Austrian Court orders player to return part of winnings from unlicensed gambling

The court ruled that both the player and the operator breached Austrian law.

Austria.- Players in Austria and Germany have been suing gambling operators over losses incurred from unregulated gambling, but the legal situation has taken a turn with the first case of an operator suing a player. A player has been ordered to return winnings won from an unlicensed operator as both the player and the operator were found to have breached Austrian law.

Casinos Austria’s Win2Day remains the only licensed online casino operator in Austria, and players have been going after unlicensed operators for historic losses since the Supreme Court ruled that foreign operators were illegal in 2021. The latest case is the first to find that it goes both ways. However, the court granted the unnamed operator only €626 of the €7,162 in winnings that it sought to recover from between May 2020 and July 2020 in order to reimburse the operator’s legal fees.

The player argued that the request for repayment was an abuse of the law because the operator was aware both parties were acting illegally, but the court found that each contractual partner could invoke the illegality and nullity of the contract. The court stressed that it did not intend to protect the company. It said the role of regulation was to stop gambling outside of the licensed monopoly and to prevent gambling addiction.

Meanwhile, the question of whether gambling operators must refund customers’ losses before online gambling was regulated in Germany has been referred to the European Court of Justice (ECJ). Several class action suits claim losses should be invalidated because gambling was illegal at the time.

A regional court has ruled that all German civil courts must submit such cases to the ECJ for the final decision. This includes cases arriving at the Federal Court of Justice, which was due to hear a case this month until the operator involved withdrew its appeal.

Hambach & Hambach, a law firm defending operators, has argued that granting reimbursements to players could lead to a deluge of cases, with law firms taking on class actions for both online casino and sports betting losses. It also claims that a ruling in favour of customers could lead more people to gamble with unlicensed operators today under the belief that they may be able to recoup losses.