I am going to admit up front that this column does not offer up anything in the way of poker “strategy.” Rather, I am going with a bit of advice this week. Advice that, thanks to one of the most out of touch, obtuse, stubborn, self-centered poker message board posters of all time giving me the perfect jumping off point, may help you avoid some potential headaches down the road.
This tough guy posted a rant about Full Tilt Poker temporarily freezing his account pending an explanation of a transfer he received from another player. His story was that he had been staking this person for some time when this stakee decided to play in games above his skill level or bankroll. Our genius requested that the stakee return part of the stake, which he did. Our friend then proceeded to cash out that money.
Full Tilt did not like this withdrawal request and wanted to know what his relationship was with the stakee. This infuriated our main character, who believes that since it is his money, he should be allowed to do what he wants with it. He contends that Full Tilt, because it is a company that holds people’s money and facilitates transfers, is essentially a bank.
And he is so completely wrong.
Online poker rooms are not banks. Player to player transfers are allowed at some of them in order to give people another option for funding their accounts. It is a convenience for the players and benefits the poker room by making it quicker and easier for players to get money, get to the tables, and generate rake. Transfers are not for the purpose of paying debts or conducting private funding transactions.
Financial transactions cost online poker rooms money, as they have to pay the online payment processors fees whenever a player puts money on or takes money off a site. If they were to allow players to cash out immediately upon receiving a transfer, they would lose money. They need players to generate some revenue at the poker tables before cashing out.
Online poker rooms are in the poker business, not the home banking business. Your funds are on the site to be used for playing poker.
When almost everybody pointed out to our hero that it is completely standard for a poker room to not allow an immediate cash out after a transfer, he became very argumentative. I had to shake my head when he released this gem, complete with unnecessary abbreviations:
“if u made a transfer to Chase Manhattan bank to pay your mortgage 6 times a month for a year, always for 10k$. And then one day ur bank told you that they were holding your funds, and wanted u to explain the reason u were transferring money to chase manhattan bank, and until u did they were freezing all ur assets, and the process would take 3-5 days. Keep in mind nothing has changed, there is no scandal going on with Chase Manhattan, they just suddenly felt like they should freeze your account for 5 days and ask why. That wouldn’t bother you? Would certainly bother me.”
Once again, my friend, Full Tilt Poker is not a bank. A bank is there for you to use to move money around and pay bills. Thus, they would almost certainly not question your own transfers into your own account and subsequent mortgage payments. This sort of activity is normal for a bank. Transfers and insta-withdrawals at an online poker site are not normal.
Side note: six $10,000 transfers per month for a year to pay a mortgage? That is one expensive house!
On top of the business reasons for not allowing this sort of activity, online poker rooms will take action like Full Tilt did to prevent money laundering. I mean, think about it. If they just let transfers fly back and forth and cash outs to happen with no security checks in place, criminals would run wild. Credit card thieves could make a deposit, transfer the money to a friend, and have that friend cash out with nothing to stop them. These security policies are in place for the protection of both the poker room and the player.
Keep all of this in mind if you ever find the need to receive money from someone via inter-account transfer. I can absolutely understand why people would transfer money at an online poker room to settle a debt – I am not judging anyone who does. Just realize that this is not what the player to player transfer feature was intended for, and if you try to cash out right away, you risk having your account frozen. Make sure you play some poker before pulling the money out of your account. Heck, e-mail the poker room to ask them how much you need to play. Chances are, they would appreciate you wanting to abide by the rules.
Full Tilt does not have the greatest customer service reputation in the world, and I suppose that if the backer and his horse really did have tons of transactions over a long period of time, as the complainant said they did, Full Tilt could have noted that and let the cash out slide with a warning. But the site was still within its right to disallow it. Online poker sites are for poker. They are not banks. If you need to send someone some money, it is best to just write a check.
Great article. Another additional point that I think merits mentioning. Online poker sites that permit inter-player transfers like this are forced to be hyper-vigilant, as this is classified as a potential AML (Anti-Money Laundering) risk. This is why chip-dumping is prohibited. Having a vehicle where one player can deposit funds, transfer them to another, and then have the transferee withdraw them will always, always be scrutinized carefully, and rightly so. This is not a sign of an operator playing fast and loose – quite the opposite. This suggests that they are taking their internal AML controls seriously. The industry endures a tide of allegations that it is unscrupulous – some it deserves, and some it doesn’t. This looks to me as though the operator was doing exactly the right thing.
Please ask Full Tilt for a copy off the anti-money laundering regulations that they operate under.
I don’t believe that the KGC care at all, and that this is just Full Tilt trying to suck money onto their tables.
I have money in a Paypal account and use it to buy goods(play poker) with other Paypal members(other players), but I get paid interest on the money EVERY MONTH and I can withdraw ANY AMOUNT at ANYTIME without question, why should a online poker site be ANY different??? Why don’t the Poker sites PAY interest on balances, I bet they make a ton of money themselves on the interest!!!
@ Joe:
The reason online poker site do not pay interest is because they do not have to pay interest to attract depositors. The attraction is the game. OTOH banks, like PayPal, have to compete for deposits with the thousands of other banking options. The poker sites compete as well, but currently their direct competition is not with banking institutions.
Now, I’m not saying that it would not be a good marketing tool to offer interest on player deposits. It would certainly set one poker site apart from another to offer such a benefit to members of its site.
Also, if you think PayPal can’t freeze your account, you haven’t done much research on them as they have a storied history of doing just that.
General comment: to me this is just more reason to legalize (and tax and regulate) online poker. Clear regulation about how the sites can and can’t use the players’ balances would benefit everyone.
@Joe — like Jim, I disagree with you about PayPal. I use it extensively and always have to wait several days when I try to transfer the money to my main bank account. I don’t think it should be that way — it’s my money, and it should be transferred digitally instantaneously in my view — but it’s not.