Good luck, Nat.
This is slightly off-topic of the specific AP cheating scandal, but it involves the operations of AP and UB and the reneging on promises to its members.
Questions: What is the ownership situation, relating to Absolute Poker, UltimateBet and Bet21.com? When is UltimateBet and Bet21.com going to honor its promise to pay bonus dollars on blackjack tournaments, free "Play to Win" books, and the agreements that it made with its affiliates?
Background:
Bet21.com began in the Summer of 2006 as a site to play elimination blackjack tournaments as well as poker. It is a skin of UltimateBet and can play all of the UltimateBet poker games and tournaments. Bet21 is operated by Blast Off Ltd. Both UB and Bet21 leased the Elimination Blackjack format from UBT (Ultimate Blackjack Tour) and started to offer blackjack tournaments. Both were television sponsors of UBT in the fall of 2006. When Bet21 launched, they offered their customers 100% bonuses to $350 to be paid in "bet21 dollars", identical to the UB bonus program. But they also said that the bonus dollars would be redeemable in blackjack tournaments. See
this. I believe the same claim was made at UB that their bonuses would be eligible for blackjack tournaments, but I would have to confirm that with proof within the BJ community.
Soon after joining bet21, most people realized that their bonus dollars were not being converted to cash when they played blackjack tournaments. They contacted customer support and soon learned that the module that operates the blackjack tournaments was not programmed to operate with the bonus accumulator. They assured customers that it was a high priority, would be fixed in a couple months, and that all bonuses earned playing BJ tournaments would be retroactively applied.
A couple months later, UIGEA passed and UB was sold to AP. It is suggested that bet21 might have been sold off seperately, but both UB and bet21 still offer the exact same games today under seperate skins and according to the website, it is still operated by Blast Off Ltd. For several months, separate promises were made by bet21 employees and representatives about dates that the bonus system will be completed. None were kept, and 15 months after the site launched noone has earned bonus credit for BJ tournaments. In addition, most of the people you play only BJ tournaments never received their free book from Ken Eininger (obviously of less importance) which I assume was linked to the bonuses being cashed.
To date,
bet21.com is nearly dormant. Their homepage prominently advertises an upcoming event that took place 5 months ago. It still runs a daily schedule of tournaments (which were revamped about 6 weeks ago), but the affiliates no longer receive payment or communication, and of course, the bonus situation is now ignored by UB and bet21.
For more background, this
BlackjackTournaments.com thread is the most recent discussion on this topic.
Please feel free to PM me with any specific questions. Thank you for any help you can bring to the blackjack community.