William Hill, one of Europe’s leading bookmaker is now facing their own legal troubles and quite possibly setting precedent with the pending lawsuit from a greyhound trainer and former customer Graham Calvert.

Graham Calvert, a former customer of William Hill is suing the company for failing to adhere to the customer’s requests to close his account due to his compulsive addiction to gamble on their website.

The gambler claims to have been placing wagers since 2005 but only opened an account with William Hill in 2006. Since this time he claims to have lost £2 million by bets placed on various sports.

He admits to earning close to £30,000 a month through his bets with initial wagers of £1,000 which over time grew to more than £30,000 a punt. He claims that he asked the bookmaker to close his account in May 2006 which he states was recorded on audio by the bookmaker. Calvert repeated the process to close his account the following month, although he alleges the bookmaker took his bets until December of 2006. 

Calvert claims to have bet over £7.5 million in a 16 month timeframe sometimes bringing bin liners stuffed with £100,000 cash to place his bets. The largest bet he placed and lost was in the amount of £347,000 placed on America to win the Ryder Cup.

During the same timeframe he claims to have suffered a marriage breakdown which he says was a result of his compulsive habits and told the media "If I'd known I had the problem and didn't do anything about it, I would see myself as being 100 per cent responsible. The fact is that I did try to go through the right procedures and I was let down."

Although William Hill contests to the allegations made by Calvert they are expected to appear in the High Court on Monday which is sure to set a precedent for future claims against online gambling websites.

Players who have gambling problems or want to close their accounts can request to do so from any online gambling company. William Hill has a self-exclusion policy in effect which states “For those customers who wish to restrict their gambling, William Hill provides a self-exclusion facility enabling customers to close their account or accounts for a minimum period of six months up to five years as requested. Unless you request self-exclusion, any account that is simply 'closed' can be re-opened at any time.” Players will need to contact Customer Support to request a self-exclusion.

William Hill is a member of Gamcare.org.uk, GamblersAnonymous.org.uk, GamblingTharapy.org and GambleAware.co.uk