AGCO orders Great Canadian Entertainment to pay $170,000 over Pickering Casino Resort compliance failures

The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) has fined Great Canadian Entertainment (GCE) $170,000 after a compliance audit of Pickering Casino Resort found failures in monitoring high-risk patrons and reporting suspicious activity. For high-risk operators and their payment partners, the useful part is simple: Ontario’s regulator is treating missed suspicious activity reporting as a controls issue, not a paperwork issue.

1. AGCO said GCE failed to adequately identify, assess, and monitor high-risk patrons at Pickering Casino Resort, and did not report suspicious activity, including potential money laundering indicators.
2. Ontario’s gaming standards require operators to have effective measures to identify and respond to suspicious activity, including reporting suspected money laundering. AGCO said it found several failures by GCE to properly assess and track high-risk patrons, and that Suspicious Transaction Reports were not filed in various cases.
3. GCE has 15 days to appeal to the Licence Appeal Tribunal (LAT).
4. Karin Schnarr, chief executive officer and registrar at AGCO, said casino operators must take “a proactive approach” to identifying and reporting suspicious activity, adding that weak monitoring of high-risk behaviour undermines safeguards that protect the integrity of Ontario’s gaming sector.
5. This is the second AGCO penalty cited here in recent months: in June, the regulator ordered GCE to pay $120,000 for using unauthorised gaming system software at Ontario casinos, saying the compliance failure bypassed requirements designed to protect the integrity of casino gaming.