The Crown Casino Melbourne Scandal: What’s Happening Now?

In the Australian casino industry scandal, Crown Casino had been punished for many breaches of Victorian gambling laws in 2021 with a fine of $120 million — it’s the maximum available. The penalties imposed for years of misconduct, including failing to stop problem gambling and using illicit gaming tactics, are the latest steps taken over the facilities’ licenses.

What Laws Were Broken by Crown Casino?

The Crown Casino didn’t carry out responsible gambling; players could gamble for more than 24 hours and weren’t stopping. Chiversit, a state gaming regulator, said the casino did not listen, ignored the warranties for over a decade. It is that negligence that has given a heavy hand print to those people that suffered from all this, some pushed on to financial fall and then some even committed suicide.

The Two Major Fines

For twelve years, the casino flouted laws and warranties and was fined twice. While the gambling commission was given more substantial enforcement power, it set the following penalties:

• A$100 Million Fine – For failing to implement responsible gambling measures, and failing to inform patrons that a responsible approach to gambling must be implemented;
• A$20 Million Fine – Crown engaged in conduct that allowed players to use plastic picks to hold poker machine buttons in their hands to enable those players to play games of poker machines and multiple games at once without interruption. The casino rejected requests to ban these devices in 2019.

After-Fine Crown Reforms

In addition, the penalties listed above also required Crown Melbourne to respond to the Royal Commission’s conclusions and follow through on implementing specific reforms including the introduction of the PlaySafe program for responsible gambling. In addition to diversifying the revenue streams through other sources, such as gambling, the casino also purchased the hospitality industry, which it plans to use to attract a large number of people and compete with other AU casinos. To regain public confidence and guarantee such regulatory standards, however, is an amount of effort that is substantially greater.

Crown Casino Today

In November 2024, the most rigid poker machine regulations Oz has seen in several years were introduced (limiting the maximum allowed limit to A$100 and requiring players to set loss limits that they cannot exceed, compared with A$150 previously), and they came into effect in late 2024.

Crown Melbourne successfully retained a permit to its casino in March 2024 after meeting conditions sought by authorities, and has since more effectively clamped down on misbehavior in the past and pursued regulation. The casino and various governmental organizations enforce responsible gambling and corporate governance standards at their highest level.

Expert Opinion

I suppose it was a good lesson for Crown Casino since the reforms covered the responsible gaming issue for penalties. The casino had enough time to exclude the imperfections that were the subject of warranties for over ten years. The sky-high fines were extreme measures to make the casino comply with Aussie gambling laws.