Why not WSEX?

[HarmonicaMan]

Some of the negative comments in this thread are laughable.

2 things:
a) WPEX games are NOT that hard.
b)If you play only 1 or 2 tables at WPEX, u should help ur winrate even a little bit. You are not being forced to play only at WPEX if u play there, u can still play at stars or wherever and play also at WPEX, lol

[[Phill]]

The way i see it, my rake pays for (in order of importance):

1, Advertising which brings in fish
2, Good quality software/servers
3, Customer Support

Im probably missing a few smaller ones, but those are the big three reasons why rake is a good thing. The fact is WPEX was never as fishy as the big sites, and certainly not as fishy as some of the more fringe sites. Their software always came under scrutiny and they may have the greatest customer support in the entire planet but if they fail on 1 and 2, 3 is irrelivent. This is ignoring some people having issues depositing and withdrawing (i include this as 3, fwiw).

WPEX wasnt the first to try the rake free model and it probably wont be the last. But to this day no such site has succeeded because all of them failed in 2 or more of the catagories above.

Maybe a site will succeed with rakefree, i dunno, but for now i gladly pay my rake (minus my rakeback) because i know without it online poker would be MILES harder than it is now.

[sparky3474]

I guess that's why Monday's seem to be the highest traffic day.

[Ozawasan]

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Has anyone had trouble getting money out of here? I made a withdrawal request (bank draft) two weeks ago and still haven't received it. I talked to their CS and she says it hasn't even been processed yet due to the high volume of requests. And when it is finally processed, she said it would 4-6 weeks via regular mail. That means it could take potentially over two months just to get my money. I would think this would be reason enough not to choose this place.

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I don't know what you were told exactly, but I am pulling the chat logs later today. WSEX is not behind with withdrawals.

WSEX is currently processing all withdrawals within the time frame stated on its web site. You put in a regular mail withdrawal request on October 15th or very early October 16th. It was processed on October 16th. Our web site states that regular mail takes up to 20 business days. Today is the 11th business day since your withdrawal was processed.

I really don't understand what the problem is.

Please feel free to contact me if I have the facts wrong here.

Fred Balfour
General Manager
WSEX.com

[/ QUOTE ]

Problem is I made my request 2 weeks ago and the check hasn't even been processed. Because of "high demand" the live chat person (Alivia) said she doesn't even know when the bank draft will be processed since I'm on a waiting list. When if finally does get made and sent, it will take another 4-6 weeks to get to me by regular mail, according to Alivia. That means even if they process the check tomorrow, which they probably won't, I will get my check in 2 months at the very minimum if i'm luck from the time I requested it. I don't know if that's normal for you guys but I guess I just expected to get if faster. If that's how you long the withdrawals normally take then I apologize. The title of this thread is "why not WSEX". My reason for "why not" is because the withdrawals take this long.

after reading your reply it seems like you think the check has already been sent. Alivia told me it hasn't even been made yet, that I'm on a waiting list at whatever bank you use to process the checks. I asked her why it take 2 weeks to write a check, and she just said somehting like you guys are having problems now. This is an email i got from the live chat person soon after:

Dear Jason,

We have discussed your bank draft situation via live support. What I have done is to include your name on a earlier draft list to be delivered considering your position with your last draft. When we receive confirmation from our processor I will have an email sent letting you know the status of your draft. Please note the exact date a draft is sent will not available.

Regards,



Alivia

Obviously it still has not been processed. She's waiting for confirmation from the bank, and then will contact me when the bank has the check made. even then, she can't tell me when it will be put in the mail. Awesome!

[MattSuspect]

Poor marketing is the answer. Thats it. But that's a risk reward issue for management. The cost of properly marketing and building a player base may not be worth it unless they players bet sports, I'm sure the business minds of WSEX have crunched all the numbers and its purely not worth it fiscally to go all out to try and build a player base. And fwiw, I enjoyed all my time on WPEX, the high limit games were good, the CS was excellent, and cashouts were really fast post UIGEA. They even gave me my first parlay fix.

[ACynicalOptimist]

It's a combination of a lot of things. Ignorance of deposit methods is probably at the top of the list (I can't tell you how many times people on here make some snide remark about not playing on there because of the difficulty of depositing and withdrawing, when in reality, as a U.S. player, it is absolutely far easier for me to do both these things on wpex than on Bodog or FullTilt).

