Gambling - Proposals for Commission fees from April 2017

Following a joint consultation carried out by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and the Gambling Commission, the Commission now published the responses to this consultation.

These are detailed within the responses document: Proposals for Gambling Commission fees from April 2017 - consultation response

There will be fee reductions for around 1,900 operators while fees will be held at their current levels for around 1,000 operators, and around 75 operators will be subject to an increase in fees.

The fees structure that will take effect from April 2017 will:   

• “take account of the significant changes to the Commission costs and income following the implementation of the Gambling (Licensing & Advertising) Act 2014   
• reflect the efficiencies we have achieved in our expenditure and reduce the overall fee burden across the industry by over 10%
• ensure that our costs continue to be recovered on a proportionate basis from different types and sizes of operator   
• address other issues identified in the current fees structure”.

The Commission also intend to proceed with some important modifications to the fees structure, including:

• “the replacement of ‘number of premises’ with gross gambling yield (GGY) as the basis for fee categories across a number of licences   
• the sub-division of various fee categories into smaller categories to ensure that our costs are recovered through fees on a fairer basis   
• the re-alignment of our cost recovery more proportionately in relation to GGY”.