What's up with withdrawal options (Grand Mondial rant)

Fleur-De-Lis

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 11, 2007
Location
CY
I *know* that most online casinos have a policy to pay back player's winnings in the same way/method whcih was used when depositing. I have no problem with this whatsoever, it seems reasonable and all... especially if player has one depositing method, f.eg. uses only Neteller or only MB, or only one Visa Card...

BUT. What GM casino keeps doing with my finances does really confuses me up to point I am...eh...speechless.
Two examples.
1. I made several deposits using Neteller, CC and MB. I won, and asked for money to be sent to Neteller. With no sight of money after a while, I contact Support and find out that withdrawal was sent back to my CC. Oh well... it was my first withdrawal, I am gald I got it, so I did not pursue it.

2. I made deposit using Credit Card ending at *1111, Credit Card ending at *2222 and MB. After I won, I asked for half of the money to be sent back to MB, and half of the amount to Card *2222.

Surprise, surprise :) When no Moneybookers funds arrived in due time, I called Support and was told that money went to Card ending at *1111 instead. No idea why. No explanation, no logical reasoning behind this, either.

The support person clearly did not understand why I am mad - I was paid after all, isn't it all what matters he asked? Well, not always. I guess since I am requesting cashout to same source I used for deposit, and if I am specifically choosing this withdrawal method, I am in my right? After all, I am not asking for any extraordinary thing - I follow all casino's terms, I am fully verified, etc.
Besides, it is *important* for me that my withdrawal hits the account I chose from all avaialble options and requested to be paid to. I do have reasons for this.

Ouf... rant is over. Thanks for bearing with me :)
 
I think you have every right to be mad. If they give you the option to choose your withdrawal method they should honor the one you choose, especially when it is the deposit method used..
 
Normally a casino refunds the money back to credit cards (if possible) up to the amount deposited to save on costs. So, unless they sent in excess of your deposits back to the cc, I think they are justified in doing so. After all, they run a business and they should keep their costs down. Your choice of payment only holds true when refunds to earlier deposits have been exhausted.

As for support staff, we are now in the era of dealing with extremely incompetent people who knows nothing about the issues they are dealing with. This is not confined to online gaming operators though.
 
Normally a casino refunds the money back to credit cards (if possible) up to the amount deposited to save on costs. So, unless they sent in excess of your deposits back to the cc, I think they are justified in doing so. After all, they run a business and they should keep their costs down. Your choice of payment only holds true when refunds to earlier deposits have been exhausted.

As for support staff, we are now in the era of dealing with extremely incompetent people who knows nothing about the issues they are dealing with. This is not confined to online gaming operators though.

I think it should be stated that way, if they plan to give withdrawals to wallets or CC to reduce their cost. They should not give us options when we withdrawl. I for one would like to know where my money goes when I make the withdrawal.
 
yup its happened to me to,
asked for cashout to neteller . i get it by bank transfer,
i ask for cashout by money bookers i get it by neteller,
i ask for cashout by neteller i get it by moneybookers,
sometimes i wonder if these ppl are on the same planet,

i had to laugh at this one, i made a 1k withdrawal by bank draft and i had about 15 deposits of $20 go to my bank, about 4 deposits of $40
and the rest in a lump sum :confused:,

i shouldnt moan , i did get paid :)
 
Normally a casino refunds the money back to credit cards (if possible) up to the amount deposited to save on costs.

Doesn't seem to be the case, either. I do not remember the exact figures, but let's say I deposited 500$ via MB, 800$ with card ending at *2222 and 300$ with card ending at *1111. When choosing among avaialble withdrawal options, I asked for 50% of withdrawal to be sent to MB *(by that time my official 'prefferred' withdrawal method) and 50% to the Visa Card ending *2222 (NB - this card was the only one shown as available to receive withdrawals!!). Instead, they say they sent money to other card...

Not a big deal, I guess. But for a while I truly was mad... wondering if there could be some weird logic behind this mess :D
 
Normally a casino refunds the money back to credit cards (if possible) up to the amount deposited to save on costs.


I'm not sure it is to save on costs. Perhaps I'm wrong but I assumed they can only pay upto the deposit amounts because it could put the card over an available credit limit.

Assume it is a brand new card with a credit limit of $5K. You deposit $1k, win
$2K and cash out, if they paid the $2K back on to the creditcard you'd have a $6k credit limit. I'm not sure creditcard companies allow that but correct me if anyone knows for sure.
 
I'm not sure it is to save on costs. Perhaps I'm wrong but I assumed they can only pay upto the deposit amounts because it could put the card over an available credit limit.

Assume it is a brand new card with a credit limit of $5K. You deposit $1k, win
$2K and cash out, if they paid the $2K back on to the creditcard you'd have a $6k credit limit. I'm not sure creditcard companies allow that but correct me if anyone knows for sure.

