WILLEMSTAD – Online casinos operating under a Curaçao license may include provisions in their terms and conditions prohibiting players from transferring financial claims against the casino to third parties. The Joint Court of Justice has ruled that such a restriction is not inherently unreasonable, a decision that could have significant consequences for organizations that pursue gambling claims on behalf of players.
The ruling was issued in an appeal involving Gaming Services Provider (GSP), the Stichting Belangenbehartiging Gedupeerden Online Kansspelen (SBGOK) and several individual players.
GSP holds a Curaçao license for offering online gambling services and makes that license available to various online casinos.
At the center of the dispute are claims from players seeking the payment or recovery of money they say online casinos wrongfully withheld. Five players transferred their claims to SBGOK, while two others are pursuing their cases against GSP individually. The amounts involved range from several thousand to tens of thousands of U.S. and Canadian dollars.
A major issue before the Court was whether GSP could rely on the terms and conditions used by the online casinos.
According to GSP, players were required to accept those conditions when opening their accounts. The terms were accessible through a link, and players could not create an account or gamble unless they checked a box confirming their acceptance.
SBGOK argued that GSP had failed to demonstrate that players were able to save the terms and conditions at the time they entered into their agreements.
The Court acknowledged that, for contracts concluded electronically, the law requires that general terms and conditions be made available in a manner that allows them to be stored for later reference.
However, the absence of a dedicated download or save button does not automatically make the conditions invalid, according to the Court. The gambling operator was also not required to verify whether individual players had actually opened or read the conditions.
The ruling differs from the approach taken in an earlier dispute involving online gambling provider Usoftgaming. In that case, the operator could not sufficiently demonstrate that players had been able to save the applicable conditions, preventing the company from relying on them.
The latest judgment is particularly important because of the Court's findings concerning the transfer, or assignment, of claims.
The Court ruled that online casinos may prohibit players from transferring claims against them to another party. Such an assignment prohibition is not unreasonable in itself, the judges concluded, partly because gambling operators are required to conduct checks aimed at preventing fraud and money laundering.
If a valid prohibition is included in the applicable terms and conditions, players therefore cannot simply transfer their financial claims to an organization such as SBGOK.
The Court also found that the restriction cannot necessarily be circumvented by arranging for SBGOK merely to collect the money on behalf of the player rather than formally taking over the claim.
The decision could have broader consequences for the way claims against Curaçao-licensed online casinos are pursued. Organizations such as SBGOK depend in part on players transferring claims to them so they can take legal action against gambling companies.
However, the Court has not yet issued a final determination on all of the claims involved in the case.
GSP must first prove which versions of the terms and conditions applied when the players opened their accounts in 2022. Questions have arisen, for example, regarding the conditions used by online casino Betcoin, where there are discrepancies between the article numbers cited and those contained in the documents submitted to the Court.
SBGOK will also be given an opportunity to submit what it considers to be the correct historical versions of the applicable terms and conditions.
Both GSP and SBGOK have until October 6, 2026, to submit the additional documents. The Court will then continue its assessment of the individual cases.
The outcome means that while the Court has established that an assignment prohibition can legally form part of an online casino's terms and conditions, GSP must still demonstrate that such valid conditions actually applied to the players involved at the relevant time.