I am sorry but we cannot accept US based players.

This is correct. Switch Poker is a licensed operator and our license required following certain 'know your customer' regulations. Your private details are stored securely and are not shared with third parties for commercial purposes.

The worst thing that this will lead to is receiving the odd Christmas card from the team -- something which can be opted out of. And the best that will lead to is delivery of an iPad or other gift after completing one of the signup bonuses.

This has been picked up by Card Player

http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-news/14529-switch-poker-launches-bitcoin-only-poker-tables

2 @ 6

We are informing bitcointalk.org of this Bitcoin related news first. Before we blog about it, before we tweet about it, before our Facebook page gets updated and before we notify our journalist mailing list.

As many of you know, last year we added Bitcoin as a deposit and withdrawal method on Switch Poker. But as all of our games were in Euro it was necessary for players to convert their Bitcoins to Euro to play on the site.

Minutes ago we added Bitcoin currency tables to our lobby. These allow players to deposit using Bitcoin, play using Bitcoin and withdraw winnings using Bitcoin without needing to convert to Euro. There are zero fees to deposit or withdraw using Bitcoin.



This is a limited launch of Bitcoin only tables and therefore there are only 0.01/0.02 BTC tables (2BTC maximum buyin) at the moment. If it proves popular we will add more levels.

We hope you enjoy the Bitcoin games and would appreciate your feedback and suggestions.

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Switch Poker offers no-limit holdem cash games for iPhone, iPad, Android & desktop

I would like to give an official response to the question of whether we allow users to use Switch Poker to convert credit card funds to Bitcoin.

Switch Poker exists to give people a place to play online poker. It is not set up as a currency exchange service. Thus all deposits and withdrawals are free to people who use the site to play poker.
If users attempt to use the site to convert funds to Bitcoin, and not to play poker, then the user is notified that there is a fee to continue with the Bitcoin withdrawal. The user is always given the option of having their funds returned back to their original payment source free of charge. We do not hold users' funds hostage in return for fees. The user is also give the second option of a free withdrawal to Bitcoin if they start to play on the site.

Before a user converts any Euro (the game currency is Euro) to Bitcoin they are displayed a confirmation message like below:


As per the confirmation message, we may (and often do) require ID to continue with a withdrawal of funds converted from Euro to Bitcoin.

To be clear, there is only the possability of a fee when withdrawing Bitcoins if the funds have been deposited using in Euro. If a user deposits Bitcoins there is no fee to withdraw Bitcoins.

We try to communicate all processes clearly to our customers. We would very much like to hear any feedback and suggestions which may help us improve the experience for our Bitcoin users.

This is certainly an error on our part. We do not currently accept players based in the US and it should not be possible to select US as your location when completing the deposit registration form. If you find a way around this please do let us know and we will take a look. 

If you, or anyone else, have funds that you wish to withdraw below the 10BTC minimum please contact us at support@switchpoker.com and we will process it for you.

Official SwitchPoker.com representative here.
Since Switch Poker became the first real money poker site to add Bitcoin as a deposit option we have worked hard to ensure a smooth experience for all our users who choose to use Bitcoin payments. It pains us to see this type of misinformation published about our site.

Switch Poker never charges users to deposit or withdraw using only Bitcoins. The only time a withdrawal fee is applied is when a user deposits Skrill / Visa etc and then converts those funds to Bitcoins without any significant play. In these cases the user is attempting to use our system as a way to convert Euro to Bitcoin for free. As we have many costs related to accepting payments (Skrill charge % fees for receiving funds, as do Visa, Neteller etc) we cannot allow users to move funds from Euro to Bitcoin without any charge.

We are upfront about this -- a message similar to the one below is displayed to the user before they move any funds from Euro to Bitcoin.


Had mem deposited Bitcoins and then wished to withdraw Bitcoins then there would be no withdrawal fee.
But if mem deposits using Skrill and converts those funds to Bitcoins and attempts to withdraw them then a fee will apply.


All our games are currently in Euro and it is necessary to convert any Bitcoins to Euro to play. The conversion rate is based on the current exchange rate on the major Bitcoin exchanges and fluctuated. Users are shown the amount of BTC/EUR that they will receive before they accept the conversion. We never hide any costs from users.

We are open to adding Bitcoin only tables, which will mean people can deposit and play but Bitcoin with zero conversion fees. If anyone here would like to see pure Bitcoin tables available please let us know any way that you like
- in this thread
- pm me here
- via our contact form (https://www.switchpoker.com/en/contact)
- via Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/switchpoker)
- via Twitter (https://twitter.com/switchpoker)

Hello. Could you kindly upgrade this account to allow posting in the main forum? We have integrated Bitcoin payments on SwitchPoker.com.