Corporate Social Responsibility
Betfair is fully committed to a CSR strategy which addresses the key business-related social, environmental and economic impacts in a way that builds stakeholder and share value, thereby improving commercial sustainability. This includes relations with employees, suppliers, partners and contractors, and its impact on the environment and on society more generally.1. Responsible Operator
Betfair fully supports the objectives of the UK's Gambling Act 2005, which are to ensure fairness to the punter, protect the young and vulnerable and keep out crime. This also applies to all other jurisdictions in which Betfair operates.
Betfair has set new standards in the fight against corruption in sport. The company has led the way in information-sharing agreements with sports authorities: the Memorandums of Understanding that we have in place with most major sporting regulators allow them unprecedented access to our audit trail. This transparency provides the regulators with the best available means of identifying any fraudulent betting on their sports. Betfair has signed MOUs with the UK Jockey Club, the International Cricket Council, the South African and US horseracing authorities, the English Football Association, UEFA and many more.
Betfair has built up a highly experienced fraud prevention and market integrity team to combat any fraud (mainly related to stolen credit cards) and to identify any suspicious behaviour on the web site. As part of our code of conduct, we make thorough "know your customer" checks on all our users, to verify their age, identity and that they are the rightful owner of the credit cards being used to fund their accounts. Betfair will suspend accounts should the fraud prevention team have any concerns. Betfair believes that it is among the top five e-gaming sites in terms of fraud prevention. Betfair is a member of Gamshield, an anti-fraud forum for the industry, and is committed to sharing its expertise with the industry.
Betfair has been registered with the Independent Betting Arbitration Service since 2002. We will always do everything possible to resolve a customer issue in-house and we will only turn to IBAS as a last resort. Being registered with IBAS means that we have to commit to abide by their rulings in any betting disputes. Betfair has an excellent relationship with IBAS and is keen to participate in discussions to establish greater uniformity governing rules throughout the industry.
Responsible Gambling
Our Responsible Gambling Policy sets out its commitment to minimising the negative effects of problem gambling and to promoting responsible gambling practices.
Betfair are fully compliant with the Remote Gambling Association's Codes for Social Responsibility and Age Verification.
Betfair's strict and rigorous process for age verification takes customers through multiple stages to confirm their identity and age. Funding amount restrictions are placed on some 'at risk' funding methods and withdrawals are blocked on all accounts until age has been verified. Full account suspension takes place where age cannot be verified.
We are constantly monitoring our processes, and perform regular random checks on all accounts.
Our website pages are Internet Content Rating Association
(ICRA) 'labelled', which allows us to be recognised as a gambling
provider, and we encourage our customers to use parental filtering
programmes.
Information relating to maintaining control and self assessment has been made easily accessible, and contact details and links to support organisations are readily available.
Self-exclusion functionality is available on or
offline, allowing an individual who may be having difficulties
controlling their gambling the opportunity to take a break. A
self-excluded account cannot be reactivated by the customer for a
minimum of six months.
GamCare, the leading authority providing counselling, advice and practical help in addressing the social impact of gambling in the UK, have been instrumental in the development of our training material.
Betfair invests in research that is aimed at finding out more about problem gambling, its causes and treatments, and makes voluntary donations to the Responsibility in Gambling Trust (RIGT).
Betfair are proud to work closely with GamCare and Gambling Therapy.
2. Charity Initiatives
Betfair is committed to
supporting charities as part of its comprehensive Corporate Social
Responsibility strategy. In 2008 we will have donated over £350,000 to
a wide variety of causes.
Each year Betfair nominates a
'Charity of the Year' so that the two can work together on a series of
fundraising events, with Betfair committed to matching an agreed
amount.
Major charity partners include:
SportsAid;
Betfair's nominated charity partner for 2007 and 2008, resulting in
£500,000 for young British athletes. During this time Betfair was the
official 'Development Partner of Team University GBR'. Betfair's
funding will provide these athletes - a team of 300 - with an
unprecedented level of support in terms of training facilities, support
at the holding camps and the provision of specialist personnel.
SPARKS; Betfair's Charity of the Year 2009, voted for by its employees.
Injured Jockeys Fund:
Betfair has made a three-year commitment to help fund the Injured
Jockeys Fund's Oaksey House project. This is a retirement home for
injured jockeys in Lambourn, incorporating 12 residential units and a
resource centre. It is also intended to be a centre of excellence for
the provision of medical care.
Betfair's support will go
directly to the provision of physiotherapy in Lambourn. This is
something which is desperately needed and will be of benefit to the
entire racing community.
Racing Welfare; Betfair's Charity of the Year in 2005. £250,000 was raised for the charity under Betfair's matched funding scheme.
The
Pride of Racing Awards is a legacy of the partnership. These unique
awards celebrate the unsung heroes of the racing industry; those who
make British racing special and who, in various ways, enhance the lives
of others involved in the industry.
