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[Betcoin.AG]

It's a little concerning that you don't appear to have replied to any of his posts here. He seems to be raising valid concerns, but you leave them unanswered.

Did you really use 10 BTC confiscated from cheating players to fund a promotion instead of giving them back to the players they were stolen from? If so, how do you justify that?

Did you really allow those same cheating players to them play in the freeroll funded with the money they stole, after claiming to have zero tolerance for cheating? That sounds pretty crazy if it's true.

Hi Dooglus, it's because we did return most of the btc and we still ran a 10 btc freeroll to thank players for their support on top of returning funds.  This was many months ago and was handled expediently.  Ironically, most of the players were from a prop program which we no longer have, yet most of the players still play in.  

No we did not allow those players to play in the tournament but as you may know a bitcoin gaming website creates some unique challenges which we embrace.  

We have addressed all of this before and will happily address it again as we continue to move forward.  

Thanks guys!

Jessica

Ahhh, I remember that situation. That was, in fact, a long time ago. I remember a lot of community backlash both on the forums and on the site as a result, and Betcoin apologizing for the wrong action taken IIRC.

Yes, ranlo absolutely and we worked with all involved individually and collectively and improved from there.  Again, this was many months ago and nearly all of those players involved still play today and continue to bring in new players.  We remain extremely vigilant in combating collusion, abuse and any type of nefarious play at all times.

Thank you for your support!

Jessica

[TwitchySeal]

I am absolutely certain that from March 2015 till August 3rd, 2015 (perhaps someone whos been around longer could verify the timeframe) that there were no terms for the badbeat jackpot.

Support refused to address the situation publicly, and privately they told several players (including myself) that even though there was a ticker in the lobby that kept increasing, and the hand histories were showing a fee for "BBJP 0.01", they were not - in fact - collecting an extra 0.01 per hand.

(I dont have evidence of support claiming they weren't collecting a fee - if anyone does PLEASE share it.  Betcoin will likely lie, please help me hold them accountable.  You can remain anonymous if you like, pm dooglus or anyone you trust if you don't feel comfortable sending it to me)


Naturally I did the simple math and explained they were mistaken.  They ignored me. (standard) And I just kept asking them over and over - louder and louder (standard).

Here's an example hand from May. ($1 = 1 mbtc)

The final pot ends up being $81.60 pre rake and BBJP.  The rake is capped at $2 and $0.01 is deducted for BBJP

Winner received $79.59

Winning Poker Network Game #6091979: No Limit Holdem ($0.50/$1) [2015/05/31 08:15:44 UTC]
Table: Tokyo - 2
Seats: 9
Seat 1: SexyTime ($111.50)
Seat 2: Gunt ($91.16)
Seat 3: Benjamin.Li ($116.50)
Seat 4: lonewolf ($212.04)
Seat 5: raccoon ($139.92)
Seat 6: standarr ($52.79)
Seat 7: spike420211 ($361.92)
Seat 8: DrBlakeDowns ($206.33)
Seat 9: OHYEAH ($80.28)
Button is seat 4
raccoon: posts small blind $0.50
standarr: posts big blind $1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
OHYEAH: dealt [Js Ac]
spike420211: raises $2
DrBlakeDowns: folds
OHYEAH: raises $7
SexyTime: folds
Gunt: folds
Benjamin.Li: folds
lonewolf: folds
raccoon: folds
standarr: folds
spike420211: calls $5
*** FLOP *** [Qc Jc 3s]   (Pot = 15.50)
spike420211: bets $16.98
OHYEAH: calls $16.98
*** TURN *** [Qc Jc 3s] [7h] (Pot = 49.46)
spike420211: bets $16.07
OHYEAH: calls $16.07
*** RIVER *** [Qc Jc 3s] [7h] [8c] (Pot = 81.60)
spike420211: checks
OHYEAH: checks
OHYEAH: mucks
*** SUMMARY ***
Pot: $79.59 | Rake: $2 | BBJ: $0.01 |  ($79.59 + $2 + $0.01 = $81.60)
Board: [Qc Jc 3s 7h 8c]
Seat 1: SexyTime didn't bet
Seat 2: Gunt didn't bet
Seat 3: Benjamin.Li didn't bet
Seat 4: lonewolf didn't bet
Seat 5: raccoon lost -$0.50
Seat 6: standarr lost -$1
Seat 7: spike420211 won $79.59 (+$39.54) [Qh Ts] One Pair, Queens
Seat 8: DrBlakeDowns didn't bet
Seat 9: OHYEAH lost -$40.05 [Js Ac] One Pair, Jacks

By July I think they realized that something had to be done. Their solution:




- This 10 BTC freeroll was open to ANYONE.  

