The Casino Club / Affiliate Club refused to pay out

[universal4]

I did not know that Germany was the only focus of the targeting from the beginning. I remember being approached by them and do not recall a big German push.

Rick
Universal4

[Roulette Zeitung]

I did not know that Germany was the only focus of the targeting from the beginning.

It was the first online casino special targeted for Germany. The founder J.W. was the biggest roulette system seller ever in Germany for a long time. He constructed systems by a computer, based and adjusted on spins of the past (!!!) and gave huge incredible winning promises. Every one could be a rich man. ... he promised.

The prices go up to $800. He have had some publishing companies and bought player addresses from the real casinos here in Germany. This database became bigger and bigger with the publishing companies, and then he started the Casino Club.

It was the first 100% German targeted casino at that time, with good Zero conditions (very important for German players!) and a great marketing strategy. He used his database with postal addresses and wrote a letter to all the players of the list and to all sellers of his systems. Fast payouts and fair rules were the secret.

In the biggest German forums every reader at that time saw the words "Casino Club" here and "Casino Club" there. So the casino collected thousands of German players within a short time. He was able to promote his winnings systems with a casino magazine. There was never a complaint with the casino at the time he was the leader.

And this is the reason why he sold his casino for the proud price of € 107.000.000.

He was the German "Muhammad Ali" in the German online casino business for a long time.

The right man at the right place to the right time.

But also very entertaining e.g. as I wrote about his funny journey to a German real casino to break the bank with a system and became "sick" after some days ...

Leopold

[Roulette Zeitung]

Only AffiliateClub subsidized the VAT

As you’ve likely heard, the tax structure for gross gaming revenue (GGR) has recently changed across the German market.

Due to EU tax directive, all online gaming sites must now pay 19% VAT of the gross gaming revenue (GGR) on players from Germany and other relevant territories.

Luckily, you’re working with AffiliateClub, where we’ve decided to subsidize the cost – the only ones to do so!

That means we will pay 50% of the required tax, each and every time.

Your VAT deduction will appear as a negative fixed amount at the end of each month.


"the only ones to do so!"
"the only"

Leopold

[COPCapo]

Here is the reply I got this morning from the Head of the Justice Unit, about this:

The articles you quote are in the Civil Code - that is, what is considered at law as lex generalis (the general law) and it mainly refers to personal bets like what happens during the world cup, etc (which strictly speaking should be considered illegal). Casino games, on the other hand are regulated by the lex specialis – the particular law – in this case the Lotteries and other Games Act and the Gaming Act.

The Lotteries and other Games Act can be found at http://www.justiceservices.gov.mt/Do...temid=8904&l=1 whilst the Gaming Act can be found at http://www.justiceservices.gov.mt/Do...temid=8867&l=1

Online Casinos are also seperately covered by the Remote Gaming Regulations of 2004 found at http://www.mrgc.org.mt/downloads/Rem...0176of2004.pdf

I've skimmed through them quickly as they are too much to read on a Sunday morning, but what I found that is most relevant here is Article 34 of the Gaming Act which reads:

34. (1) Article 1716 of the Civil Code shall not apply with respect to a game lawfully played in a licensed casino.
(2) The provisions of article 1713 of the Civil Code shall not prejudice the right of the casino licensee to recover a debt arising from the acceptance of a cheque in accordance with article 35 and which is subsequently not honoured.

This automatically voids the use of the Civil Code to avoid paying winnings, however, one would obviously have to read through the 3 documents to see if there is any way that casinos can actually get away with not paying players' winnings.

What I'm sure is that the excuse of "in Malta gambling debts are not enforceable" is a joke and put the rest of the other law-abiding Casinos registered here in a bad light when used by Casino Attorneys to cheat their customers!

as i said, its not possible to not pay winnings

its easy to get a lawyer in malta and hand him out the case

[Roulette Zeitung]

I have a long list of German speaking lawyers in Malta, but you forgot, that an individual outside of competent court without pre-payments will likely not to be accepted and a lawyer is no judge.

Law and law comments are two different things and moreover: If you are playing in a country, where online gambling is prohibited outside of casinos with a German (!) license like it is in Germany, then appeals against judgments to the favor of a players are preprogrammed.

In real life you also need summonable address, and most online casinos are working with an rusted-up strawmen construct, and as a result the casino company succeeded in delaying the proceedings for years.

Leopold

[Roulette Zeitung]

After split of Ebay and Paypal there is an interesting case here in Germany.
If you deposit via Paypal to any wild online gambling services ... as a German you are violating Paypal's terms.
And Paypal violate their own terms if they accept the transaction as they did until today.
In a case from Germany the Paypal customer's account was not covered.
More than 7.000 Euro!
The normal way in situation like this is, that Papal's collecting agency will be set on the player.
But in this case ... a sample letter from a lawyer was sent to Paypal because of the law situation in Germany, and ...
Relinquishment of the claim against the player!
It was always my opinion, that Paypal should banned from any online gambling!
The reason is simple.
It will end in a legal disaster [As you can see with this case = Germany] and every ordinary Paypal customer have to suffer under it.

Leopold

[universal4]

If you deposit via Paypal to any wild online gambling services ... as a German you are violating Paypal's terms.

That is how it has ALWAYS been for US Residents also, but many residents will not admit it and often I find that operators in other countries deny that these rules exist.

They have recently added a section for US Residents about getting pre-approval in order to accept payments for gambling activities, but I would personally NEVER want to accept payments from a gambling operator via PayPal.

What operators ignore is that if there EVER is an issue concerning these payments, the US Resident loses their account, as well as access to their funds, and nothing the operator does can change that. (I have witnessed personal case histories of this in the past but will not disclose the names of those that were involved as it was quite difficult to get things restored)

Rick
Universal4

[Roulette Zeitung]

That is how it has ALWAYS been for US Residents also, but many residents will not admit it and often I find that operators in other countries deny that these rules exist.

They have recently added a section for US Residents about getting pre-approval in order to accept payments for gambling activities, but I would personally NEVER want to accept payments from a gambling operator via PayPal.

What operators ignore is that if there EVER is an issue concerning these payments, the US Resident loses their account, as well as access to their funds, and nothing the operator does can change that. (I have witnessed personal case histories of this in the past but will not disclose the names of those that were involved as it was quite difficult to get things restored)

Rick
Universal4

Thank you for the U.S. situation report.

"I would personally NEVER want to accept payments from a gambling operator via PayPal [...] if there EVER is an issue concerning these payments, the [...] Resident loses their account, as well as access to their funds, and nothing the operator does can change that."

Also in Germany a lot of Paypal accounts have been frozen in the past for none of woolly reasons, and I am not talking about connections with online gambling which aggravate the problem.

It's irresponsible, that [at least a German] Paypal customer can deposit huge sums (in the German case 7.777,77 Euro) in an online casino, lottery or bookmaker without having any Paypal funds on the Paypal account. It's suicide gambling, financed on credit.

In our case, the lucky number 7 proverbial shows her power.

In the German area of GPWA is a special Paypal thread regarding this case with some additional links for detailed information. I wrote today also an article to this case and topic because this topic is a must read. I know, a lot of programs will not like it, but players and especially ordinary Paypal customers are more important than shaky profits.

Leopold