[RESOLVED] Virgin Casino - Poor treatment of High Rollers.

[rpalmer83]

Yesterday (Sunday 18th November 2007) I deposited £400 into Virgin casino and hit an £8,000 Royal Flush playing £40 per hand Lucky Draw Jacks or Better. This was my own funds and no bonus was claimed with it. I am currently awaiting this withdrawal appearing in my bank account. At the time of this writing my win is being advertised on the front page of the casino. Giving the impression that Virgin creates happy winners and customers. Well I am neither at this moment in time.

This evening I recieved the following email:

We are writing to you with regard to recent betting activity on the
account you hold with Virgin Casino.

As you may be aware, Virgin Casino reserves the right to prohibit or
exclude certain individuals with immediate effect if any offer abuse
is identified or suspected. Our Terms and Conditions are quite clear
on this matter and can be reviewed by clicking on the terms and
conditions link on any of the promotions on our promotions page.

To visit the promotions page, click below:
http://links.email.virgingames.com/c...NzYxMzQS1&mt=1

Our analysis of play patterns has identified you as being in breach
of those terms and conditions. As such, with immediate effect, we
regret to inform you that you are no longer eligible to receive
promotional offers and bonus credits from Virgin Casino. Your Virgin
Casino account will remain open and your ability to play will be
unaffected. However you will not be able to take part in any of our
promotional offerings.

At Virgin, we believe in looking after our customers and ensuring
that they have as good a time as possible. This is not just done by
providing the best games on the market but also by rewarding our
players for their loyalty. The Terms and Conditions that govern how
our customers enjoy Virgin Casino are there to protect the interest
of our gamers; when a minority of individuals engage in what we
believe to be "bonus hunting", it affects our ability to reward the
majority who abide by the terms of the service. It is on this basis
that we have taken the decision to temporarily restrict your account.

We will of course be happy to review the restrictions placed upon
your account in the future, but for now you will remain restricted.

If you have any questions with regard to this correspondence, then
please do not hesitate to contact our support team at
support@casino.virgingames.com.

Kind regards,

The Virgin Casino Team

Therefore I have now been restricted from recieving any promotions at the casino, It is their right to do this however below is a summary of my transactions in the casino over the last 30 days:

Games Room Bet (£165,650.20)
Games Room Payout £170,933.00
Loyalty Cash £12.81
Converted Bonus Credits £410.00
Withdrawal (£15,093.63)
Non-playable Cash Awarded £410.00
Manual Adjustment £68.02
Deposit £9,320.00

As you can see, I am no bonus abuser. I have been a customer of Virgin for about 3 years and over the last year I have put thousands in there and at times when they have not been offering any bonuses. Granted I have won significantly from them but I could quite easily have lost a hell of a lot of money there as well. The game I play most there has been Lucky Draw Jacks or better, quite simply because I feel it offers good payback and I enjoy the gameplay.

With wagering figures like the above I would have expected to have been invited into some kind of VIP scheme but nothing from them, and now I can't help but think that because I had a big win yesterday is the only reason they have pulled me out of recieving any benefits by playing there.

Things like this certainly make you wonder how much I can trust online casinos.

[lifechooser]

It's not just you.

I recieved the same email today. Mostly I played at virgin when they had a bonus on, but when they do bonuses twice a week, it seemed a bit pointless playing at any other time, though I did usually play far more than I had to to get the bonus money.

I did notice their T&C's changed in the last week or so - you had to play the bonus through within 2 days, and the £50 bonus became a £30 bonus. Perhaps they've decided the bonuses are costing them too much money?

It seems very odd to ban you when you are so obviously not abusing though. I'm very suprised.

[rpalmer83]

Glad to see im not the only one then!.

The bonuses aren't very generous anyway and exclude a hell of a lot of games, it just scares me that if they are flipping switches like this on their high wagering customers then what other switches can they flip?.

So much for Virgin being a brand thats supposed to be 'trusted' and 'rewards' its customers.

If the bonuses are costing them too much then maybe they should consider dropping them and offering them exclusively to loyal customers but then that probably wouldn't work for them because I'm pretty confident that if i'd have lost £8,000 yesterday I would probably still be on their bonus list.

It would be nice to hear Virgin clarify what 'bonus hunting' actually means to them because I do not see how depositing over £9k and wagering over £150,000 over a month would be worth the risk to anyone to try and profit by £410 worth of bonus money.

[bash_2357]

Doesn't look like very good treatment to me.

I suspect the Virgin Rep ( Virgin Ace) will be on his way soon. However, you may like to draw his attention to this thread. I think he/she will find it rather interesting.

[liquuid_fusion]

I got the same email.

Over the last two months, I have bet £86k at the casino and received a total bonus of just over £1k. However, I have made a profit of £6k in that time (NB. Most of that win is from luck at gambling). I was formerly a "Red Room" member and many of my deposits and much of my gameplay was without a bonus.

I am not impressed. Virgin is a reputable and public-friendly brand and the casino is CM accredited, although it doesn't even need to be with such a strong name behind it. Such bonus banning tactics should not be used by straight-forward casino. If you don't want people to make money from your bonuses, either don't offer them or change the terms to make them unprofitable.

[GrandMaster]

Richard Branson needs the money to buy Northern Rock. This must also be the explanation for the negative bonus points balance I have.

[uki]

Well that treatment is just appalling!

Perhaps the Rep would be kind enough to outline the sort of customer they are after - Just losers I expect.

[topoor]

I won 4k on 4 play poker on Friday night and today I received the same mail. I have lost thousands at Virgin playing on 10 play poker in the last few months which has been a bonus excluded game for ages now.

I too believe that if I had lost 4k I would not have received this email. It is an appalling way to behave and I urge everybody to take their play to paddypower which offers the same games - I know I am!

[uungy]

Same thing here. I must have lost loads there, and been in the redroom for a while. They must have screwed up big time!

It must be a new manager, or someone has made a big mistake.

By the way is this you rpalmer? seems a reasonable win, surely at 5p a hand (bonus baggers) would find it hard to win that sort of wins on Jacks or better.

[rpalmer83]

Yes uungy, that win was mine. I won it playing £2 per hand (£40 per sheet) Lucky Draw Jacks or Better, the game is now banned in the T&C's from play with a bonus but as I mentioned in my first post I deposited my own cash on sunday and didn't even claim a bonus when I got that win.

Even if I was playing just to redeem bonuses, they offer 2 a week at £20 and £30. Would I really play £40 a hand merely to try and profit from these bonuses?.

My issue isn't really about the fact that I am not entitled to any bonuses there now, they are poor value anyway. It's more the fact that im being treated as something I'm not and have been cast as an 'outsider' for simply winning money there.

I suspect if I continue playing there and win anymore money then they'll shut my account down entirely. That's really unfair, considering if I lost thousands they'd probably be throwing money at me and begging me to deposit and lose more.

Punishing customers for winning money is something a backstreet arcade would do, its not something i'd expect from something with the Virgin name on it.