- Betcoin was claiming to fund it with the Bad Beat Jackpot - I'd estimate there are 20-30 regulars who contributed over 75% of the jackpot.  The whole time haveing a 0% chance at winning it.

- There ended up being over 1000 players in the freeroll which ended up a disaster on its own due to them having rebuys for actual chips.  (not getting into that now)

- I can't help but speculate a very large chunk of the 10 BTC prize pool ended up getting seized due to multi account abuse.  

There was 60 minutes of late registration, unless they have changed anything, I don't think you even have to verify your email to create a new account.  Fill this form out and boom, you're back in:



It's almost as if they were begging players to come and multi account this thing.

In my opinion, they really thought this freeroll would solve their BBJP problem.  They never even considered that every satoshi that had been collected DID NOT BELONG TO THEM AND THEY SHOULD RETURN IT TO THE SAME PLAYERS.



I ended up bitching even louder, and getting some attention at least.  They decided to change plans.

NEW PLAN, POST BBJP FREEROLL:

The day after the freeroll they threw up some terms on the website and acted as if they had been there all along.

How did they get away with all this?  They just ignored the hard questions - rewarded players for spreading good things about them in the forums, and eventually everyone just kind of forgot about it.  Same as all the other issues.  


Additional evidence:

official announcement:

https://www.betcoin.ag/10-btc-gtd-pre-millions-freeroll-betcoin-poker

The prizepool of the 10 BTC freeroll is being funded by the Bad Beat Jackpot which will remain on the website until the client is updated.

Screen shot of part of deleted thread.  Betcoin Paul justifying the BBJP freeroll, shaming a player for complaining (zzzz who disliked his comment is also moderator) and then claiming that the whole thing was a huge success just to rub our face in it.https://i.gyazo.com/7777f5fb51a7db3861b5b94c6d0724b5.jpg

From Original announcement:

The prizepool of the 10 BTC freeroll is being funded by the Bad Beat Jackpot which will remain on the website until the client is updated.

Support claiming there actually has been a way to win the jackpot- they just disappeared and didn't know what they were, but they will be back soon.  (Translation, we're just going to pretend nothing happened and there's nothing you can do about it.)



Terms for Bad Beat jackpot as of August 3rd (they don't make sense)

https://www.betcoin.ag/support/what-are-rules-bad-beat-jackpot

if anyone is not familiar with BBJPs - here's an example of what you would expect when someone who understands poker and knows how to write clear and complete terms and conditions: http://www.theborgata.com/assets/webpage/PLAY/badbeat/index.html

Missing from Betcoin BBJP Terms:

- How is the jackpot distributed?  Usually the loser gets the biggest share, the winner a little less, and either everyone else at the tabl, or everyone else currently playing on the site divides up a portion, and the final portion is used to reseed.  

The full rules for the bad beat jackpot are below and you need to follow the rules precisely to be eligible for the Jackpot. You must 1) play Hold’em at a Bad Beat Jackpot table and 2) lose a hand containing 4 “Jacks” (or better)

Please remember: the last cards in both your and your opponent’s hand should play – this is a mandatory condition.

- What happens when the BBJP is dealt. Contact support?  Are the funds added automatically?  Is there a waiting Period?

- What does this table mean?



- Fee is "10" for 5/10+ ?  10 what?  10%? 10 chips? Per hand?  Who gets the jackpot share?

My point is, the terms are crap and obviously thrown together at the last second.

[TwitchySeal]

No we did not allow those players to play in the tournament but as you may know a bitcoin gaming website creates some unique challenges which we embrace.  

Dear Betcoin.ag,

Yes you did.

I don't have time to prove all of your lies are lie, but you won't get away with too many in a row.

