Things are tense regarding gambling advertising in Belgium, something that has brought a wave of reactions from the Unibet Kindred Group. The latter issued a warning towards the Belgian authorities, telling that the recent restrictions are set to push the players towards unregulated operators. Unibet wants to create a new gambling campaign based on responsible gaming and in fact, managed to get the nod from the Royal Decree, the final stage of legislative authorization in Belgium. The new rules will be effective in June of 2019 and although the new legislation was backed from the biggest part of the political leadership in the country, it is considered as problematic by industry experts.
According to the new legislation, online casinos are banned from advertising, while sportsbooks will be allowed to be advertised after 8 pm, but not during live sports events. Dennis Mariën, the country manager of Kindred Belgium told regarding the changes which are about to be implemented within the next few months. “Enforcing a set of rules that might be too strict for regulated operators to keep a competitive offering vs the non-regulated ones is a possible danger towards the customers as the non-regulated operators are in no way obliged to offer similar levels of security towards their customers. Moreover, problem gamblers will most likely drop off the radar and therefore will not be able to seek help or assistance as by playing with a non-regulated operator.”