Off Shore Gaming Association

Quite often you will hear today’s online gambling environment compared to the days of Prohibition in the late 20s and early 30s. And in typical ‘Untouchables’ fashion, today’s G-Men went after the Al Capone of the online industry – Calvin Ayre earlier this week. Tuesday a story broke outlining the indictment of Ayre, Bodog’s founder, and the subsequent seizure of their original domain Bodog.com. But just like in the first hour of Brian De Palma’s Oscar-winning film, the Feds raided a warehouse that had been vacated. And vacated for awhile.

After the ‘Black Friday’ domain seizures in April 2011, many online gambling companies moved from their dot com domains to ones registered outside the long arm of U.S Law to prevent further seizures. Immediately there were .ag domains and ultimately many have moved to a .eu domain extension. That is exactly what Bodog did. In April 2011 they moved to a .eu domain and never looked back.

As far as Ayre, following the UIGEA passage in 2006, he sold his U.S. -facing Bodog brand to the Morris Mohwak Gaming Group (MMGG) in the Kahnawake Indian reservation outside of Montreal, Canada. MMGG ultimately let the brand licensing agreement expire at the end of 2011 and moved all of the former players to a new brand, effectively ending an involvement of the Bodog name or brand in the U.S.

When the story broke on Tuesday, there was immediately a buzz in the industry. Many of the folks that we speak with regularly in the offshore world were ‘not surprised’ and we got more than one, ‘it’s about time’. You see, Ayre became both the poster boy for online gambling and for everything that you would NOT want to do if you had an offshore gambling house that caters to U.S. players. Bodog advertised all over the U.S. on billboards, radio ads, in magazine and print mailers and even via a Las Vegas conference, and Ayre was seen as a jet-setting playboy, flaunting his ‘illegal’ business in the face of the G-Men. Many industry insiders believe that the industry started getting more heat than was warranted after Ayre was featured in 2006 in Forbes magazine as a new billionaire. The story was titled ‘Catch Me If You Can’ and it seems that the Feds have done just that. Well kind of . . .

We saw the story and immediately reacted. After a brief meeting we all sat by the phones and chat lines waiting for an onslaught of players to ask about the situation. The story hit the mainstream media and within a few hours there were hundreds of stories in Google News. We waited and after a few hours and just a handful of inquiries had another meeting. “Why isn’t our phone ringing off the hook?” How come our chats lines have had just 2 inquiries on this?” After all, this was big news.

Apparently not to players.

Unfortunately for the Feds, this indictment and seizure has had little or no effect on the current operation servicing Bodog’s former customers and online gambling in general. In fact, unless you follow online gambling news (most players do not), you might never have heard of any seizures. Players had not been using bodog.com for nearly a year and the newly minted website and brand had taken hold of players browsers on Dec 14th, 2011, when even bodog.eu became dark.

In addition to the lack of inquiries here at OSGA, a quick perusal of the top online gambling forums and social media sites saw very little attention given to the seizure. So little, that it became obviously that online players either didn’t know or didn’t care about the DoJ actions. We have seen many stories about Bodog being shut down, including one claiming this was the Feds ‘biggest prize’. Really all of this could not be further from the truth. There has been no interruption for players and it’s business as usual for the Bodog Brands that do not face the United States, as well as for MMGG and their new U.S.-facing website.

So after nearly a decade and untold hours of investigative work, the G-Men essentially found a ‘dry’ warehouse. At a time when the U.S. economy is reeling and the national debt is skyrocketing, the cost of an investigation that started with Internal Revenue Service investigators in Maryland circa 2003 and immigration and customs officials launching a formal investigation in 2006 is absurd. At some point with all of that manpower and money someone should have noticed that bodog.com was no longer a gambling site. And they also should have figured out that Calvin Ayre, who announced after the UIGEA passage that he would not set foot on U.S. soil, was true. It has been over 5 years since he said that.

Yes, the U.S. DoJ did grab another domain and did indict more high profile online gambling entrepreneurs, but this one has to leave a bad taste in the mouths of prosecutors. They basically got nothing – no one that they will ever be able to put on trial and no change in player activity. In the last round of seizures the government did force several large poker operators out of the US, did scare tens of thousands of players away from playing online and did end up shutting down a few operations that stiffed players entirely; all goals of the current regime. But this latest escapade by the DOJ would cause even Eliot Ness to throw his hat in disgust.

