The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) has fined licensed online casino operator Casino Days $54,000 for allegedly advertising a “deceptive” bonus offer on its website that required players to first wager tens of thousands of dollars.

In a notice published on Monday, the Ontario market regulator wrote that Casino Days, which is the authorized online gambling brand of Well Played Media, Unipessoal LDA in Ontario, promoted a welcome bonus on its website that allegedly promised new players up to $2,000.

However, after a player’s complaint that more than $8,500 in winnings had been confiscated by Casino Days sparked an AGCO investigation, the regulator found that to qualify for the full bonus amount, a player had to:

• Deposit $2,000 of their own money
• Wager $70,000 (35 times the deposit) at under $5 per wager
• Complete all wagering requirements within seven days

Investigators also found that certain terms of the bonus offer were “buried behind multiple links” on the website. The AGCO’s analysis found that the average player would lose $3,640 in their efforts to earn the $2,000 bonus.

“The bonus offer is alleged to have encouraged high-risk behaviour and failed to properly disclose key terms,” said the AGCO’s statement.

Canadian Gaming Business reached out to Casino Days for comment.

‘Not a fair offer,’ says AGCO

“Player protection is a non-negotiable priority for the AGCO,” said the agency’s Registrar and CEO Dr. Karin Schnarr. “We expect operators to be truthful and transparent about their promotions, and we also require them to ensure that those promotions do not encourage reckless or harmful patterns of play.

“An offer that requires a player to sustain substantial losses for a perceived benefit is not a fair offer. This penalty sends a clear signal that we will not hesitate to take action against operators who fail to meet their obligations to protect Ontario players.”

Ontario’s online gambling rules require licensed operators to refrain from offering bonus promotions that encourage harmful gambling behaviour and fail to disclose key conditions appropriately, and operators may not promote bonuses that cannot reasonably be attained without significant gambling losses. The casino can also promote the offer on its website but cannot advertise it in external places.

The company has been a licensed Ontario online casino since 2023 and offers gaming content from renowned providers such as Evolution, Pragmatic Play and Play’n GO. It notes on its website that, “in the digital world, trust is essential.”

Casino Days has the right to appeal to the independent Licence Appeal Tribunal (LAT).

Casino Days latest to incur Ontario penalty

Ontario’s regulator is not afraid to take operators to task for infractions of its iGaming standards around advertising and promotions.

In March, it fined BetMGM Canada $110,000 for offering cash to new customers who signed up and placed a deposit. Ontario’s standards explicitly prohibit licensed operators from publicly advertising sign-up bonuses or any other inducements designed to attract new players.

In BetMGM’s case, the company acknowledged that two of its marketing affiliates had engaged in prohibited inducement marketing which helped to attract more than 470 new sign-ups. A BetMGM representative told Canadian Gaming Business it subsequently terminated the relevant affiliate relationships as a result of “misconduct.”