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Colombia’s gambling regulator has published draft rules that would overhaul the import and sale of slot machines, less than eight months after creating the registry that oversees them. The draft resolution, dated 24 July and issued under Coljuegos president Marco Emilio Hincapié Ramírez, would cut the length of import and distribution licences from four years to one, introduce a minimum wealth requirement for applicants, and set out a disciplinary procedure — including cancellation of the licence — for operators who fail to keep Coljuegos informed of where their machines end up. Coljuegos is accepting comments on the proposal until 31 July.
The rewrite would touch almost every part of the Single Registry of Importers and Distributors (RIC), the mandatory database Coljuegos created in December 2025 to trace electronic slot machines (METS) and gaming elements from the moment they enter the country to the point they reach a licensed operator. That registry only opened for applications in January, after a companion resolution gave the trade 45 calendar days to sign up.
Under the current scheme, authorisation to import or distribute lasts four years and can be renewed with six months’ notice. The draft would cut that to one year, renewable on the same terms provided the request is filed two months before expiry — a change Coljuegos says is needed so it can carry out annual checks on whether importers and distributors still meet the standard, rather than taking their fitness for granted for the best part of a decade.
Authorisations already granted under the four-year regime would keep that term under a transitional clause, though those operators would still have to comply with the tightened reporting rules going forward.
The most consequential addition would be a wealth test. Anyone applying to import METS would have to show a certified gross net worth of at least 150 times Colombia’s monthly minimum wage — roughly COP262.6 million, while distributors would need 50 times the minimum wage, around COP87.5 million.
Importers would be required to notify Coljuegos within ten business days of clearing customs, providing a Spanish-language technical data sheet for each machine — serial number, manufacturer, brand, model, year and country of origin — along with high-resolution photographs and the buyer’s tax details.
Failure to comply would trigger a summary disciplinary process run by Coljuegos’ contract monitoring unit. Late reporting — filed within the calendar month after the deadline — would bring a three-month suspension. A complete failure to report, or persistent lateness on more than three occasions during the life of the authorisation, would bring cancellation outright, with the operator barred from reapplying for a year.
Suspended or cancelled files would also be passed to Coljuegos’ illegal-operations division to inspect any machines that were never reported, because the draft assumes unreported machines warrant inspection for possible illegal operation. First-time offenders who fix the problem before a final decision is issued could have the sanction waived or knocked down to a written warning.
Operators and other interested parties can submit comments on the draft to [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] or [email protected] before the 31 July deadline.
