ThePogg talks licensing jurisdictions

[maxd]

ThePogg recently pointed me to a couple new articles he'd published regarding licensing jurisdictions. I thought the Casinomeister gen-pop might find these worthwhile:

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I would like to say a few things about Curacao: historically (at least) Curacao has been the Wild West of licensing jurisdictions. Generally speaking the four Master License holders have given licenses to anyone that can pay the license fee and the casino can keep that license as long as they keep paying their fees. Any policing of the sub-license holders was entirely up to the Master License people and policing has typically -- ahem! -- not been one of the Master License priorities.

Some Master Licenses are better than others -- see here for more on this: Curaçao and Their Four Master License Holders -- but the bottom line as far as players were concerned was that a Curacao license didn't really mean much in terms of player safety and protection. The only thing that really mattered -- as far as Curacao licensees goes -- was the quality of the casino management itself. Some were good, many were not, some were outright crooks and thugs. That hasn't changed in 20 years.

Although Curacao is apparently evolving -- the word is that political pressure is finally moving things along a little -- the basic truth remains the same as it's always been: Curacao is stuck in the 90s in terms of player care and awareness. In other words zippity-do-da there for players to fall back on. All a player can count on from a Curacao license is the quality, service and above all the reputation of the individual casino.

That said some of our longest and dearest relationships in the business are with Curacao casino operators. Two groups in particular are completely top-notch and always have been. Given that these are privately owned, non-corporate outfits they still give a damn about player satisfaction and casino trustworthiness because they have to, it's part of their business model.

So do your homework, some Curacao license holders are top-drawer outfits and will give players better and more reliable service than most of the big name outfits combined.

Regards,
Max, Casinomeister.com

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Read our full writeup on Curacao master license 8048/JAZ.

 

[maxd]

I thought it might be worthwhile to add a little commentary to what I've posted above.

Think of five casinos that you loved a few years ago but have totally gone to shit since. How many of those were great little boutique casinos that were bought by some massive casino management group?

My guess is that at least 4 of the 5 will fit that profile, and the 5th is likely a casino that grew enormously, entered every jurisdiction on the map, and now has 1000 employees to feed monthly paychecks to. In other words size and conglomeration typically eat the soul out of any casino -- or any company in any industry really -- that goes that route.

The reasons are simple and they all fit into one box: business pragmatics. A small, boutique operation NEEDS satisfied customers and a good reputation to survive, assuming they don't go the totally Rogue route and just rip people off willy-nilly until they burn the brand, pull the plug, and pop up under some new name to rinse and repeat the process.

A huge company has shareholders that need to be fed nice fat dividends annually. The customers are just cattle: advertise big to get them, promise the moon, plug into their cash flow and pump as much as possible for as long as possible into your revenue stream that, among other things, feeds those hungry shareholders. Customer has a complaint? Who cares! There are 10,000 other customers who are worth real money, why waste time on some numpty who is only trying to drain your time and energy with their problems? Say whatever you need to but really, flush and forget, and the sooner the better.

Ok, so I'm banging on about the evils of capitalism and blah blah blah. My point is that you're going to be served better in the long run by someone whose continued success depends on YOUR satisfaction. The small mom-and-pop shops are exactly those people and they typically can't afford to operate in the heavily regulated jurisdictions, so they drift towards "small" jurisdictions and yes, that includes Curacao.

The big, corporatized outfits can afford to splash out the big bucks for expensive licenses, big fines, and massive amounts of advertising. In the end though they just want your money, YOUR satisfaction is not really their concern.

 

[Deeplay]

The small mom-and-pop shops are exactly those people and they typically can't afford to operate in the heavily regulated jurisdictions, so they drift towards "small" jurisdictions and yes, that includes Curacao.

The big, corporatized outfits can afford to splash out the big bucks for expensive licenses, big fines, and massive amounts of advertising. In the end though they just want your money. At the end of the day YOUR satisfaction is not really their concern.

Agree with everyting you said Max - I rememeber a number of great smaller outfits back in the days when players were known by a name not a number. I am now done with UK online gambling totally. Had my last session a few days back. Maybe CM might think in the future of listing the very few safe to play at Casinos in Curacao - that accept UK players. I have not seen a new UK allowed casino listed on CM in ages.

With all the numerous changes coming - It could be worth thinking about ?

 

[maxd]

Yeah, the problem we have listing the Curacao casinos is that a lot of them are happy to take US bets and that would put Bryan in hot water with the US regulators and his NJ license. It's not a situation we've found a proper solution for TBH. Our Curacao friends keep prodding us on this -- and rightly so -- but as yet the solution has not presented itself.

 

[Betreels Casino & Sports]

@maxd Maybe you can list the ones that don't accept US bets and the ones who have more than 1 license?

 

[dunover]

Agree with everyting you said Max - I rememeber a number of great smaller outfits back in the days when players were known by a name not a number. I am now done with UK online gambling totally. Had my last session a few days back. Maybe CM might think in the future of listing the very few safe to play at Casinos in Curacao - that accept UK players. I have not seen a new UK allowed casino listed on CM in ages.

