Down With Prima Poker

[funnymunny]

I know I'm probably gonna get shot down for this, but I gotta ask...

Why are you all slating Prima for this? They are a software provider, not the operator. You deposit money with the operator, so it's their responsibility to give you the money back. If your account at your local bank gets locked, you don't, you don't then start boycotting the bank of america / bank of england (or similar), your gripe is with your bank.

See following link discussing this thread on the Hendon Mob forum - probably explains my point better (after all, they should know what goes on @ Prima)...

http://www.thehendonmob.com/forum/vi...?p=57654#57654

[Jay.]

[ QUOTE ]
Their initial response was that my account was locked indefinitely. What more would I need than that. I called them, they told me the same thing. Then I raised a stink.... THEN the floor manager got involved.

-Jason

[/ QUOTE ]

I wouldn't let this rest right now. Since they are paying attention to this forum you are in a good situation. Get a list of accounts who withdrawn money because of this, and a list off accounts who keep their balance as small as possible, and tell them all these people are doing this because prima has the worst possible collusion detection system and the worst possible way of handling afterwards.

[Mike Haven]

For those who never leave the Zoo:

The Mob:

We asked Prima to comment on this thread and they said this:

Prima / Microgaming are a software company - they license their software to operators. It is then the operators that attract / have all the relationships / conduct banking transactions with the players. (Think of it as being similar to when you buy a television…if something goes wrong, you don’t call the manufacturer, you call the shop where you bought it. Prima / Microgaming are the manufacturer & the operators are the shops).

Prima also do not lock player accounts or funds – this would be done by the central fraud & collusion unit CFC). Prima have no influence over them – all player disputes are a 3-way thing…Player / Operator / CFC.

As all banking on the Network is done through the operators – slow cash-outs with one operator do not mean it will be the same with all operators.

and they made these comments on the CFC unit:

The CFC unit are an independent company who effectively police the Network (they are the ones who respond when someone types “pokermanager” in the chat). They do their best to ensure a fair & friendly playing environment is always there. (No swearing / foreign chat, no spamming, etc). If players aren’t nice, the poker managers give them a couple of warnings before blocking their chat.

Perhaps most important of all, they are the ones who monitor play for collusion and / or chip-dumping. If they suspect something is amiss, they will block a players account pending an investigation. They go through all details on the player (IP address / physical address / play style & who they play with (through playcheck). If there is a pattern of say losing consistently to a player on the same IP or house address, then there is a good possibility that chip-dumping / single player with multiple accounts / player collusion / etc is happening. The will then discuss this with the operator involved (where the player holds the account).

The reason why the CFC unit is completely independent is that we cannot allow anyone’s financial position to be used as an influence on the Networks security. (E.g. a certain player could be the highest ranking player, for our biggest operator – financially it may not be in our interest to lock their account, but if they are breaking Network rules / playing with funds from a stolen credit card / etc, then their account should be locked).

All Prima operators have 24/7 access to the CFC unit.

[Viscount]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't know if this has been said in this very long thread, but just to clarify, their collusion and fraud detection unit locked an account that had been inactive for 4-5 months as standard protocol.

I trust online poker sites a lot; they were trying to steal your money.

[/ QUOTE ]
Just to clarify further, an account holder with $15K was asked for ID and documents to verify their identity. This request was ignored and no further attempts were made by the account holder to play with, or withdraw the money.

This is classic fraudster behaviour (get money fraudulently, then give it up when you are challenged), and would have, quite rightly, set alarm bells ringing in any poker room's security system.

There are issues with the communications between Prima/CFC/Royal Vegas and the player, but they are separate from the crux of the matter, namely the poker room was entirely correct to freeze the player's account until they had completed their investigation.

[moondogg]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I don't know if this has been said in this very long thread, but just to clarify, their collusion and fraud detection unit locked an account that had been inactive for 4-5 months as standard protocol.

I trust online poker sites a lot; they were trying to steal your money.

[/ QUOTE ]
Just to clarify further, an account holder with $15K was asked for ID and documents to verify their identity. This request was ignored and no further attempts were made by the account holder to play with, or withdraw the money.

This is classic fraudster behaviour (get money fraudulently, then give it up when you are challenged), and would have, quite rightly, set alarm bells ringing in any poker room's security system.

There are issues with the communications between Prima/CFC/Royal Vegas and the player, but they are separate from the crux of the matter, namely the poker room was entirely correct to freeze the player's account until they had completed their investigation.

