Gambling and a duty of care

The case law concerning alleged duties owed by gambling operators to their customers largely relates to claims for recovery of gambling losses. These losses are often alleged to have been caused by an operator's failure to protect problem gamblers (ie by a failure to suspend their accounts or limiting their activity) in breach of an alleged duty of care. Over time, claimants’ arguments became framed as breaches of implied contractual obligations or became based in the concept of ‘illegality’ in an attempt to base a civil cause of action on purported breaches of the Licence Conditions and Codes of Practice (LCCP) set by the Gambling Commission.

Each such claim has generally been framed as one for recovery of economic losses. The theme running through all of the cases is fairly clear (from Calvert to Gibson and Ehrentreu and O’Brien in between) ie absent a clear (and likely fact specific) assumption of responsibility, the courts have not recognised either a general duty of care in negligence or any implied contractual terms requiring a gambling operator to prevent a customer from sustaining gambling losses.

The modern line of authority begins with Calvert -v- William Hill Credit Ltd [2008] EWHC 454 (Ch), which was subsequently upheld in the Court of Appeal. Mr Calvert, a pathological gambler, had entered into a self-exclusion arrangement with William Hill but was nevertheless able to continue gambling with them because of failures in the defendant's systems. Briggs J held that William Hill had assumed responsibility to administer the self-exclusion scheme with reasonable care and had breached that duty. The claim ultimately failed on causation because the evidence showed that Mr Calvert would have gambled elsewhere and suffered substantially the same losses. (A noteworthy reminder that the damage which the law would allow Mr Calvert to recover must be linked to the scope of the duty for which William Hill assumed responsibility ie placing telephone bets with them, not stopping him from gambling elsewhere).

Nevertheless, Calvert remains significant because, whilst the court rejected Mr Calvert’s case about a wider, more general duty of care (which was not appealed), it recognised that, in particular circumstances, a gambling operator could assume responsibility towards a customer. Moreover, Calvert related to activities prior to the entry into force of the Gambling Act 2005, which brought with it far greater gambling regulation. However, put bluntly, because it is often the case that a problem gambler will seek somewhere else to gamble when they are ‘cut-off’ and because an operator’s knowledge of their (new) customer’s gambling activity was nearly always with hindsight, the combined effect made causation a very difficult hurdle to overcome. The advent of increased digital interaction with customers, the acquisition of multiple brands by a single parent (which might be relevant to knowledge) and increasingly structured regulation meant that Calvert was not the end of matters and differently formulated claims began to arise.

Fast forward 10 years and, although not strictly speaking a gambling case, the Court of Appeal's decision in Ehrentreu -v- IG Index Ltd [2018] EWCA Civ 79 reinforced the exceptional nature of ‘Calvert type’ duties. The claimant, a spread bettor, argued that the operator should have closed out his position earlier, thereby avoiding significant losses of over £1 million. The court rejected the argument that the contractual provisions governing margin calls and close-out obligations were intended to protect the claimant from self-inflicted financial harm. Drawing on principles reflected in Calvert, the Court of Appeal emphasised that duties requiring one party to protect another from deliberately inflicting economic harm upon himself are highly unusual and would require very clear language before they could arise as a matter of contract.

A similar approach was adopted in O'Brien -v- Star Sports (On Course) Ltd. This was a County Court case, in which there was a significant amount of interest within the gambling sector. Here, the claimant sought to recover gambling losses on the basis that the operator had allegedly failed to comply with its social responsibility obligations (part of the LCCP) and was therefore in breach of an implied contractual duty to exercise reasonable care and skill. The court rejected that contention, holding that licensing and regulatory requirements and conditions could not be used to create a private law cause of action which parliament had not granted in the relevant legislation. The decision aligned with the view of many practitioners at the time that compliance failures in the regulatory sphere do not automatically generate a liability for a customer's gambling losses.

The cases moved on and in October 2025 Gibson -v- TSE Malta LP (t/a Betfair) [2025] EWCA Civ 1589 was heard in the Court of Appeal. The trial judge and the Court of Appeal undertook a detailed review of the earlier authorities and declined to recognise either a general duty of care in negligence or implied contractual terms requiring a gambling operator to prevent a customer from voluntarily sustaining gambling losses or that a breach of the LCCP would render gambling contracts void due to section 33 of the Gambling Act. (Noting a factual finding that Betfair had not, in any event, breached the LCCP.) Calvert was treated as a case turning on a specific self-exclusion arrangement and an assumption of responsibility, rather than authority for a wider duty to protect customers from the consequences of gambling. The decision therefore reinforces the orthodox position that gambling operators will not ordinarily be liable for losses voluntarily incurred by their customers.

Where does that leave us? Is it theoretically possible that an operator’s customer could successfully sue them for recovery of their gambling losses? In principle, yes. That said, it would turn on the specific facts of the case rather than any general duties owed by an operator to a customer. In practical terms though, with increased awareness of customer (online) activity and the checks and limits which the Gambling Commission requires licensed operators to apply to their customers, it remains difficult to see how that fact pattern might arise and, in any event, causation will always be a significant hurdle.

Attention now turns to the outcome of a claim made by the estate of Luke Ashton against TSE Malta LP (t/a Betfair) and heard in June 2026. Against the above legal background, it assumes particular significance. Unlike Calvert, Ehrentreu, O'Brien and Gibson, which were all concerned mainly with economic loss, the Ashton claim has more in common with a personal injury claim.

English law has traditionally drawn a distinction between a duty to protect against financial harm and any duties which may concern physical or psychiatric injury or death, where a duty of care arises more readily. The proceedings therefore provide an opportunity for the courts to consider questions of operator responsibility that have not been directly addressed in the existing economic loss authorities. The judgment is awaited with interest.

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This article was co-authored by Senior Associate, Katie Dugdill.