Bookmakers and casinos scored record compliance rates in the latest audit.

UK.- The industry lobby group the Betting and Gaming Council (BGC) has hailed record compliance rates reported for British bookmakers’ and casinos’ age verification checks. Independent figures provided by the auditor Serve Legal show a 91.4 per cent age verification pass rate for bookmakers and 98 per cent for casinos.

The figures represent a 30 per cent increase since Serve Legal began auditing performance in 2009 and make the betting and gaming sector the UK leader for age verification compliance, beating supermarkets, convenience stores and petrol stations. Compliance rates were 10 to 15 per cent higher than in the alcohol and lottery sectors.

Wes Himes, BGC executive director for standards and innovation, said: “I am hugely grateful to Serve Legal for their work over the last 15 years, who have been instrumental in this change. Serve Legal, alongside our members and their dedicated staff, have led the charge in raising standards and setting a new benchmark for excellence.”

He added: “Bookmakers and casinos play a vital economic role on the UK’s hard-pressed high streets, as well as in the leisure and tourism sector. But economic contribution has to go hand-in-hand with the highest standards.

“We are delivering that, which should be welcome news to customers and communities across the country. Our work to raise standards goes on, and I expect these compliance rates to continue improving across the land-based betting and gaming sector.”

The BGC stressed that members take a zero-tolerance approach to underage betting and that the most popular forms of gambling among children are legal arcade games like penny pushers and claw grab machines, bets with friends or family and card games.

It said: “Our members enforce strict age verification on all their products to prevent underage gaming and will further strengthen age verification measures by increasing the checking age from “Think 21” to “Think 25” across betting shops and casinos. This policy will require anyone who is over 18 but looks under 25 to provide ID.”

Serve Legal CEO Ed Heaver said: “The Serve Legal team are incredibly proud of the work conducted by the BGC and their members. Their impressive dedication and work ethic has paid off in some highly impressive statistics, showing the 30% compliance increase across the industry over the time that we have worked in the sector. We thank the BGC for pioneering their mission of customer safety alongside ours.”

The BGC recently welcomed the publication of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s (DCMS) response to its land-based gambling consultation. The DCMS announced that it will go ahead with plans to allow debit card gambling and to update gaming machine ratios for land-based venues.