PAGCOR Shifts B2B Accreditation Deadline to September 30 After Delays

The Philippine gambling regulator has pushed back the B2B supplier accreditation cutoff by two months, giving technology vendors until September 30 to complete the process. PAGCOR confirmed the extension after it became clear that many applicants were stuck waiting for documentation from other government agencies, a bottleneck that threatened to lock them out of a market now ranked among South East Asia's largest regulated gambling jurisdictions by gross gaming revenue.

The accreditation framework, first announced in October 2025, is the Philippines' first attempt to regulate its entire B2B gaming supply chain. It follows years spent dismantling the POGO sector, which became synonymous with organised crime and money laundering and ultimately led to the country being grey-listed by the FATF from 2021 to 2024. Industry analyst and lawyer Marie Antonette B. Quiogue described the new regime as a "significant shift," saying it reflects standards seen in mature iGaming markets such as the UK, New Jersey, Malta, Germany and Ontario.

Under the original transition plan, suppliers that applied by May 31 were allowed to keep operating while they worked to meet the July 31 deadline. That timeline proved unrealistic for many. Licensing and compliance expert Ivan Kiselev, co-founder of My Gaming License, said applicants face a demanding process including document submissions, probity checks, facility inspections, technical testing and fee payments, with the sheer volume of paperwork posing the biggest hurdle.

PAGCOR's own figures highlight how little had been completed by mid-July. As of July 20, only 66 accreditations had been finalised, the majority of them game providers: 41 game providers, 13 aggregators, four customer support firms, three marketing companies, two payment gateways, two KYC providers and one games certification laboratory. If the original cutoff had been enforced, the country's 60 licensed online operators would have been left with just a handful of accredited non-game suppliers, creating serious pressure points across the market.

Kiselev argued that the extension was justified to preserve the rigour of the checks. "The real constraints sit in the thin support categories," he said, noting that the shortage of accredited payment and KYC providers could leave the market vulnerable if a provider exited, encountered regulatory trouble, or suffered technical outages. He also predicted that future accreditation would shift to a rolling process, with one key difference: suppliers will no longer be permitted to operate while their applications are still under review.

PAGCOR has not disclosed how many applications remain pending, though the extension hints at a substantial backlog. The regulator also has not outlined the procedure for suppliers that missed the original grace period. For those already in the pipeline, however, the immediate threat of being shut out has been lifted.