What the hell happened to Club Gold Casino?

[maxd]

Is it warning worthy yet? Using Dino's name on top of everything else should be enough IMHO.

[strike]Good point. Bryan has been taking the lead on this one so I'll flag your post to his attention.[/strike]

Bryan is one step ahead of us: WARNING: ClubGoldCasino - strange unannounced software switch.

 

[Nate]

My primary concern with this fiasco is the details of already registered players and their banking details / credit card / e- wallet info.

Nate

 

[Azzurri]

I'd suggest this whole thread would be warning enough, lol.

I think many moons ago I may have made one deposit, never to return, so I too feel your concern regarding my details and payment information.

I am of the strong opinion that there's been a corrupt take over, so an official warning would be good for new players.

It's a shame, and yet again these crooks out there make me sick!

 

[syntynyt]

at least they finally placed a SEARCH bar. too late though.

 

[asghan]

Maybe answer is simple here? They were about to go broke and owner decided to make a quick deal? I would rather believe in this than in stealing casino.

Either way, we need answers.

 

[Casinomeister]

This just in from GoldClubPartners:

Our apologies for the confusing last few days, however it has been a period of rapid change. As you may already be aware, Club Gold Casino has moved to The Hawk game suite developed by Habanero Systems. This move was warranted by the insufficient flexibility of the multi-vendor platform when offering your players bonuses. I am sure you experienced a certain degree of frustration yourself due to the many changes implemented to the bonus structure in order to facilitate the players while maintaining the casino’s functionality. This proved, however, to be unsustainable. The new platform will allow once more to deliver a superior gaming experience without compromising player satisfaction.

...

The basis for any relationship is trust and communication, thus I wish to once more extend my sincerest apologies for the delay in relaying this information to you. As an esteemed affiliate you have the right to be notified of any changes sufficiently ahead of time which would allow you to adapt to the circumstances, however, unfortunately this was not possible in this case.

It is understandable that you too will have many questions, they will all be answered as soon as the paramount items have been taken care of. Until then I ask for your patience and understanding, all your emails will be replied to once the transition is complete.

Kindest regards,

Liisa Chambers

Affiliate Manager

 

[Nate]

What absolute BULLCRAP - I'm am glad I don't promote them.

Nate

 

[spintee]

So Liisa Chambers is still on board than ?

 

[Azzurri]

"The basis for any relationship is trust and communication".

Classic!

 

[vinylweatherman]

That just makes matters even worse. If this whole fiasco was nothing more than them resolving the issues related to a lack of flexibility in the bonus handling of the former provider, an orderly change would have been the obvious way forward.

A sudden change is not explained by this bullcrap, they didn't jump, they were shoved off the precipice by some third party, and this meant a few days of chaos and panic whilst they tried to formulate a damage limitation plan. Many operators have changed platforms for various reasons, but were mostly able to keep players and affiliates informed. Where there have been sudden changes in the past, it has been down to an action taken by a third party. The chaos surrounding the Spanish regulation where players got locked out overnight from Microgaming casinos whilst getting the run around from CS and reps was down to Microgaming shutting down access from Spanish IP addresses. Other sudden changes have been down to software suppliers withdrawing service without notice, and this is often down to the escalation of a dispute about payment for services provided. The sudden closure of TUSK casinos and poker was down to non payment of funds to the network, which itself resulted from fraudulent trading by the operator (they were effectively insolvent, relying on new deposits to hide the problems in the hope that things would turn around).

Even if we entertain their excuse, the LAST thing an operator would do in the circumstances is to sack all the staff that players and affiliates had grown to trust, and then try to fool them by pretending they were still around by using their names in communications.

Former employees probably got royally shafted, not just sacked without notice, but owed some salary and other payments such as severance, but finding that their employer has "done a runner" and opened up in a different jurisdiction to make it hard for creditors to recover any payments.

They are likely to have broken their contract with the former platform provider too, as it was probably for a set term with a penalty for ending it early. This was the case when Grand prive ditched Microgaming overnight, screwed affiliates, and even breached it's licencing agreement with Kahnawake who were left looking embarrassed as the operator had jumped ship and left the Kahnawake regulator struggling to punish the transgression.

The change has probably breached their Curacao licence, so we will get to see whether this jurisdiction actually bothers to do anything about it, or proves to experienced players that the general consensus of opinion about them is justified.

I don't rate their chances of getting a UK licence now, but they may well intend to operate within the UK without one, something they could not do had they stuck with their former platform as they would have been switched off by their providers were they to breach any licencing laws within the UK and EU.

