Casino Complaint Account closed

sweets89

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Nov 3, 2016
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lancashire
Hi all
I recently won over £15,000 at mobile Vegas casino. They have now closed my account and said I have breached bonus terms. They are saying that in their terms it states no bet higher than £1.00 per spin. I have never heard of this before. I started on low bets at 40p per spin and as my winnings increased I raised the bet. Have I lost my winnings? :-(
 
Hi all
I recently won over £15,000 at mobile Vegas casino. They have now closed my account and said I have breached bonus terms. They are saying that in their terms it states no bet higher than £1.00 per spin. I have never heard of this before. I started on low bets at 40p per spin and as my winnings increased I raised the bet. Have I lost my winnings? :-(

As you are from the UK, possibly not. You can challenge that term as being "unfair", "unclear", or "not prominently shown". The CMA is investigating the use of "smallprint" like this to deny payouts. £1 is an incredibly low limit, even some "fruit machines" that can be sited in pubs and motorway service areas can be played at £2 per spin, and these are limited to such low bets because they are NOT classed as "casinos".

Unfortunately, you may have to take them to court and be prepared to demonstrate that the term being used is in violation of the UK consumer protection laws. £15,000 is too much for the small claims process too, so you would be using a higher court, with the risk of having to pay costs if you lose.

You should begin by making a complaint to their ADR, and arguing on the basis of the consumer protection laws that this term isn't legally enforceable and should be struck out. ADRs are not really up to speed with this, which is why it has ended up in the hands of the CMA, and a few players are winning in court having had little luck elsewhere.
 
Hi all
I recently won over £15,000 at mobile Vegas casino. They have now closed my account and said I have breached bonus terms. They are saying that in their terms it states no bet higher than £1.00 per spin. I have never heard of this before. I started on low bets at 40p per spin and as my winnings increased I raised the bet. Have I lost my winnings? :-(

What was the bonus amount?

Their T&C state £5 max bet or 5% of the bonus, whichever is lower.


Other examples of irregular game play include but are not limited to, placing single bets equal to or in excess of the lower of £5 / €5 / $5 / 50kr or 5% of the value of the bonus credited to your account (including where such limit is exceeded due to any double up or other feature of any game) until such time as the wagering requirements for that bonus have been met.
 
Hi all
I recently won over £15,000 at mobile Vegas casino. They have now closed my account and said I have breached bonus terms. They are saying that in their terms it states no bet higher than £1.00 per spin. I have never heard of this before. I started on low bets at 40p per spin and as my winnings increased I raised the bet. Have I lost my winnings? :-(

Their terms say each bet can't be higher than £5 or 5% of the value of the bonus, whichever is the lowest.

So if they say it is £1, the deposit given would have been £20 - is that what the bonus amount was?
 
OK thank you I will make a complaint and see what happens. They are not responding to any emails or messages from me at the minute and I can't seem to find a phone number :-(
 
Hi all
I recently won over £15,000 at mobile Vegas casino. They have now closed my account and said I have breached bonus terms. They are saying that in their terms it states no bet higher than £1.00 per spin. I have never heard of this before. I started on low bets at 40p per spin and as my winnings increased I raised the bet. Have I lost my winnings? :-(

I would go and check the casinos terms it will tell you there what the bonus terms are because no bets higher than £1 a spin seems very low usually it's £5 - £6 from what i have seen when reading bonus terms.
 
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This would be an unfair term because it would be near impossible for players to comply if they made small deposits for a low percentage bonus, leading to the max bet being below the min bet available on a given game.

For example, the Microgaming slot "5 Reel Drive" has a minimum proper bet of £2.25 (as in playing all 9 lines as intended) as it doesn't allow a coin below 0.25 to be selected. This may not be the case in a given casino, but the principle remains sound.

This term usually sets a floor below which the min bet cannot sink due to the calculation, and this is often around the £4 to £5 mark.

Under UK law, a restriction this extreme and out of character for the product being offered (a casino), must be prominently displayed as an "attention grabber", not simply included in the "smallprint" which is the multi-page document setting out a whole host of terms for different aspects, many of which will be irrelevant software, copyright, and legal issues that have nothing to do with how a regular player would use the service. Even such prominent display doesn't mean a term is automatically "fair", this is decided in a court with reference to the UK laws.

Once the CMA investigation has run it's course, there should be more clarity on this issue. In some ways, it might be better to wait a bit and prepare a good case rather than rush ahead and risk getting it wrong, and later finding that the CMA issues an edict that would have made the case an easy victory. I believe you have a certain period of time in which you have to issue a claim, but it's years, not months or the 14 days some casinos claim (which is another thing the CMA is looking into, terms that give players too short a time in which to lodge a complaint).
 
From £40 (assuming a 100% match bonus) to £15,000 is some achievement! I would have thrown the towel in at £500 or so unless you had one single massive win that made your balance jump up by thousands by betting less than £5 a spin?

Whilst Vinylweatherman's posts are good and very informative, please don't put your hopes up too high by the very first words "This would be an unfair term".

You may well wish to take them to Court but what you're going to do when they offer a settlement of a few thousand out of court? Risk it all for a £20 investment?
 
From £40 (assuming a 100% match bonus) to £15,000 is some achievement! I would have thrown the towel in at £500 or so unless you had one single massive win that made your balance jump up by thousands by betting less than £5 a spin?

Whilst Vinylweatherman's posts are good and very informative, please don't put your hopes up too high by the very first words "This would be an unfair term".