Please stop lying,

Twitchy


https://www.betcoin.ag/collusion-soft-play-cheating-zero-tolerance-betcoin-poker
https://www.betcoin.ag/collusion-soft-play-cheating-zero-tolerance-betcoin-poker#comment-11099

[TwitchySeal]

Hi Dooglus, it's because we did return most of the btc and we still ran a 10 btc freeroll to thank players for their support on top of returning funds.  This was many months ago and was handled expediently.  Ironically, most of the players were from a prop program which we no longer have, yet most of the players still play in. 

Hi Jessica,

No you didn't.

But even if you did return "most" of the funds, that's not ok. 

It wasn't your money, you should of returned all of it.

Their accounts have been banned and even though neither player has ever made a deposit we are allowing them to keep a small portion of the funds.

The remainder and majority of the funds will be dispersed to players that were cheated and used to host a 10 btc freeroll next Sunday February 15, 2015

[dooglus]

Dooglus, Ranlo or anyone.  Please ask Betcoin.ag to comment on anything you find interesting in the following. 

I'm pretty new to the site, but it seems obvious to me that the bad beat jackpot pool is to be used for funding the bad beat jackpot, and nothing else. Using it to fund freerolls is just wrong. It was contributed mostly by high rollers (the site's most valuable asset) and shouldn't be given away to the hundreds of random new users that freerolls attract.

It seems they don't appreciate me as much as they claimed   My Account is banned now for the third time in a week - this time my IP as well.

I wouldn't take it personally. I started playing at betcoin a few weeks ago, immediately found a whole load of problems with the site and made a post about them. betcoin's response was that they would like to discuss the problems, but that I should make a support ticket rather than discussing it on the forum. So now my initial list of problems and a bunch more are on a ticket, being ignored.

I don't know if they're horribly understaffed or just don't give a shit, but I've never seen such poor customer support before.

Here's the tail end of the ticket. It includes a promise of a reply "in a few hours", made 8 days ago, and an odd request to "revisit the ticket", as if it was ever visited in the first place.

[TwitchySeal]

Dooglus, Ranlo or anyone.  Please ask Betcoin.ag to comment on anything you find interesting in the following. 

I'm pretty new to the site, but it seems obvious to me that the bad beat jackpot pool is to be used for funding the bad beat jackpot, and nothing else. Using it to fund freerolls is just wrong. It was contributed mostly by high rollers (the site's most valuable asset) and shouldn't be given away to the hundreds of random new users that freerolls attract.

I think it's actually more likely that most of the jackpot pool was contributed by low-midstakes grinders.  I know of a handful that were approaching geting close to 500k hands as of mid summer.

While higher stakes players certainly pay more rake per hand, its not directly related to the stakes.  A 100NL player may be averaging 6 or 7 chips in rake/100 hands and be able to consistantly play 9-12 tables while a 1000NL player could be averaging 18-20 chips/100 hands but rarely get any action at more than 2 or 3 tables.

This is all besides the point though.

It's a breath of fresh air having you here, I was hoping you'd make it through some of my walls of text tbh, thanks for responding. 

[dooglus]

I think it's actually more likely that most of the jackpot pool was contributed by low-midstakes grinders.  I know of a handful that were approaching geting close to 500k hands as of mid summer.

OK, but my point is that the BBJ pot was filled up by paying customers, and so shouldn't be distributed to freeloaders.

It's a breath of fresh air having you here, I was hoping you'd make it through some of my walls of text tbh, thanks for responding. 

It feels like I'm late to the party and there's nothing but sloppy seconds left.

[ranlo]

I think it's actually more likely that most of the jackpot pool was contributed by low-midstakes grinders.  I know of a handful that were approaching geting close to 500k hands as of mid summer.

OK, but my point is that the BBJ pot was filled up by paying customers, and so shouldn't be distributed to freeloaders.

It's a breath of fresh air having you here, I was hoping you'd make it through some of my walls of text tbh, thanks for responding. 

It feels like I'm late to the party and there's nothing but sloppy seconds left.

If it makes you feel any better regarding the ticket, here's my status (the top one has 1 reply, which was me because they told me in live chat to "respond to the ticket to bump it"):



I've been in live chat and spoken to 4 different people, all of which said over and over that I will get a response soon. I have long since given up on that.