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So far our phone lines, online chat and email box have been inundated with the same question: “Why did bodog change its website?” or “Why is bodog now Bovada?”

As of today (December 14th, 2011) the Morris Mohawk Gaming Group (MMGG) will no longer operate under the Bodog name. MMGG’s brand licensing agreement with the Bodog Brand is expiring at the end of this year and as a result MMGG will no longer be offering its services using the Bodog name or from the website, bodog.eu. Instead U.S. players will be moved to the new brand, Bovada.

What does this mean for players?
• All accounts remain entirely the same. U.S. players only need to log in at www.bovada.lv
• The business is still owned and operated by the Morris Mohawk Gaming Group, as it has been for the past several years.
• The same great products and games, payout methods and phone number will all stay the same.

Basically this is nothing different that when industry giant BetCRIS spun off its U.S. players into their Bookmaker brand back in 2007. Nothing changed, in fact, many players thought that the new brand with mostly U.S. specific sports and props was even better. We expect that same from the new Bovada. One nice thing that they have introduced is a new Poker platform where players are basically anonymous when they are playing. This prevents expert or pro players for fishing and data mining new or poor players so that they can go after them in tournaments and ring games.

Players should be automatically re-directed from their respective jurisdictions to the correct site. Bodog has done an excellent job of geo-location and when we tried this morning to go to Bodog, we immediately were redirected to the new bovada.lv domain. A redirect message as to why you are being re-directed will also appear.

Bodog has had to change their domain name in the past due to legal issues as well as the ongoing war that the U.S. is waging against online gambling companies that service U.S. customers, but this is not another name change. Instead it is the gaming giant’s parent company MMGG opening a new brand for U.S. customers. This is simply a way to differentiate between the different offerings from the company, while expanding Bodog into most of the top jurisdictions around the world where gambling online is legal.

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The fallout from the recent website seizures by the U.S. is still ongoing. Companies are running away from America, changing domain names or simply fleeing all together. Keeping up with who is in and who is out following both Black Friday and the U.S. processor sting has become increasingly difficult as almost every day another participant in the U.S. online gambling market makes a change. As of this writing here is a brief (and ever-evolving) list of who is in and who is out for U.S. players.

Let’s start with who is in because unfortunately for players, that is a much shorter list. Following the latest domain seizures of URLs like bookmaker.com, doylesroom.com, 2betdsi.com and others there was a fundamental change in the way many sites that service U.S. players operate. They moved their domains out of the dot com realm! Players can still wager at all of the aforementioned places just at different addresses.

BookMaker is now located at bmaker.ag, Diamond is at betdsi.com (though that surely will be changing), Doyle’s Room and True Poker also moved to Antigua with doylesroom.ag and truepoker.ag. Even places that did not see their URLs taken or their names on any recent government paperwork are moving to web addresses that do not end in .com. You now have to surf to Europe for Bodog which is at bodog.eu and travel to Panama to find BetUS at betus.com.pa. Still, some of the large companies like BetUS, Sportsbook.com, SIA and a few others are not accepting NEW players from the US.

Sorting through the places that are no longer doing business in the U.S. is a bit harder. The list for both casinos and poker rooms is long and mainly due to the fact that certain software providers are making their clients ‘just say no’ to us players. This is similar to what Cryptologic , Playtech and others did after the passage of the UIGEA. Some online gambling houses are also planning to or have shut down altogether.

The Merge Poker network stated early on that they were going to refuse players from the states that have been aggressive in any of the DoJ actions. The list includes Missouri, Maryland, New York, Kentucky, Louisiana and Washington State. However, as recently as yesterday Merge has decided to give up on the US altogether, at least for now. Existing players are apparently still able to use the likes of Carbon Poker, PlayAces and PokerHost and can go to lockpoker.eu. If these poker rooms cannot find new processing to handle the increased need to process withdrawals, then this is probably a good short term solution to a current backlog of payments at several Merge rooms. In addition, the bigger sites in their network, Sportsbook.com, Hollywood, etc had already decided to stop taking new U.S. players for most likely the same reasoning. Merge may be back.

