“GVC is coming at this with a fresh pair of eyes post FOBT and realises the industry needs to do things differently, be proactive and take some difficult decisions, which didn’t happen previously given the FOBT debacle.

“We want safer gambling running through all we do,” she continues. “So we launched a group-wide strategy this year called Changing For The Bettor.

“It recognised we needed to make improvements but also that there isn’t a silver bullet to solve this. So the strategy was developed with seven pillars because we realised we needed to invest in a variety of initiatives.”

Hurst fluently recites the thinking underpinning each pillar:

1. Understanding the problem

“We have a five-year multi-million pound research partnership with Harvard University’s gambling addiction centre. Their experts have been looking into the issue for years.

"Many in the industry have been reticent about providing data to research institutions but we have opened up anonymised player data to the Harvard academics. That’s a first for the industry.”

2. Educating key stakeholders

“Partnering with the charity GamCare we are rolling out a nationwide outreach programme called The Big Deal to educate young people and those who work with them about the risks associated with gambling. We don’t want anyone to develop problems in the first place – prevention is better than cure.”

3. Promote responsible attitudes

“We were the first business to call for a whistle-to-whistle advertising ban and we’ve recently gone one step further and said there is a benefit in banning all television gambling adverts around live sport with the exception of horseracing.

"With sports sponsorship we believe in a ban on [gambling companies] shirt sponsorship in football. We won’t be branding shirts as we previously have in the Scottish Premier League and will instead have a safer gambling message from next season.

"Perimeter boards and interview backdrops won’t be Ladbrokes branded any more but will carry safer gambling messages.”

4. Empower customers

“We’re putting in systems for spotting problematic play. There are nine behavioural triggers we look for, including chasing losses, frequency of play, late-night play and cancelling withdrawals. If a customer triggers one of the controls we have a team who interact with them. We suppress all marketing until we’re comfortable they’re playing safely.

"We’re also offering customers free access to GamBan software. It lets them block gambling sites on any device for up to five years.”

5. Fund treatment for those in need

“When we launched the strategy we committed to upping our funding of research, education and treatment from 0.1 per cent of GGY (gross gambling yield), which is the existing industry voluntary contribution, to 0.3 per cent.

"Last month we went further and said we would increase that tenfold to one per cent by 2022. That’s roughly £20m on today’s revenues.

"There is a long waiting list for problem gambling treatment and not the services to meet demand. We’re hoping our contribution will help that situation.”

6. Champion responsible product design

“We’ve been working with software suppliers, looking at the volatility of games, the colours used – obviously we don’t design anything that might appeal to children – and the game mechanics so they don’t encourage increasing speed of play, chasing losses etc.”

7. Drive cultural change within our business

"From the top down we are refreshing training of all colleagues on safer gambling. It will be mandatory and will happen annually or more regularly for those on the front line.

"It’s about trying to engender a mindset through the organisation so safer gambling is built into the way we think about everything. It’s only by working together we can control the problem. We’re working better collectively than ever before but it will take a while to get there."

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