Winward Casino warning

[wuwinthrop]

Hi,

I just had a rather unpleasant experience with Winward Casino and would like to prevent others from experiencing the same misfortune...

A couple of months ago I made a deposit at Winward Casino and played BJ with my deposit and their new member welcome bonus. After an extended period of playing primarily BJ, I had accumulated winnings of ~$1500 over my initial deposit (quite a bit of luck was involved). I tried to make a withdrawal from my account via eWalletXpress over the course of several weeks and it was denied for the usual reasons (unspecified account number, missing documentation, etc.) Finally after I had addressed all of Winward Casino's issues, they denied my latest withdrawal request due to a "random security" check and I was informed that my withdrawal would be processed the following week.

A couple of days later access to my account was disabled. I spent over a week sending emails trying to get status or an update to Winward's accountig dept & customer support and got _absolutely_ no response whatsoever. I tried calling Winward's customer service number and was told that the only thing that could be done was for the customer servcei representative to send an email and even then I couldn't get a copy of the email. After I ended that useless phone call, I sent an email to missMD which is Winward's representative in this forum. She was very responsive to my emails for help and promised to look into the matter for me.

A couple of days later I finally got a call from someone in Winward's accounting department. He told me over the phone that my account would be permanently disabled due to the decision of the risk & fraud department. Apparently their conclusion after analyzing my play history was that I followed some pattern that is prohibited in land-based casinos and that my winnings would be voided. This is something that I have never heard anything about. The customer representative gave me 2 options:

1) Refund my deposit
2) Re-able my account with no withdrawals allowed so that I could continue to play until I had a zero balance

The customer rep told me that their (Winward's) decision to void my winnings is no different than one of their players requesting/obtaining a refund of their deposit from their credit card companies due to claims of fraud by Winward Casino. Frankly that reasoning sounds completely bogus to me but I was not given any other option.

At least I was able to get my deposit back (and I believe that was due solely to missMD's intervention). I don't know about other casino's but this type of behavior seems questionable at best to me. The reason that I can come up with for not servicing my withdrawal requests is that I won even with the odds stacked against me. Had I lost, they would have had no problems keeping my money even if their was a bug/error in their sw.

Bottom line, stay away from Winward Casino and only patronize those casinos that value their players.

Sorry for the long post.

[Bullajami]

Wish this was available before I deposited at Winward. I turned a $150 deposit into $300 and now I want a cashout. I have been declined three times now, and your story is looking very familiar. They never tell you why you've been declined, they just state that there was some rule not complied with, and send you a link to one of the rules pages on their site. It is maddening.

This casino is at the least operating shady, and at worst a total scam. When will they be rogued?

[lauram]

thanks for the warning one place i wont deposit with at all. Big from a casino having a software issue to deposit back to you but at least you know its coming here its just sorry to bad kinda story.
Sorry you 2 had to go through this gl to both of you

[GGW Laurie]

i will have to mark this on my list of places not to play at, my list is getting longer all the time, soon i wont have anywhere thats safe to play at, im sorry you guys are going thru this, with what seems to be a shady outfit...............laurie

[RobWin]

Questionable !!! is an understatement, this casino group has been operating this way for years now and this IS their standard operating procedure...why Bryan has not Rogued this bunch yet has this poster totally at a loss and flabbergasted !!

[maxd]

Please note that a Casinomeister Warning was issued against Winward well over a month ago (see here).

Also, Winward was Rogued in the past (see here and here) but managed to climb out of the pit. We are re-evaluating that status now and will make a decision based on forum and PAB issues which are currently in their hands.

Finally, I'll alert the rep, RGiants-Mo, to this thread too.

[Bullajami]

Finally, I'll alert the rep, RGiants-Mo, to this thread too.

MissMD (a.k.a. Malci) is aware of this thread. I e-mailed her directly asking her to look into the matter, then I posted here and at casino affiliate programs (dot) com. She has responded indicating that she has seen my e-mails and my posts, and has indicated that my forum posts somehow discredit my e-mail claim that I wish to resolve this matter. I do not agree with her assessment on that point.

Having read through almost all of her posts here and at CAP, I find that she is consistently courteous and professional. Unfortunately that does not seem to have ever resulted in getting a dispute settled in a manner that benefits the player. Perhaps I can be the first.

I have not filed a PAB here yet. I will wait to hear back from Malci (or a week of being ignored if it comes to that) before I proceed to that next level.

I LOVE online gambling. I have been an online gambler for nearly 4 years, and a small time affiliate for 3 years. I have had just under 200 player accounts at casinos, sportsbooks and poker. I played at Winward to evaluate them for possible promotion on my own website. I am no rookie or clueless noob. I know how to read T&C's and how to abide by the house rules. I have never NOT been paid before.

The practices of Winward Casino are bad for online gaming. They are the type of thing that idiot politicians in Washington will point to when they want to pass some more idiotic legislation. I believe that monitoring and exposing bad operations is our only defense against bad operations and more bad laws. My $150 deposit is quite inconsequential in that regard. So, if by posting here I jeopardize a favorable outcome to my Winward Casino cashout, so be it. The mustard is off the hot dog.

[NextToYou]

This casino has been a rogue for a few years already.

[RGiants-Mo]

Hi there! I just wanted to add that Bullajami's issue has been addressed through a private message. I hope the information given was of help.

-Monica-

[Bullajami]

Hi there! I just wanted to add that Bullajami's issue has been addressed through a private message. I hope the information given was of help.

-Monica-

Addressed but not resolved.

I have received courteous and informative responses from both Monica and Malci. They will receive courteous and informative responses from me later today.

They both seem to believe that I had no need (or right) to openly complain here about Winward declining my payout 3 times. I disagree, but out of respect for them I will not post the ongoing details of this issue. I will post a synopsis when it is done, including snippets of relevant communications between myself and Winward's representatives.