A newer poker outfit called Victory Poker just called it quits. The operator decided that between the processing, threat of prosecution and amount of fraud that it was just not worth doing business anymore. Victory did move is players over to Cake, and plans to come back in the future . . . as a poker information website.

The Cake network will still take U.S. players and no doubt several poker rating sites will being to push the likes of 7Win Poker, Fugu Poker and other Cake-driven rooms that no one ever heard of before. Poker players, this is a dangerous time. Of course, the three Poker Giants are all still out of the U.S. leaving the market wide open for a new company to swoop in. However, players must be diligent in knowing who they are dealing with.

The same applies to online casino players. A couple of very popular casinos stopped taking new U.S. players two weeks ago including English Harbour, Millionaire Casino and Super Slots . These places may come back to the US. And finally, the likes of popular casinos Online Vegas, Go Casino, Crazy Slots, and Grand Vegas have said that they are closing down, but currently are available. There is just no “United States” in the country box on their real-money, signup page. Casino players should also be very careful jumping on any new bandwagons.

As the recent indictments have shown, gambling companies have several options open once their name appears in government documents or their URL gets seized. The trick moving forward, especially for online poker and online casino players is who will simply move their URL and who will shut down and worst of all, who will run and stiff players.

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Last week we made mention in our BLOG of a couple of things that have gotten players into trouble with their gambling houses.  And one player, who admitted that he read the BLOG, did not heed our advice and now has a bigger problem. So, we thought it might be useful to outline the top thing NOT to say to an online sportsbook, Internet casino or poker room should a payout problem arise.

Quite often players in the U.S. have trouble getting their money sent in a timely fashion once a request has been put in and accepted. This can happen at just about any outfit offshore, and usually is a just a one-time issue. However, too many players get frustrated and starting popping off at the next available clerk once a payout does not arrive as planned.

The #1 thing NOT to say is that you are thinking of making a charge back on your credit card deposits. Do not even mention the words ‘charge’ and ‘back’ in the same sentence. The word (or words) ‘chargeback’ instantly will get a player into trouble. Even if you are not planning to do the dirty deed, DO NOT mention a charge back. Unfortunately, this week’s case proves this point.

A player called us because he had not received a bank wire from Bodog, who in the past had been very reliable for him with payouts. The player claimed that the wire did not arrive in his account, while Bodog said it had been delivered. This player went round and round with the sportsbook giant and finally resorted to calling OSGA. Once we got involved the wheels started moving. But unfortunately, these types of problems do take some time to sort out. The player got more and more frustrated. Bodog insisted that it was sent. The player got bank records and letters saying it was not sent to his account. Bodog still insisted it was sent to him. Finally, through our involvement, Bodog’s processing company began to make an extra effort to find the wire.

Meanwhile, the player got more furious and more steamed with each passing day. This week he decided to make the ‘chargeback’ threat. And it was a veiled threat at that. He said, “A lawyer friend suggested that I charge back my deposit,” when he was inquiring if there were any updates with the clerk who was handling his issue. The warning bells went off and within a few hours the players’ account was closed.

Credit card charge backs are such a big problem that the mere utterance of the words makes an offshore outfit react or overreact, and not in a positive way. The problem is that too many chargebacks will cause VISA or MasterCard to drop the processing company and thus the gambling house has to find a new credit card processor. This not only affects the book or casino, it affects all of the players at that place and the industry itself. Many new books are not even taking credit cards and most places have lost the ability to accept credit cards at one time during the last few years. We spoke with one operator who recently launched a new shop in Costa Rica. “I am not taking credit cards at this time, it’s just too much of a headache. Credit cards cause nothing but problems,” we were told.

In addition, the sportsbook or casino has a further problem if a chargeback is made – they never collect that player’s deposit money. Years ago when these problems began to surface regularly we, of course, got involved with many disputes. At the time one operator told us that he could NOT pay the player in question because of the threat of a chargeback. Why? “Because, if I pay the guy and then he charges back, I lose twice.” Puzzled, we inquired further. “I lose twice because (one) the player beat me and got paid and then I lose again because I can’t collect his deposit money.”

