Guts Group UK Compliance Email / Site Lists

[baldidiot]

I'm sure you all got this but just in case it slipped by and you get UK traffic, the Guts group (guts, thrills, super lenny et al) are requesting:

1. List of all sites by Monday 23rd October
2. A link to the T&C's where the offer/brand is mentioned

Few other bits and bobs but all fairly standard ASA/CAP type rules.

Just FYI!

Dear partner,

More than ever we as an operator, you as an affiliate and we together as an industry
have to undertake a higher socially responsible manner towards our end customers. Although this newsletter primarily addresses our partners with a clear focus on UK-traffic, we still encourage all of you to read it to be updated on current and future changes that are required from you as an affiliate. Needless to say, more markets will become regulated over the course of time so it is only in your best interest to be constantly updated on the progress.


The Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP) administered by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), perform an important and long-term role for the greater good of our business operations. Breaches of ASA and UKGC codes may result in rulings made against you as an affiliate and us as an operator. As an affiliate of GIG affiliates, any advertising you do on our behalf must adhere to advertising requirements at all times.

With this newsletter, our aim is not only to enlighten you as our partner about the future demands that are required from our end, but also to be as specific as possible to ensure that you don’t fail to understand our message. Therefore you will, besides more general guidelines, also find current “Do’s and Don’ts” depending on your marketing method when promoting GIG affiliates. If you still are in doubt, please don’t hesitate to contact your account manager or reach out to us at support@gigaffilaites.com.
General Marketing Guidelines

• Sales promotions have to be clear and accurate
• Adverts cannot feature themes that link gambling to toughness, resilience, and recklessness
• Adverts cannot give the impression that gambling can be a source of income or an activity to resort to for the payment of debts
• Adverts and promotions cannot appeal to children, young people and/or vulnerable adults

General Rules For Advertising

• All adverts need to clearly indicate that the gambling activity promoted is to be exercised only by persons who are 18+
• All adverts have to clearly state how to make use of an offer. For example, the customer has to be fully made aware of all wagering requirements, limitations of bonus offers etc
• Offers cannot be misleading. For example, the promotion of a higher theoretical RTP than confirmed by the game provider or any of the GIG affiliates brands
• No adverts can be targeted to or appeal in any way to people under the age of 18
• Any promotions, including large winnings by any of the customers from the GIG brands, must be real ones
• Aggressive promotions cannot be used. Statements that will not be tolerated include, but are not restricted to: "You have won x amount of bonus", "This bonus is only available today" (if the offer is not time-barred), "Get rich today"

Marketing Do’s And Don’ts

What we don’t allow for the time being
Social media, including Facebook, native ads, Twitter or any kind of social posts. Furthermore, we will not allow Pop under campaigns, SMS, Programmatic media buying or advertorials. If any of these channels are your cup of tea you can already be sure that it will not be accepted going forward.

What about banner material?
We have a large range of creative assets ready to be shared with you in in the Media Gallery of your affiliate account. All assets contained within adhere to the advertising regulations and are fully compliant.

I can’t find the banner size I am looking for, can’t I just create my own?
If any specific sizes are missing from your end you can just reach out to us so we can cater for it. Any homemade creative assets that have not been approved by an account manager may lead to the termination of your account and removal from the affiliate programme

Email templates and how to be compliant

• Customer subscription to receiving marketing material from the affiliate has to be on an opt-in basis, preferably double opt-in
• Send outs need to have an "unsubscribe" link which would enable the customer to opt out of receiving any future marketing materials
• The material that is to be sent to the customers has to be from any of the GIG brands. If you aim to change copy, images etc it will need pre-approval from your affiliate manager
• All e-mails have to clearly state who the sender of that e-mail is, providing a registered address and contact details
• None of the brands under GIG affiliates can appear in the ‘From’ field to make it clear to the recipient that the email has not been sent by us
• GIG affiliates must be provided with a preview before every send out and should not be sent without approval from your account manager

How to be compliant if you have an SEO/PPC site

We are fully aware that even though you don’t intentionally target UK traffic, you may still attract traffic from there. Therefore, our suggestion here applies to affiliates that have either their full website/s or any sub-category that target this market. Our suggestion here I based on how the welcome offers are presented on your page. If you use a, £ (GBP) sign, we have a clear case. What we demand from our end are then the following standards:

1. The terms free spins have to be replaced with extra spins
2. When mentioning any of our brands you must clearly state how this is achieved along with all major terms. We are fully aware that the layout might be a problem here and can, in such cases, recommend mentioning only the first deposit offer including links to the terms and conditions and Full Terms and limitations of the Welcome Offer (in italics above) listed in your review
3. You need to add a link to terms & condition for the brand that you are promoting (see media ID for each brand below)

Thrills (Media ID 4250 in Netrefer)
Kaboo (Media ID 4249 in Netrefer)
Superlenny (Media ID 4251 in Netrefer)
Rizk ( ID 2550 in Income Access)
Betspin (ID 2552 in Income Access)
Guts (ID 2551 in Income Access)
What do we demand from you?
If you are operating in UK you need to mail us a list of all sources in which you mention or refer to us as an operator, enabling us to conduct compliance checks in order to ensure we are meeting regulatory requirements.

