VBET

Two VBETs: which one did you play on?

VBET is one brand run through two separate legal structures, and everything about a claim depends on which one took your money. The UK site, vbet.co.uk, is operated by SCGO Limited, a Malta company (registration C45929) that appears on the UK Gambling Commission register under account 44662 with five remote licences; UKGC and Malta records previously carried the operating entity under the Vivaro Limited name, and the account, licence and company numbers tie the two names together. The international site, vbet.com, is run by a different company altogether: Radon B.V., registered in Curacao under number 126922, a vehicle third-party trackers associate with the BetConstruct platform. The wider group traces back to a bookmaker founded in Yerevan, Armenia, in 2003, and sits under SoftConstruct, the technology group behind BetConstruct.

The practical test is simple: check which domain your deposits went to. A vbet.co.uk customer contracts with a UKGC licensee and keeps the full UK framework, including GamStop and IBAS as the registered dispute adjudicator. A vbet.com customer contracts with a Curacao company and has none of it.

The 2023 settlement and the reported UK exit

In January 2023 the Gambling Commission announced a regulatory settlement of 337,631 pounds with Vivaro Limited, trading as vbet, after a compliance assessment found anti-money-laundering and safer-gambling failings between October 2020 and June 2021: customers could deposit significant sums before know-your-customer checks completed, source-of-funds guidance was inadequate (including for crypto-derived money), and safer-gambling interactions fell short. The settlement included an independent audit requirement. Separately, review sites report that VBET messaged UK customers on 25 September 2025 that it was leaving the UK market, and its retail entity, Vbet Sports Limited, surrendered its non-remote licence in August 2025 and was dissolved that December. When checked in July 2026 the remote UKGC licences were still recorded as active, so UK customers with balances during the wind-down still face a live licensee with live obligations.

Why VBET balances get frozen, and the route for each site

The freeze reports around VBET cluster into three causes, none unique to the brand. The first is verification: identity and source-of-funds checks that arrive or repeat at the point of withdrawal. Some of these are a genuine legal duty, though the 2023 settlement record cuts both ways here, because the Commission found customers had been able to deposit significant sums before checks completed, which makes checks that only ever bite at cash-out worth questioning. The second is a review after a win, the pattern in the AskGamblers complaints where large balances sat locked with no reason given. The third is a terms dispute, where a playing style or bonus condition is said to have been breached and the balance is held while the operator decides what to do about it. In every version, the first move is the same: get the reason and the exact term in writing.

The route depends entirely on which entity took your deposits. A vbet.co.uk customer contracts with SCGO Limited, a UKGC licensee under account 44662, so the full UK sequence applies: a written complaint through the operator's published procedure, then, once that process is exhausted or eight weeks have passed, the registered independent adjudicator, IBAS, free of charge, with licence-level concerns reportable to the Gambling Commission, which regulates the operator but does not order individual refunds. The UK-exit message reported from September 2025 does not change this while the remote licences remain active, because a licensee winding down still owes its remaining customers every obligation the licence carries. A vbet.com customer contracts with Radon B.V. in Curacao, so the UK ladder never applies: the complaint goes to the operator first, and any escalation runs through whatever its own licence provides. Under the regime Curacao has operated since the end of 2024, licensed operators must offer a free, independent dispute-resolution route, and suspected licence breaches can be reported to the Curacao Gaming Authority, which supervises operators but does not adjudicate individual disputes or award compensation. One caution: the vbet.com licence details in our entry are recorded as reported from the register by third parties, so the live licence position is worth confirming before a complaint leans on it.

The evidence that decides a VBET frozen-balance case

Start with the domain, because it decides everything else. Your bank or card statements show whether deposits went to vbet.co.uk or vbet.com, and that single line settles which company you contracted with and which routes exist. Then capture the freeze itself while you can still see it: dated screenshots of the balance and the account status, a full export or page-by-page record of the cashier history, and the terms as they read today. Ask in writing for the reason for the freeze and the exact term relied on, and keep every reply; an operator that will not name a clause is telling you something an adjudicator will notice. If you carry a self-exclusion history, add the registration confirmation and its dates, because GamStop bound the UK site, and a failure there sits at the centre of a different and often stronger kind of claim. A frozen balance is not by itself evidence of wrongdoing on either side, and a loss alone is not a claim; what the record does is let the freeze be tested against the operator's own rules, which is where these disputes are actually decided.

If you are in the United States

For a United States player the VBET Gambling Commission licence is beside the point: it covers Great Britain, and online gambling in the United States is licensed by each state. This page does not record any US state licence for VBET, so no state regulator has authority over your VBET account. Your state attorney general or consumer protection office can log the dispute; the complaint itself goes to VBET in writing through its published procedure.

If you are in the EU

The VBET Great Britain licence gives an EU player no protection, and in two EU countries a foreign licence has been no defence to a refund claim. The Austrian Supreme Court held in 1 Ob 229/20p, against an operator relying on a Gibraltar licence, that contracts with a provider lacking an Austrian concession are ineffective and the stake repayable. The Court of Justice of the EU confirmed in Case C-440/23 (16 April 2026), on facts involving Malta-licensed operators rather than VBET, that a German player may claim restitution of stakes lost on games prohibited in Germany; the Federal Court of Justice’s lead decision, I ZR 216/25, is pending after a hearing on 17 September 2026. In the Netherlands the Hoge Raad ruled on 3 July 2026 that an unlicensed operator’s contracts are not automatically void, so no automatic refund. Elsewhere in the EU we have found no sourced route against VBET beyond the VBET complaints procedure.

If you are in Canada or Australia

Neither market is covered by the VBET Great Britain licence. Canada: apart from Ontario, every province runs a government monopoly and we have found no domestic route; in Ontario, and only if VBET is registered there (not asserted here), the route is a complaint to VBET, a complaint number, then iGaming Ontario review, which cannot refund wagers or award compensation, and the AGCO says it cannot get your money back. Australia: the Interactive Gambling Act 2001 bans online casinos and sports betting services without an Australian licence, ACMA accepts complaints about breaches, and ACMA says Australian regulators cannot help you recover money withheld by an illegal service.

If you are in the UK

In Great Britain the route is fixed by the VBET licence. Complain to VBET in writing through its published procedure; VBET has eight weeks to resolve the complaint. If it does not, or issues a deadlock letter sooner, you can take the dispute free of charge to the ADR provider named in the VBET terms, as licence condition 6.1.1 requires. Where that provider is IBAS, its decisions bind registered operators up to £10,000 / $13,000. The Gambling Commission does not resolve individual complaints or help consumers get money back, and the VBET terms cannot restrict your right to go to court.