In recent years, frustrated players have made charging back on a deposit part of their modus opperandi. As soon as a problem occurs, the easiest thing for a player to do to recoup his money is to charge back. However, players need to be aware that this behavior is now being tracked. There is a list, a big list. And the list is being shared amongst all of the major players in the gambling community. One player was recently shut down within hours after depositing at one of the franchises of Sportsbook.com. Of course, we inquired as to why this player was shut down, with bets pending. Here Sportsbook ran him through the list and found a chargeback from 7 years ago!  According to the management at Sportsbook.com, “We caught his account within 2 hours of being created and no actioned all wagers, then credited back the initial deposit.”

This is what all of the sportsbooks, casinos and poker rooms are doing now once a player utters ‘charge back’. If a player threatens to reverse his deposits, the gambling house will cut the alleged offender off at the pass and refund all cards used to deposit, closing the account and keeping all monies. This is the knee-jerk reaction that operators have been forced into in the face of mounting losses and repeat offenders. And once a player says ‘charge back’ our hands are pretty much tied in trying to achieve any type of positive resolution.

Players should remember that if they are playing a reputable house (rated Elite or Premier) they should not sweat whether or not they are going to be paid; maybe ‘when’, but not ‘if’. Quite often complaint resolution takes far longer than anyone wants and due to the murky world of money processing, missing wires and delayed checks are particularly frustrating. Players should use the chargeback only as a last resort, as a virtual ace-in-the-hole to use after all other means of resolution have been exhausted.

Saying chargeback is like going ‘all in’. It’s a last ditch effort to get the money sitting in the pot. And who goes all in announcing what is in their hand? You would get creamed doing that. And most players who utter the word charge and back together end up getting screwed too.

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This year Super Bowl should be an excellent game, as these two teams match up very well, and the expectation is that this one will be a shootout. And touchdowns are always fun to watch especially when viewing with a mixed group of bettors, fans and commercial watchers. But, the most exciting thing about the Super Bowl? Prop betting or live wagering.
 
Prop betting has exploded with every outlet offering hundreds if not thousands of these ‘man-made’ wagers. Every outlet is currently offering props from the coin toss to the final play and utilize every offensive player and special teams gimmick. Keep in mind when looking at all of these wagers that the public generally bets ‘over’ and ‘yes’ so prices for these options are typically inflated.

Still, these wagers will make even the slowest of Super Bowl games interesting. You can bet on the yardage for Bush’s first carry, total yards, longest rush, receptions, reception yardage and whether he will score a touchdown. It’s a given that if your sportsbook is giving Bush this much attention, the so will the Colts. With plays available on Saints’ Marquis Colston and Jeremey Shockey and the Colts’ Joseph Addai and Reggie Wayne it may be worthwhile to look at some of the ‘other’ cast members on each team’s offense for a bit of value.

Saints WR Devery Henderson has been having a nice run in the payoffs, with 8 catches for over a hundred yards and two scores. So, I’ll take “Will Devery‘Henderson score a TD in the game?” for Yes at +235, instead of Colston at +105.

For the Colt’s turn to Austin Collie as the oddsmakers seem to have caught up with Pierre Garcon, who has been on fire for Manning in the last two games. Collie has been a huge contrbutor recently and is the only Colt with 2 scores in the post-season . “Longest Reception – Austin Collie” at -110 looks like a solid play, though it is hard to lay off of Dallas Clark to score a touchdown at -140.

The coins toss, the first score, the longest field goal are usually some of my favorites and will certainly get some of my attention. I also always look to an exact point prop, as these always have some excellent odds. Usually I will take the team that I like at the half and then place an ‘exact margin of victory’ play. So, thinking it will be a close game, rather than take the Saints +3 for the half, wager Saints up by 1-3 points at 4-1 or the Colts margin of 1-3 points at 3-1 odds.  Still, I sift through the pages and pages of prop at the various outlets clicking and clicking to find some crazy ones that make me look twice and perhaps, wager once.

Bodog has two that are just fabulous. “What color top will Kim Kardashian be wearing at the Super Bowl?” Black (the favorite at -135), white, or other color (6/5). I wonder what happens if she changes at halftime?  The silliest prop is obviously from 1968, “If any member of the Who smashes their guitar what does the guitar hit first?” Hmm, floor at 1/9 or drummer at 200/1? How ’bout “No” to will a guitar get smashed at -190 (these guys are pretty old for that kinda stuff).