Hammersmith Junior Rowing Centre;
Betfair is an early supporter of the Hammersmith Junior Rowing Centre,
which is currently being developed next to Betfair's headquarters on
the River Thames in Hammersmith, West London. This will be a regional
centre to introduce young people of all abilities to rowing, indoor
rowing and sport in general. Its further purpose is to introduce the
community to other sports and increase awareness of fitness, nutrition
and well-being are important objectives. Betfair is proud to support
and establish an ongoing partnership with this valuable local community
initiative.
Animal Health Trust; As a fellow of the charity, Betfair is dedicated to animal welfare.
3. Community Investment
Betfair's
broader Community Investment programme enables the business to support
a wide range of causes and support employees to do volunteering work.
Betfair has been a Business in the Community member since February 2007.
Cash for Clubs - A regional programme of activity for supporting community sport.
Over
the past year Betfair has been rolling out its innovative 'Cash 4
Clubs' programme to provide community sports clubs in the regions with
much needed funds. Betfair is giving clubs a unique chance to raise
the money they need to improve facilities, purchase new equipment,
improve coaching staff qualifications, nurture young talent, etc.
This
is linked to Betfair's vision to be a champion of regional and
community sport, which evolved from its successful partnership with
SportsAid.
For more detail go to www.cash-4-clubs.com
Employee-focused CSR
Betfair
has a volunteering policy which allows employees to volunteer with a
registered charity or recognised community service for two working days
a year.
Betfair actively supports local community projects near its offices, including providing student mentors and work placement programmes, in addition to funding. We also encourage and facilitate employee volunteering, for example with charity partners, through local volunteering centres and the London Better Together Day.
Clean Up Malta Campaign - Betfair has joined forces with the Ministry for Resources and Rural Affair to support the national clean up campaign. Betfair has organised six of its own events with over 50 employees participating each time. To ensure that this is sustainable Betfair will also be sponsoring a number of permanent litter bins to be set up around the Dingli Cliffs area.
A 'Give as You Earn' scheme enables employees to easily donate to a
charity of their choice, with Betfair matching donations which are
given to the company Charity of the Year.
4. Environment
Betfair
has an environmental policy to tackle climate change head-on. We have
set ambitious targets to reduce the environmental impact of our
business and work with peers, customers and suppliers to reduce theirs.
Betfair's carbon footprint has recently been measured at 3,277 tonnes,
which is about 17 tonnes per £1m of revenue. The target is to reduce
this by 30% by the end of 2010 to 12 tonnes per £1m of revenue.
Our
own 'Green Supplier Award' best illustrate efforts to stimulate and
challenge suppliers. In September 2007, we announced the winner of the
very first 'Betfair Green Supplier of the Year' award. We wanted to do
something which would encourage and recognise suppliers who were
striving to reach similar goals to our own and who were able to work in
partnership with us in order to help us deliver ours.
Betfair is
now in a position, having had these early initiatives in place, to
progress more ambitiously with its full environmental strategy. The
programme has four main themes:
- Operations: Challenging the business to minimise its environmental impact
- Partnership: Engaging partners and customers on these issues
- Innovation: Exploring new technologies and ways of working
- Leadership: Learning from others and sharing what it learns.
We
recognise that the day-to-day running of our operations has an effect
on the local, regional and global environment and it is therefore our
responsibility to manage this impact.
Commitment to this
ambition has already been demonstrated over the past year by a series
of environmental initiatives and particular enhancements to our
recycling and green procurement efforts. Specific measures include:
Recycling
of all paper, glass, cardboard, plastic and cans through O and G and
printer cartridges and redundant IT equipment through Computer Aid
International. This is in keeping with the strong culture of recycling
to ensure that our old PC's, monitors and other peripherals are where
they are most needed.
Use of 100% recycled paper and a Paper
Use Policy which includes tips about the avoidance of printing
altogether and minimal paper use. Photocopiers and printers are set to
duplex as a default wherever possible, and older machines that do not
have this capability are being upgraded.
Providing all staff with water bottles to cut down on the use of disposable plastic glasses.
Power
Consumption: Migration from Xeon servers to Niagara servers and wide
spread use of Opteron CPU's has reduced power consumption.
Introduction of motion sensor lighting in all offices.
RoHS Compliance - All new major equipment purchase categories are RoHS 5 compliant.
This includes Dell PCs and Servers, Sun Servers, NetApps storage and Cisco networking equipment.
As well as having a focus on more energy efficient machines, we have
had for sometime a policy of virtualisation to increase the utilisation
of our existing equipment. This not only reduces the need to buy more
equipment but also has a power reduction implication. We want to
extract the maximum value from the fewest machines and this has led to
a power saving to date of 84% in this area. Storage virtualisation is
another area to examine when you are looking for power reductions and
the reduction of 40TB we have achieved represents another power saving
of over 60%.
We are Members of the Green Grid Consortium and recognise the
importance of collaboration and knowledge sharing in order to drive the
industry forward.
We investigate the environmental programmes that our suppliers have
in place and have signed up to the Mayor's Green Procurement Code.
A 'Ride2Work' cycle scheme which allows employees to purchase bikes interest free, and at a discounted rate. Prior to re-launching and promoting the scheme, a programme of site improvements, which included the building of new showering facilities, took place. High take up of this scheme demonstrates it success.