 

[Balthazar]

This just in from GoldClubPartners:

Does anyone here (including Bryan and Max) actually believe that:

1- They ditched the multi-platform including NetEnt overnight
2- They had no time to warn players, partners nor staff
3- They fired employees on the spot

and all that happened at the same time because the bonus flexibility was inadequate?

Hello?

They really, really have to take us for a bunch of drooling idiots.

 

[Krrk]

Nope.
The email they sent just made the case worse as it doesn't make any sense.
Besides, if they still sign outgoing offers as Dino then why trust emails signed as Liisa?

 

[spintee]

Nope.
The email they sent just made the case worse as it doesn't make any sense.
Besides, if they still sign outgoing offers as Dino then why trust emails signed as Liisa?

I thought of that my self, Probs just another blow off

 

[maxd]

Does anyone here (including Bryan and Max) actually believe that....

Do note that Bryan simply posted the thing, he made no further comment thereon.

 

[jetset]

Even assuming that the woolly statement from Club Gold is the truth (which I have serious personal doubts about) it would indicate an astonishing degree of bad planning, disorganised management and a general level of incompetence, given the three factors summarised by Balthazar earlier in this thread.

This smacks of a deliberate attempt to hide the truth, and for an operator that crosses the line into rogue behaviour territory imo.

When the truth comes out....as it usually does....this incident will make interesting reading.

 

[Mosse]

They still seem to send promo-emails/offers with Dino´s name under them.

Today i got some freespin offer from them...

 

[vinylweatherman]

8. SUNDRY PROVISIONS

8.1. The contents and structure of the Website/s are subject to copyright and all rights are reserved. All text, files, images, code, graphics, animations, video, music, audio and links within the Website/s belong to the Casino and no part of the Website/s may be reproduced, transmitted or stored on any media without the Casino’s prior written consent. No links to the Website/s or any of the pages within the Website/s may be placed on any other website on the internet without the Casino’s prior written consent.

8.2. The Casino shall be entitled at any time to assign or otherwise transfer the rights and obligations arising out of these T&C, in whole or in part, to any party at its absolute discretion and You shall be deemed to consent to such assignment. You shall have no right to transfer nor assign any rights or obligations arising out of these T&C to any party.

8.3. These T&C constitute the entire agreement between You and the Casino in relation to Your use of the Website/s and the Software and Your participation in the Games and shall supersede all prior discussions, communications, agreements, representations and/or understandings between You and the Casino, whether in writing or verbal or electronic form.

8.4. Should any provision of these T&C be found to be illegal or unenforceable, such provision shall be excluded from these T&C and all remaining provisions shall continue to have full force and effect.

8.5. Any notice given to You by the Casino shall be sent to You at the most recent email address provided by You and shall be deemed to be received by You on the date on which it is sent by the Casino. Any notice given to the Casino by You shall be sent to the email address appearing on the Website/s and shall be deemed to be received by the Casino on the date on which it is sent by You.

8.6. These T&C shall remain in force indefinitely until such time as Your Player Account is permanently closed.

8.7. You acknowledge and accept that a printed copy of these T&C and of any notice given to You by the Casino in electronic or any other form shall be fully admissible in judicial or administrative proceedings relating to these T&C.

8.8. These T&C shall be governed exclusively by English Law and the parties submit to the jurisdiction of the English courts.

Fair enough.

Let's see if this works in practice given that they are still accepting UK players, yet don't seem to have made any progress towards getting the required UK license. It would be a waste of their time applying under the current circumstances, as the truth about the recent odd goings on will have to come out.

Having the terms governed by English law under the jurisdiction of the English courts makes their key target market pretty obvious, and from the 1st October, it will be a "black market". Maybe THIS is why they had to ditch all the well known and soon to be UK regulated software suppliers in favour of a relative unknown. Playtech, Microgaming, etc may well have been the "third party push" that caused them to leap without notice, possibly in order to avoid getting caught out with an inoperable platform once it became clear that they were not going to be in possession of any gaming license that would allow them to offer services in their main markets.

Microgaming have already made it pretty clear that they will block operators from using their product without the correct license in any given jurisdiction, and is what was behind a few Microgaming casinos suddenly being locked out overnight from the Spanish market, much to the bewilderment of players, CS, and management.

 

[lockinlove]

any updates on this? Is the casino legit?

 

[Birdy84]

I played with club gold when they used playtech software & when they changed to the multi platform, now i wouldn't touch the place too much weirdness going on with that place.

 

[Jasminebed]

I echo Birdy's sentiments. I trust neither the software nor the owners. I was a very loyal player with both Playtech and when they offered NetEnt and Tain.

Now I won't even play a free chip.

Mind you, I haven't seen complaints here. The Pogg scores them 1.7 out of 10, and does not recommend them.