Germany’s Ludwigslust district court has ordered Kaizen Gaming operator Betano to pay back €4,380 (£3,735/$4,608) worth of player losses after finding a player was allowed to gamble past the national loss limit of €1,000 to play.
The case involved a player who lost €5,380 between February 20th and March 4th, 2021 at sports betting site Betano.
Apart from a few exceptions, this amount exceeded the monthly loss limit of EUR 1,000 for German operators under the German State Treaty on Gaming.
Furthermore, István Cocron, who acted as the player’s attorney, said that the player was also registered with the OASIS self-exclusion system.
As a result, the court in Ludwigslust – located just outside Hamburg in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania – paid back 4,380 euros to the player.
“The provider allowed our client to wager more than the allowed €1,000 per month, in violation of the gaming license granted to them,” Cocron said. “That’s why we have reclaimed the stakes that exceed the 1,000 euro limit.”
At the time, the limit applied at the operator level, but was later extended to player spending across all operators within the regulated market through a treaty that came into effect in July 2021.
The case is one of several player reimbursement cases in Germany. While this case dealt with loss limits, many previous cases involved losses at online casinos before the vertical was legal nationwide. Court rulings in these cases went both ways, with courts such as the Cologne Regional Court ordering a refund, while the Braunschweig and Leipzig Regional Courts both ruled on the side of the operators.
“Both in online sports betting and online gaming, for which a far-reaching ban applied in Germany until July 1, 2021, there are good chances of winning back seemingly lost stakes,” says Cocron.
In April, international operator Allwyn acquired a 36.75 percent stake in Betano from Greek operator OPAP, paying €50 million in the transaction.