[/ QUOTE ]

Good Lord, read the damn thread. The crux of the matter absolutely was not the freezing. It was the fact that he was told his account was frozen indefinitely, was not given an explanation, and was given the impression that he would never have an answer.

It was not freezing that people are complaining about, it is the lack of communication. This has been clearly stated over and over. And over. And over.

[TimsterToo]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I don't know if this has been said in this very long thread, but just to clarify, their collusion and fraud detection unit locked an account that had been inactive for 4-5 months as standard protocol.

I trust online poker sites a lot; they were trying to steal your money.

[/ QUOTE ]
Just to clarify further, an account holder with $15K was asked for ID and documents to verify their identity. This request was ignored and no further attempts were made by the account holder to play with, or withdraw the money.

This is classic fraudster behaviour (get money fraudulently, then give it up when you are challenged), and would have, quite rightly, set alarm bells ringing in any poker room's security system.

There are issues with the communications between Prima/CFC/Royal Vegas and the player, but they are separate from the crux of the matter, namely the poker room was entirely correct to freeze the player's account until they had completed their investigation.

[/ QUOTE ]

All Prima operators have 24/7 access to the CFC unit.

The issue was that nobody was giving him any answers as to why his money wasn't coming back or even in what timeframe he could expect any sort of answer.

So basically if he would have remained a individual instead of a "well respected 2+2er" he would have been given the run around for an indefinite time before getting answers.

Big chains also have businesses that are owned by individual businessman. You can own a franchise of McDonalds but if a individual customer has a problem with things going on in that McDonalds he can lay that problem down at the McDonalds corporation who will then go down to there franchise taker and will in the least communicate this problem and let you know that they have done so.

If the problem is big enough for McDonalds to be harmed as a company all over I'm pretty sure that they can take harsher steps.

Prima didn't respond and in that showed that one of the reasons to play at a network doesn't count for them. I play at smaller sites that belong to a network as I feel that the network is my safety net if I get into an issue with a individual pokerroom. This is not the case at Prima which is fine, they choose to take a different approach in a business where dealing with money from players worldwide is a very sensitive issue. (companies being overseas in countries where you know you don't stand a lot of chance to get it through legal means) I in turn will choose not to go back to Prima anymore. (not a big loss for them but still [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img])

[Payoff]

They let me put $1k in my Prima skin recently, play for a while (I lost $500 cos i suck)
THEN they froze my account until I sent them scans of various documents.

If they are so concerned about security why don't they require all these documents before I make a deposit and play.

Most likely I'll be leaving the site once I'm broke or even. Shame though cos the RB is pretty good.

[BluffTHIS!]

[ QUOTE ]
The CFC unit are an independent company who effectively police the Network

[/ QUOTE ]


This statement of theirs kind of doesn't sound right unless that company also provides services to other casino/poker sites. If they do then that would meet my definition of independent. If not, then I would maintain that they are just a wholly controlled subsidiary of Prima who is looking to shift responsbility for problems.

And payoff has a good point about the document stuff. They should just ask for that stuff up front and not jack people off with account freezes and later requests.

I've made it clear that I have never played on Prima and don't intend to, because all of these kind of things show that it is a big hassle to do so, even though I laud their more aggressive than other sites' policies on preventing collusion. It just could be done better with upfront requests.

And regarding the skins having 24/7 access to the fraud unit, either Prima is lying about this or RVP is. And having "access" but refusing to give skins the details when they first ask about a situation is the same as no access.

[Jason Strasser (strassa2)]

A person high up in RVP just called me today.

Here is what went down.

1) First they wanted to ask for more information about my incident (IE why did I wait 4 months?) so they could better understand how to improve their policies.

2) They apologized for what happened.

3) They told me that Prima is very scared about this development and have been watching the forums closely and is planning to change certain procedures and terms because of this incident.

4) Policies at RVP and customer service procedures will be looked at. Specifically, when a player gets locked out of an account, more attention from people higher up the ladder will be given to the matter.

5) They saw that I cashed out my money and gave me $300 to mess around with the site.

The situation with my money is resolved. Whether I feel safe with my money on Prima, or whether I would ever tell someone else to play on Prima is another story. I told the guy who called me to post something on the forum, and he said he would. I'm interested to see what happens from here on out.

-Jason

[yvesaint]

cash out the 300