Not sure how it works either. Let's say my card has a limit of 2K, so before I used it it showed balance of zero, and available balance (read: credit limit) of 2K. I went and deposited 1K to casino (so balance turned to minus 1K, and avaialble balance to 1K). Afterwards, I successfully doubled up my deposit and withdrew back to card. After this amount reached my card, it would show balance of 1K and available balance of 2K.... do I make sense? :confused:
 
Slotplayer:perhaps I'm wrong but I assumed they can only pay upto the deposit amounts because it could put the card over an available credit limit.
Yes, that is how I have read it. The same has happened many times for me but it was expected after the first time since it was explained this way:

You deposit by cc in the amount of $100, $100, $50 in total of all deposits...you deposit by Neteller in the same denominations etc etc...

When the balance of deposits are met by your withdrawals to each way that was deposited (especially credit cards that are the worst way cause they can only redeposit what you used from them and no more) the last option will be by wire, check or webwallet.

Due to credit card restrictions, if you think in terms of returning an item, all you can get back is the total of what you spent and no more..from the chosen vendor (casino)

This is a way to balance the books for them. You cannot withdraw $1500 to a credit card you only used for depositing $500. That cannot happen. Even the banks would find this suspicious and I guess that is the reasoning behind the way they distribute any withdrawals above and beyond the deposits.

Fleur-De-Lis:I successfully doubled up my deposit and withdrew back to card. After this amount reached my card, it would show balance of 1K and available balance of 2K.... do I make sense?
It makes sense to us but cannot happen this way because you only deposited $1000 they can only return $1000 back to the credit card...think in terms of returning an item and it will make more sense to you. It's not the balance of the card it's the balance of the deposits made by the card.
 
It makes sense to us but cannot happen this way because you only deposited $1000 they can only return $1000 back to the credit card...think in terms of returning an item and it will make more sense to you. It's not the balance of the card it's the balance of the deposits made by the card.

Umm... I am sure I deposited much less with the subject card that they say they sent me now... :what: Confused, confused :)
 
Fleur-De-Lis: I am sure I deposited much less with the subject card that they say they sent me now...
Fleur-De-Lis, if you used this card at different times (and I have forgotten a few times how many times I did until I withdrew to the card and got back more than I initially deposited that one time) it still goes back the the beginning of the time you first used your card at that casino for a balance that can be returned. So if you used it for a few weeks at this casino without a withdrawal, with 5 depositis totalling a a $1000, this is all they can return. It goes by how much deposits not by time frame....
 
It is far more complicated than this:confused::eek:

I regularly deposit with one credit card (the ONLY one that still treats gambling deposits as purchases, and not expensive cash advances), and my Neteller eWallet. I always select Neteller as my preferred withdrawal option, knowing full well that refunds are likely to go back to the credit card. Unfortunately, there seems to be a very complicated formula that determines which method any withdrawal will go back to. Worse, it differs from one casino to another. Pushing the credit card into a positive balance is a frequent occurrance, but so far has not caused me any problems, although it seems other cards do have problems with this.

I thought I understood this complicated formula, and was able to test this with a recent 9000 withdrawal from Jackpot Factory, where the formula is that deposits up to 180 days ago are returned to the credit card, and any excess to the preferred method, I worked out that returning around 4000 to the card would match all the deposits and withdrawals on the card for the last 180 days, and should trigger the remaining 5000 going back to Neteller.

Wrong, the whole 9K went back to the card pushing it to 350 in CREDIT.
Had I withdrawn at my peak, around 11K, my card would have gone over 2K into credit. This would probably not have been a problem, as I have pushed it even further into credit before.

The problem is down to money laundering rules, the same ones the casinos use to justify these oddities. Some credit card operators see excess credit on a card as a means to shift money quickly out of the country, and will lock the card until they are satisfied the extra money is legitimate. Often, they will insist on paying this excess balance back as a cheque or bank transfer to the customer, rather than allowing them to spend it (shift it away in other words).
If the card issuer recognises the transactions as online gambling, they will probably understand why the card has gone into credit, but if the casino is using a merchant reference that has been set up to act as a conduit, the card company will not be able to see the tranasctions as online gambling, and are more likely to crack down on what they see as payments from a "merchant", rather than simply a return of monies spent.
Many casinos have set up shell companies to take credit card deposits, the thread about Pamper casino expands upon this. This is often used to allow casinos based in "dodgy" juristictions to get access to VISA merchant accounts, which VISA would not be prepared to give directly to a company based in the casino's juristiction.
In the case of Pamper casino, who are based in Costa Rica, they have had to set up a shell company (Operia Corp Limited) here in the UK to act as a merchant so that cards can be used to deposit at the casino. VISA are happy to give a merchant account to a company based in the EU, but wouldn't be happy to give one to a Costa Rican casino directly.
The rep for Pamper argued this was nothing "dodgy", but a necessity for accepting card deposits, and that other casinos also do the same.

