Beginners guide to The Independent Betting Adjudication Service (IBAS)
The first gambling website was set up in 1996, since then there has been an exponential increase in the number of people placing a bet online. The rapid increase in online gambling has in turn led to an increase in the number of complaints and thus in 1998 IBAS was launched to mediate these disputes. IBAS is a free to use, independent body which provides informed and impartial adjudications on disputes between gambling operators and their customers. Although their decisions are not legally binding on customers, decisions made by the IBAS adjudication panel are binding on registered gambling operators up to a maximum of £10,000. As a result customers, or operators where the value of the dispute is in excess of £10,000, are free to pursue the case through the court system after it has been determined by IBAS.
IBAS will review all claims made within one year of the relevant event occurring, a list of the areas of dispute which are covered can be found here. IBAS will not consider cases where the claimant has failed to attempt to resolve the dispute directly with the gambling operator, or where it believes that the claim has no reasonable prospect of success and it has discretion regarding whether to review a case which has been made outside the necessary one year timeframe. Providing your claim is not excluded for one of these reasons you should complete a claim form on the IBAS website where you will set out the details of your dispute as clearly and concisely as possible, you will be given the opportunity to attach any necessary evidence such as photographs or screenshots. Typically cases are resolved within 12 weeks, however some legally complex cases may take longer.
Given that the limit of their binding decisions is £10,000, recourse to IBAS may not be the most appropriate measure for high value gambling disputes. If you have a dispute with a gambling operator worth in excess of £10,000 and would like some advice or someone to act on your behalf then our highly experienced litigation team will gladly assist. Please contact us on [email protected] or 0118 951 6273 if you would like to discuss the contents of this article or have any other questions for the team.