You may well wish to take them to Court but what you're going to do when they offer a settlement of a few thousand out of court? Risk it all for a £20 investment?


It would certainly be an unfair term the way it's written because it has no floor limit, so one could end up with the ridiculous situation of never being able to play. This could happen if you received a £1 cashback as a no deposit free chip, and no game would allow a bet so small as 5% of £1. Whether or not such a situation might arise in practice does not matter, the term itself fails to cater for the possibility. Once a term is deemed unfair, it is struck out, and this would mean it's also struck out in other situations.

Another thing that makes such a term potentially unfair is that it sets a mathematical equation as one of the parameters for the player to follow, rather than a clear max bet limit.

If such terms were not seen as an issue, the CMA would not be running this investigation. They are doing so because so many players have been falling foul of these kind of convoluted rules for bonus play that the system of ADRs and UKGC can't cope with the workload.

Where the player probably has the advantage here is that if it went to court, the casino's defence would be along the lines that the player was betting more than £1 a spin with a 5 figure balance, and that this was deemed to be an "abuse" of the promotion, hence the term to prevent this was "fair". I can't see a judge accepting that bets of just over £1 with such a large balance is anything other than "fair play" given that the lottery is now £2 per selection because the government agreed that £1 is "too low" for a game that can be played by 16 year olds, 2 years less than the minimum age for playing in a casino.

Of course, it's no good simply stating "it's not fair" to the court, there would need to be a reasoned and logical argument as to WHY this is an unfair term in the context of consumer law and the kind of play that would be expected from an "ordinary recreational player" in the circumstances.

A consumer law solicitor would be able to advise on whether it's worth taking this to court, as the cost of doing so would have to be balanced with the likelihood of winning. If anything, waiting until the CMA have begun to give some indications of the types of terms it sees as "unfair", or even issued rulings outlawing certain types of term, would make it easier to assess the likelihood of having this term struck out as unfair by a judge.

It's also worth looking at other cases where consumers have succeeded in having terms struck out on the grounds of being "unfair" in other types of contract as it will give an idea of the kinds of things in terms that are getting struck out in actual cases. This is something one would expect one's solicitor to be doing when taking on such a case.
 
Perhaps the OP can describe how they managed to get from £40 to £15,000. We have a rather vague description that they started off with £0.40 spins and that they increased their bet as the money went up. Increased it to how much per spin? Was all of this achieved within the wagering period or where the bulk of the winnings achieved outside of the wagering period?
 
You will have to see whether you had breached the term before you had complete wager, For instance if you was betting £2 near straight away than you clearly breach the terms,

But like VWM stated, You could argue that theses terms are unfair, Which they are, is this one of the slotmagic sites? As they have this term,

This is where bonus is in a different league, Some keep it separate from real cash, Some add it into one pot, some state can only bet a certain amount WHILE a bonus is active, But you have cash and bonus,
Some sites say you can bet what you like with a bonus but as long as using cash? what ever it is they can sure twist any of the rule to there favour,

How on earth people build up balance like that is unbelievable I would be the same as interlog and be running naked with a few hundred
 
You will have to see whether you had breached the term before you had complete wager, For instance if you was betting £2 near straight away than you clearly breach the terms,

But like VWM stated, You could argue that theses terms are unfair, Which they are, is this one of the slotmagic sites? As they have this term,

This is where bonus is in a different league, Some keep it separate from real cash, Some add it into one pot, some state can only bet a certain amount WHILE a bonus is active, But you have cash and bonus,
Some sites say you can bet what you like with a bonus but as long as using cash? what ever it is they can sure twist any of the rule to there favour,


How on earth people build up balance like that is unbelievable I would be the same as interlog and be running naked with a few hundred

This is what the CMA mean by "complex terms that cause players with the expectation of being paid to have their winnings voided". The view that guides consumer contract law is that ordinary consumers are not lawyers, so need to be given simple and concise terms in "plain English", with the important points properly amplified such that attention is drawn to them. They may well make perfect sense and be legally watertight to a trained lawyer, but that isn't the main criteria for "fairness", they need to be easily understood by the average consumer.

It is the industry as a whole that is being looked at, so the fact that there are so many different and complex ways of governing bonuses may in itself be deemed "unfair" by the CMA, and the recommendation might be to bring in an industry wide standardised way of governing bonus play that is simple for the consumer to understand regardless of which site they are using, and also hard for the consumer to screw up (given the severity of the consequence), which may lead to a software based enforcement requirement, rather than expecting a player to memorise in exact detail a complex set of rules throughout their play because the software will allow them to get it wrong.
 
I'd write these winnings off in all honesty. This casino sounds phoney.

About as Phoney as some of the names there using, Boy there got lots of sites but I not heard of most of them,

m88.UK
lottery.co.uk
millionaire.co.uk

And here is the best one lol, national-lottery.com I am very surprised that they have got away with some of there names, But yes Phoney just about sums them up
 
Hi all
I recently won over £15,000 at mobile Vegas casino. They have now closed my account and said I have breached bonus terms. They are saying that in their terms it states no bet higher than £1.00 per spin. I have never heard of this before. I started on low bets at 40p per spin and as my winnings increased I raised the bet. Have I lost my winnings? :-(
The key question no-one has asked - is what was your highest bet?

If it was more than £5 then you are definitely screwed.
Even if it was less than that but more than £1, you are still in trouble for breaching the T&Cs.

What is Dunover's saying - DRAT? Didn't Read All Terms! :(

KK
 

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