In addition to all of this, you can bet LIVE during the commercial break of the game. WSEX pioneered this years ago and this year 5Dimes, who does some live wagering on various events, will have wagering during every comercial break. Bodog also is offering live betting during the game.

Sportsbooks worldwide pull out the incentives for the biggest single game of betting each year. This year is no exception with a 100% bonus offer at several outlets. BetJamaica has a $100 Free Play on a $100 first time deposit and at WagerWeb for every $100 you send in, you get the same offer – up to $1000, plus 5% back on any SuperBowl losses! BetPhoenix takes the same offer one step further Deposit $100 and receive a $100 free wager on the Super Bowl. If your Super Bowl wager loses you will get another chance to use it! WHAT!

SBG Global will pick up the fees for deposits and give you an additional $50 free Play for sending cash. Both betEd  and 5Dimes are coughing up a 50% bonus. And at least 20% can be found at most every outlet worldwide. Check here for the latest updated Super Bowl bonus offers.

Keep in mind, as with any bonuses, these offers carry restrictions. So make sure you check the fine print of any offer before you send money.

Who Dat making Ca$h on the Super Bowl? Enjoy the game.

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We get calls and emails constantly here at OSGA. Hundreds find us every day and they are all asking the same question, “What is the time frame that I can expect a payout?” Not only are we getting this inquiry over and over again, but every sportsbook we have spoken with has also been grilled with the same line of questioning.

Most sportsbooks are quite forthcoming with the information requested by players. But, even the ‘company line’ being given can be far from accurate. The problem, payment processing can change from week to week and even hour by hour.

A perfect example of this is at industry giant Bodog. They state on both their website and when you call to sign up, that players will have to wait up to 40 business days to get a check. Bodog does their best to meet this egregious time-frame, but we have had an inordinate amount of players telling us that they have been waiting since June for their payouts. We have reported the problems at Bodog for some time now and many players have chimed in (see Recent Payout Complaints Valid). Bodog was using Zip Payments and the US government effectively closed them down back in June, causing a huge problem for Bodog, Sportsbook.com and several other books. However, we are beginning to see Bodog making some headway.

This past week we were given a new contact at Bodog, as they have setup a new department to handle payout inquiries/complaints. This has proven to be quite effective. Seven complaints were sent over to the head of this new group at Bodog this week. All seven were answered and three players already received their checks!

Bodog stated to us, “We are essentially caught up on the re-issued checks we saw as a result of the loss of some third party processing relationships. We are now in a position to start chipping away at our current 40 business day time frame for check by courier and will be able to clean-up the back log of payouts that we have incurred.”

So, perhaps the light at the end of the tunnel is beginning to burn brightly at Bodog.

Still, the question gets asked every day – “When can I expect to get a payout?”

We spoke with many Elite rated sportsbooks this week to get some insights. One company told us that they are working day and night to meet clients’ expectations. “But the players do not understand how hard we are working to make almost every payout happen”, we were told. Several books told us this week that they are now getting some new methods in place and that they have new processors ‘coming on-line’ every week. We have had reports that ATM cards are being issued by some books, and if your book offers it – we urge you to look into getting their card.

However, one player complained that he was given this option at his book after waiting for over a month for a check, with no end in sight. He had them put the withdrawal back in his account and took advantage of the new ATM withdrawal option. The problem: he had to make over a dozen calls to insure that the card was coming and it took a month to arrive. However, when it did – he was able to make 10 withdrawals of $200 each and minus the ATM fee was able to collect $1800 in one day!

Other books are able to get money out rather quickly. A player reported that Diamond Sports was doing well. He asked for a payout on Tuesday and got his check on Friday. WagerWeb also got a player a check the same week as it was requested. Both BetOnline and YouWager were able to get out same-day person-to-person to several players who called in their reports to us. We have even downgraded a couple of books based soley on their payout times. After all, if one book is getting payouts to players in three days and another is taking three weeks, is there really a comparison here?

Thus, payout times vary greatly from book to book. The one thing that we cannot stress enough is for players to have some patience and understand that payout times are no longer an exact science during what is a very difficult time for offshore operators. Every Elite rated sportsbook is getting players their money within a reasonable time. The rest out there are doing their best but often fall short of thier own mark. Still, this could all change in a New York minute. Stay tuned to this space and become an OSGA member for the latest updates.

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