ANJ Wants Tougher Regulations for Bonuses

After recently announcing it has added six new members to its Sanctions Commission, France’s national gambling authority (l’Autorité Nationale des Jeux or ANJ) has published a series of fresh guidelines on the gambling promotions and rewards offered to players.

The new rules are part of ANJ’s regulatory agenda for 2022 which was presented in February. ANJ has now published specific regulations regarding commercial offers including free bets, welcome bonuses, and bonuses. The updated regulations come before the opening of the Soccer World Cup.

ANJ Wants to Improve Transparency 

One of the two primary goals of the new recommendations is to improve transparency for commercial offers that are tied to commercial gratuities. The regulatory authority has received player complaints in regard to a lack of clarity connected to commercial offers with terms like “free“ in them. 

To solve the problem, ANJ wants operators to include additional information like the duration of a promotion, whether it is free or if players must first make a purchase, and the exact requirements players must obey to become eligible such as depositing or suffering losses. The new regulations also ask operators to explain the nature of the rewards, mentioning whether they are real money types of bonuses that can be cashed out or game credits players will get to use for free wagers. ​

The ANJ recommends that these regulations are made fully available via accessible mediums, while also being expressed in a manner that makes them easy to understand and read. 

Other recommendations refer to operators being asked to use clear examples for various hypotheses for getting the promised rewards, along with the actual amounts players can expect to obtain. Operators should also provide a simulation tool that would enable players to better understand how to obtain a bonus. 

A Need for Moderate Commercial Offers 

The ANJ also wants to make sure that commercial offers regarding financial incentives are not responsible for making things worse for gamblers who suffer from excessive or pathological gambling issues. In this regard, operators are advised to make sure that their offers exclude any financial rewards for these players. Operators should also pay special attention to people who have recently self-excluded or who have received a ban on gambling. Operators should also “refrain from proposing” welcome bonuses consisting of one or several financial gratuities totaling more than €100 ($100) and limit their offers including financial rewards called “sponsorship” to five a year.