Paf risks 5% of income for €30K loss limit

Players at Finnish gaming operator Paf will not be able to lose more than €30,000 ($35,000) in a year under new plans for a first-of-its-kind loss limit.

The hard cap will be introduced for all customers on all markets from September, with Paf estimating it will lose around 5% of its income because of the measure.

Paf will become the first gambling company in international markets to introduce a hard cap for gaming losses, although such limits have been employed by monopolies.

The company said the cap is only one of its responsible gambling measures, which include identifying risk behaviour and contacting customers to provide them data about their gaming habits in order to prevent problem gambling.

“We will continue presenting personal gaming history graphs to our customers and encourage them to use the tools we provide online for voluntarily setting gaming limits that match each customer’s individual conditions,” said chief executive Christer Fahlstedt.

Paf claims it increased the number of customer interventions by almost 500% to 9,400 between 2016 and 2017.

Paf, which hopes to become licensed in Sweden, suggested the Scandinavian country should consider a loss limit as part of its re-regulation plans that will come into effect next January.

“We suggested a collective hard cap for the entire market in our official comment letter regarding the re-regulation of the Swedish market,” added Fahlstedt.

“Although our suggestion for the whole market was not employed as such, we choose to take the next step now and hope that the authorities will follow and introduce an obligatory hard cap.

“We don’t want to see people’s lives destroyed because of gambling addiction. There has to be a way back. We hope that Paf’s new hard cap will take us in the right direction.”

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