The formula for allocating withdrawals is too complicated for CS to understand, and I am not even sure their accounts department understands either, after all, I was basing my predictions for my Jackpot Factory withdrawal on THEIR explanation as to how they allocated withdrawals against previous deposits.

The answer may be down to the ORDER in which they balance deposits with refunds from withdrawals, as the statement I later got from Jackpot Factory showed that they had refunded the entire 9K against prior deposits, and had not placed any excess winnings back to the card. Again, this will be different for different casinos.

It was simpler when casinos could NOT refund back to cards, as it was easier to predict where a withdrawal would end up.

One problem (for the casinos at least), is that by sending withdrawals back to cards, or by bank wires & cheques, it takes far longer for players to be able to deposit back into any casino. As a whole, this slows down the entire process of players depositing, playing, and withdrawing when they win. Since casinos make their money from TURNOVER (wagering), which is related to depositing, they will make their money more slowly. For responsible gambling, this is a GOOD thing, as it prevents a player from immediately losing winnings from a good session at one casino by using them to chase losses at a cold casino. After a few days waiting to see the winnings, the urge to chase will probably have subsided, with common sense taking over.

If this policy starts to cause credit card companies to lock more accounts after withdrawals of winnings that place the card into temporary credit, this will slow down, or even FREEZE the ability of players to play back winnings. Card companies may even lock down gambling transactions if they disagree with how the casinos operate their refund policies - many of my cards have done just this, and others have started to charge fees for gambling "purchases", making them unattractive. Only ONE of my cards still accepts online gambling as simple purchases, but even this got screwed up last month, and I was unexpectedly charged over 100 in fees, and I am still awaiting a resolution from them (their CS was hopeless, they didn't even understand the question).
 
not sure if you will find this helpful but just recently I went thru a big nightmare at GM trying to withdraw..
In my withdraw options i selected ach..
it was there and I opted for it..
only after about fifteen phone calls into support complaining about the
money not posting to my acct did I find something out..
I was told that the method of payout is purely driven by the amount you are withdrawing..I originally was withdrawing 3200 on my cashout..and I guess because it was over 3 grand, that was ok..but I did a big no no and I reversed some money and ended up at less than 3000 and I was told that because I was now below 3000 it is now mandatory I receive a mailed check via courier...and this is after I was told for days it was an ach processed withdrawl.Only after a week did I hear this thing about it requiring a check due to the withdrawl amount. I feel they should inform the players that reversing a portion of a withdrawl will cancel the payout option selected.
The excuse I was given time after time is "its all up to the processor, we have no control on how the payment is processed. We cannot contact them, only send them a message and HOPE they respond".
I felt like I was in the twightlight zone or something LoL
Does this sound right???
why offer the options on payout if they cannot accodomate a player..
and they dont inform the players about this until there is a problem.
Terrible terrible service if you ask me..
Is an online casino only as good as its processor?
Why would any of them use a processor that doesn't support the casino?
Id appreciate your thoughts..
thanks
Kellye
 
Well... I requested my two withdrawals on 11th August, and I received none of these as of yet... It is 17th. Customer Service response was a weird one:
We are unfortuntely not able to view into this at this time as our Servers are down for the next couple of hours. We ask that you please remain patient, and we can look into this matter then and confirm all the withdrawals and where they have been sent.
We trust that we have been of assistance and wish you a fantastic weekend further.
 
@kellye:

I'm not condoning their actions, but unfortunately in this day and age, if a payment is going to the USA, the casinos (any, not just GM) are under their processor's thumb, so to speak. Honestly, I doubt they were making that up...
 
@kellye:

I'm not condoning their actions, but unfortunately in this day and age, if a payment is going to the USA, the casinos (any, not just GM) are under their processor's thumb, so to speak. Honestly, I doubt they were making that up...

Recent revelations have shown just how powerful processors have become when it comes to paying to the USA. They can do what they like, and the casino will have to accept it, even though it makes them look bad. Unfortunately, casinos do not want the players to know about this, so they do not tell them of any problems until they actually ocurr, and then they have to give excuses which may, or may not, be right.

These arguments also contradict each other, as normally it is transactions OVER $3000 that can cause a problem due to them having to be reported by the receiving bank, yet in this case the player has been told that transactions UNDER $3000 have to be paid by check. Incidentally, there is another lie here - they DON'T use couriers, but registered mail. I suspect that using a courier leaves an audit trail that could get the processor shut down, whereas using the regular mail leaves less of a trail (sender does not have to give their details as they would with a courier).
If the DoJ suspects that a courier service has been transporting casino checks, they will simply do what they did with Neteller, and ask for a list of the senders and receivers for all their deliveries of checks, which will lead them to the bank account (which they can then seize), and the processor's agent(s) in the US.

The risk for US players has never been higher, and it is probably going to be next January before anything changes, and this depends upon who gets voted in.
 

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