You must provide us with the above-mentioned list by no later than Monday 23rdOctober 2017. Please e-mail the list to support@gigaffiliates.com together with your affiliate ID. If you already have a designated Affiliate Manager you can contact him/her directly
What if I don’t agree to your guidelines?
If this is the case, then our reply is a simple one. We have no other choice than to terminate our current partnership. We are in it for the long run and are very serious about our Affiliate partners adhering to the ASA guidelines and those specified by the Gambling Commission. We need to ensure that we have you as a partner by our side.

Going forward we are as always aiming to have a strong working relationship with our affiliates whereby both parties are operating in a compliant and responsible manner.
We truly appreciate your understanding and co-operation. If you have any further questions or queries, do not hesitate to drop your affiliate manager a note or email support@gigaffilaites.com.

Links For Further Reading

Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP) Code - 16 Gambling

https://www.asa.org.uk/type/non_broadcast/code_section/16.html

CAP Executive Advice on Online Affiliate Marketing

https://www.asa.org.uk/advice-online/affiliate-marketing.html

Best regards,
Bruno Berlafa
Head of Affiliates

 

[CygX1]

It takes this affiliate program a few weeks to inform affiliates about the changes by the UK Gambling Commission but affiliate partners are forced to respond and adapt within a few days. Ouch.

 

[NDG]

They should definitely give affiliates more time. They are slow to react but then they expect
affiliates to quickly make the changes. At least this group put out a well thought out e-mail
with most of the information needed to comply with the requirements. Some of the affiliate
programs were a bit vague, and then they would ask that you contact them if any questions.
We contacted one of them a few days ago, and we've yet to receive any response back.

 

[casinonewbie]

We contacted one of them a few days ago, and we've yet to receive any response back.

But they still expect everything done yesterday -

 

[Webzcas]

I promote Guts and I have yet to receive this email....

 

[BetOnlineUK]

This is the trouble, it is too inconsistent it took bet365 several days to send out the same email to its database and looks like the same here. But Webzcas you would not know anything about it if it was not for this forum.

 

[Webzcas]

Yep, no email whatsoever. Thanks for posting. There was a message within my gigAffiliates dashboard. But I only noticed it AFTER reading this thread.

Many Thanks. Have actioned and responded as necessary.

 

[Biti]

Got the message too. It seems that we can expect 100s of this messages. Same thing for all those KYC-requests. And everybody is interpreting rules its own way.

Must say in this case the mail is clear. GIG are affiliates too, so they know what's going on on the other side.

 

[BadSanta]

the rizk terms and conditions link of 2550 is 'bullshit', it's just the terms of the casino and not the bonus terms, just going through the rest now.

 

[BadSanta]

All seems a little ill conceived at the minute, the email calls for the term extra spins, yet banners in the affiliate backend for Guts and Betspin still state free spins. And the actual sites still refer to them as free spins in many instances, albeit they do call them extra spins as well and the id's for the terms and conditions which i'm assuming should be the bonus terms and conditions, don't actually have the bonus terms and conditions on. I think they need to look into the meaning of 'uniform'.

Not looked at superlenny, thrills and kaboo yet as this is a ballache, especially when you consider these guys are sharking you on commission to fund there other ventures.

 

[casinonewbie]

the email calls for the term extra spins, yet banners in the affiliate backend for Guts and Betspin still state free spins.

So the banners they have available ain't even following their very own rules

 

[BadSanta]

So the banners they have available ain't even following their very own rules

No and some of the bonuses are all over the place - the thrills site, in places it states 200% Slots Bonus in others 100% Slots Bonus. They need to get their own shit together before giving tight deadlines for everybody else.

 

[BadSanta]

The guts terms is just a page without a link back to the actual site!!! Grrr.

 

[Lacy]

Hi, I just got an email from 21affiliates saying 'urgent' asking for all kinds of ID all of a sudden They want an immediate response! Anyone else got this one?