Veikkaus to open redundancy discussions with 830 staff

In addition to the redundancies, Veikkaus said that, the terms of the employment contracts with around 330 employees “may change substantially”.

However, the business added that it may be able to keep some people employed by directing them towards new openings in Veikkaus, particularly at its upcoming  Casino Tampere property, where it expects to employ 50 staff.

The most-affected division of Veikkaus will be its channels and sales team.

“Our future will be successful if we can adjust our operations to meet the demands of the operating environment while offering the players a responsible, high-quality customer experience,” says senior vice president for channels and sales Jari Heino said.

“We will continue to maintain an extensive network of retailers and game providers, while making the operations of our gaming arcades more uniform. We also want to keep investing in our brick-and-mortar retail network and to work to preserve its vitality.”

Veikkaus faced questions about the future of its monopoly status in 2019, with a survey that year claiming a slight majority of Finnish citizens are in favour of abolishing the country’s current regulatory framework for gambling. More recently, the European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA) ended 2020 with a call to the Finnish government to ‘fix’ its gambling policy, by bringing an end to Veikkaus’ monopoly in the country.

This year, Veikkaus has taken a number of major consumer protection measures, including making  temporary online gambling loss limits that were put in place at the start of the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic permanent. Under these measures, players will only be able to lose a maximum of €500 (£429/$596) each day while playing online casino games with Veikkaus.