Another thing is that for most people, game selection is more important than profitability. WPEX is hugely advantageous if you're a limit player, but most people lose at limit poker anyway. The ones that win are either high-stakes professionals and so the prospective rakeback on WPEX represents a very small part of their hourly rate, or people who beat full-ring but not short-handed, or people who are just marginal winners but can't get our game to the next level. The 2nd group of people wouldn't play on WPEX because for it to be profitable for them, they'd have to be able to find 4 full-ring games playing at the same time, at any time of day they wanted to play. Good luck finding that on wpex - they're mostly short-handed games and it's rare that you'll find 4 tables of the same stakes except during the peak hours of the day.
The people in the last category are the ones who actually play at WPEX, and wish more people would come along and give us their money [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

So again, for recreational players, game selection is more important than profitability. They don't play poker like professionals or semi-professionals do, i.e. playing it regardless of whether or not they enjoy it for the specific purpose of providing or supplementing one's income to a significant extent. They play poker because they like playing poker, or because they like being a person who plays poker. They want to be able to sign on whenever and have a large choice of games to play in. They don't care that they're being paid anywhere from 20$ to 60$ an hour to play poker, because if they don't like doing it, there's no point for them to do it.

Further, many of these people play NL, which dramatically decreases the profitability of WPEX.

For a low-stakes or mid-stakes short-handed limit player, who is serious about building a bankroll or making money, not playing at WPEX is the most -EV retarded thing ever. Otherwise, it's understandable why people stick to other more popular sites.

Also yes, the marketing has been terrible, and should be blamed for a lot of this. Back when WPEX was 100% rakefree, using gimmicks of "we pay you to play poker", etc., would've worked wonders. Now it's ehh. I mean they still kinda do, but not really since you're taking 25% of everyone's money now. And a lot of people are just turned off at the fact that WPEX started with the innovation and uniqueness of 100% rakeback, and now it's been changed to 75%? I mean, that is pretty much a sign that things are failing - Fred even admitted that the 100% rakefree site experiment failed. 75% is still good, but it's not the same, and I believe the decrease just adds to people's paranoia and assumptions over WPEX's instability. The fact that the software about a year ago was unstable = people saying that WPEX is unstable, and now the switch from 100% to 75% just fuels that image that people have. This makes people not want to try WPEX = it remains low traffic = more people leave, furthering the problem and being caught in a vicious circle.

Bear in mind I say all this as a very satisfied WPEX customer. I personally think the games are good (again, so much ignorance, it is NOT a rock garden - in fact people used to say WPEX was rigged because the games are so loose-aggressive that there is sometimes a lot of variance [and a lot of profit]) the software has been good for a while, customer support has dramatically improved, and the pay-out time is constantly improving and is better than pretty much any site for U.S. players. All I'm saying is, with the history of things that have occured with WPEX, it's not surprising that it didn't take off like it should have. If GM wants to change this, I suggest using all the money they've made from the 25% rake they've been accumulating, switch back to 100% rakeback and start marketing like crazy using some of the great ideas we've heard like "we pay you to play poker" - also make sure you emphasize easy deposits, and also hire enough staff and resources so that if traffic does increase, AND THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT, you're still able to handle cash-outs in a timely manner. If you attract people with marketing, and then take a month for the overnight mail cash-outs, customers won't be happy.

[Rek]

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I suggest using all the money they've made from the 25% rake they've been accumulating, switch back to 100% rakeback and start marketing like crazy

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I would think that the 25% merely covers the cost of maintaining the site and customer service. I can't see that they have accumulated much profit here.

Proper advertising takes megabucks and is why Stars, FTP and Party do so well. Unless all the players go on to do sports betting it will just be a loss making entity. IMHO they must continue to take rake and advertise big time.

Mind you, if they do this what is their unique selling point? I think it is a losing battle unfortunately.

Don't suppose they can legally do this but how about you get 50% rakeback and the other 50% must be wagered on their sports betting? I'd be up for that.

[scrts27]

Why Not We Sex? Huh?

[Q_and_A]

I, and many others, have always felt the market equilibrium for online rake should be lower than what is currently charged by the major poker sites. Has there been any credible posted or published analysis on the costs of running and maintaining a poker site (exclusive of advertising)?

[ACynicalOptimist]

the software update today screwed stuff up. if you're in the big blind and someone raises you from the small blind, you are unable to/there is no option to re-raise - you're only allowed to fold or call.

this is problematic in itself in regular ring games, but on heads-up tables it's REALLY messed up.

please fix asap, and I hope this isn't going to screw up the VIP tourney tonight, if it also affects NL tables?