With all the numerous changes coming - It could be worth thinking about ?

No, I think that's a bad idea - regardless of whether the casino 'licensed' in Cup-o-cocoa is honest or not, listing them them for UK players as 'safe' would be CM promoting unlicensed, untaxed and basically illegal gambling for UK residents.

With likelihood of eventual licensing for UK affiliates, or affiliates targeting the UK market, being seen to encourage or promote ex-jurisdictional gambling would be a big black mark. I wouldn't touch them with a bargepole - decent or otherwise!

 

[maxd]

Maybe you can list the ones that don't accept US bets and the ones who have more than 1 license?

Maybe, I'll pass that on to Bryan for him to consider. As you probably know he's the man when it comes to making these decisions.

But as Dunover says, that route is fraught with troublesome issues. I wouldn't expect a major change in this area any time soon, unfortunately.

 

[Deeplay]

No, I think that's a bad idea - regardless of whether the casino 'licensed' in Cup-o-cocoa is honest or not, listing them them for UK players as 'safe' would be CM promoting unlicensed, untaxed and basically illegal gambling for UK residents.

With likelihood of eventual licensing for UK affiliates, or affiliates targeting the UK market, being seen to encourage or promote ex-jurisdictional gambling would be a big black mark. I wouldn't touch them with a bargepole - decent or otherwise!

I hear what you say and from an affiliate pov in the UK yes it makes sense. But like it or not its going to happen more and more - of course the issue would be which casinos are rouge and which are not. But as the screws tigthen for UK players - people wont just stop gambling - wont happen but they will find alternatives and I expect to see a rise of casinos outside of the UKGC working to cash in on that in the coming few years.

The changes to come from UKGC wont be the last. There is already talk of bringing bet sizes down inline with Bookmaker fobts - and it would not surprise me that max bet at really low levesl will be imposed at some point. It will take just one offshore casino to stand out from the rest offering legit games - and clean cashouts -the same as used to happen pre regulation. And its only a matter of time before that becomes a reality.

 

[maxd]

IMO this is already a reality. On the Complaints side I've seen a fairly significant shift in players from UK to offshore casinos, as we all expected.

The bottom line is that the UK has become a hostile environment for online gaming and the people making that happen could not give a fat rat's ass what that does to players, affiliates or anyone else in the industry. They're in it for the press and ultimately the votes, IMHO. As long as they believe their actions will get them votes then they'll press on as they have been. No end in sight there I'm afraid.

 

[hhhelllo]

Very well said. It’s interesting to compare such behavior with companies in other areas. Online casinos have a very nice position giving them an opportunity to treat anyone like shit and pretty much getting away with it like it’s something normal or that should be expected from their own customers. Virtually “located” on an island, with 100% of their customers so far away that it’s impossible to ever meet them in person unless they feel like it. Gamblers are the best customers that exists. You can lie to them, cheat them and not pay them when they finally win, most of them will beg to come back. All these conditions will not necessarily create rogue behaviors from a companies managed by people with basic buisness sense and morals but what a nice place to be if you are evil, greedy and exited about the realisation of short term profits at any cost and you can purchase a nice little online casino name that has a brand name that means fair, honest and legit to gamblers. Pay the liscense mafia, agressively fool customer base and enjoy profits while 2% of these nightmare experiences are known to public.

 

[colinsunderland]

I can see this from both sides of the coin being both a player and affiliate.
I've never looked into non uk licensed casinos so genuinely don't know which are safe to play at, but am sure some are.
I could see a decent market for these casinos in the coming years as more and more players desert the UK licensed one due to the measures the UKGC are bringing in.
At the moment I wouldn't play outside the UK, but come November, I can see me looking about to see whats there.
The removal of autospins will be what does it for me. Novomatics are pretty unplayable without it, I won't touch BTG games on the casinos who don't have it (like the L&L group), and a lot of my play now is single line, usually 3/4 games running at the same time, like this morning I did about 1000 spins on each of Book of Dead, Legacy of Dead, Rise of Merlin, and that new Merlin PnG game. All running 20p a line, single line, playing all 4 at once. Theres not a chance I will do that if theres no autoplay, and it won't be allowed anyway as you are only going to be able to play one at a time. If an non licensed casino allows me to do it, and pays, then I will play there.

 

[slot_zombie]

I've not posted for quite a while here. I stopped playing due to all the UKGC changes, and excessive nannying from the two casinos I had left on high RTP settings.

I did look very hard for legitimate offshore casinos accepting UK players, and the only ones to be found are the ones linked to the known "confidence trick" groups such as Alpha, Tall Mountain, GameTech etc., or are just otherwise obvious fraudulent operations. So this "handful of legit Curacao operators" must be keeping a very low profile!

Otherwise there are the few Rival and RTG casinos that accept Bitcoin as well as cards, and will take UK players, but to be honest they ain't worth the time of day, because of the very low quality of the games on offer. Rival especially are just dire in every way, and the irritation/boredom factor is a lot greater than the UKGC licensed operations, so there is zero point to them.

Back to the crypto dabbling. Lots of buying opportunities after today's market plunge