[dooglus]

If it makes you feel any better regarding the ticket, here's my status (the top one has 1 reply, which was me because they told me in live chat to "respond to the ticket to bump it"):

https://i.imgur.com/a8MD6iZ.jpg

I've been in live chat and spoken to 4 different people, all of which said over and over that I will get a response soon. I have long since given up on that.

It's not that I feel bad for me. I feel bad for the site and its customers.

How do you explain such poor customer service? It just makes the whole operation look amateurish.

I can kind of understand it in Twitch's case. They are sick of him continuing to bring up embarrassing stuff from the past that they wish would just go away, and so have written him off as a troll. But for a new player with a good reputation, playing for decent sums, and pointing out clearly verifiable easily fixed bugs on the site I just don't get it. Why promise a reply "within hours" and then stall for 8 days?

[DarkDays]

It's not that I feel bad for me. I feel bad for the site and its customers.

How do you explain such poor customer service? It just makes the whole operation look amateurish.

I can kind of understand it in Twitch's case. They are sick of him continuing to bring up embarrassing stuff from the past that they wish would just go away, and so have written him off as a troll. But for a new player with a good reputation, playing for decent sums, and pointing out clearly verifiable easily fixed bugs on the site I just don't get it. Why promise a reply "within hours" and then stall for 8 days?

Because the staff is very small and not very knowledgeable.  So one guy reads a ticket regarding a problem, doesn't know what to do, and says "bump this in 24 hours" to give them more time/have someone else deal with it.  I've been asked to bump my own problems several times, but I stopped playing there regularly a few months ago so it looks like they don't even do that now, they just ignore you. 

[dooglus]

Because the staff is very small and not very knowledgeable.

The solution to this is to employ more knowledgeable staff. If money is a problem, maybe stop paying people to spam the forum with signature ads and use the money saved to pay for competent support staff. There's little point advertising the site when it isn't ready to handle increased traffic yet. New people will visit, be disappointed by all the broken stuff and lack of support, and not stick around. Better to focus on fixing things first, and then bringing in players later.

[ranlo]

Because the staff is very small and not very knowledgeable.

The solution to this is to employ more knowledgeable staff. If money is a problem, maybe stop paying people to spam the forum with signature ads and use the money saved to pay for competent support staff. There's little point advertising the site when it isn't ready to handle increased traffic yet. New people will visit, be disappointed by all the broken stuff and lack of support, and not stick around. Better to focus on fixing things first, and then bringing in players later.

The other solution is to have current information on the site. There's many areas where one page says something and another claims the exact opposite. Depending on which answer players read first, they will think it works one way or the other, and support is usually set in their ways that x is correct and even if their site claims otherwise, you're still in the wrong and not them. Had an issue in the past where support claimed I was wrong so I took a picture AND sent them a link to their OWN site proving I was right. Support then told me they were removing the incorrect page and I was pretty much pushed away after because I, as a player, should have known their site has incorrect information.

[DarkDays]

Because the staff is very small and not very knowledgeable.

The solution to this is to employ more knowledgeable staff. If money is a problem, maybe stop paying people to spam the forum with signature ads and use the money saved to pay for competent support staff. There's little point advertising the site when it isn't ready to handle increased traffic yet. New people will visit, be disappointed by all the broken stuff and lack of support, and not stick around. Better to focus on fixing things first, and then bringing in players later.

A good company would do these things.  Betcoin has not done these things.  That's why all of these people have so many problems with them. 

If you wanted to get the full "player" experience, you should try visiting the site and submitting issues to them under an anonymous name that has no clout.  It's even worse than what you are experiencing.

[Betcoin.AG]

Very spirited discussion guys! 

We ran a 10 btc freeroll and we still have the bad beat jackpot funded with now over 18 btc!  The freeroll was never ultimately funded from the bad beat jackpot and is still in full effect.  We do enjoy your discussion however. 

Be sure to play in the BitcoinTalk Tournament Sunday, November 22, 2015 at Betcoin Poker!

[Betcoin.AG]

Upgrading the ticket interface for Betcoin Daily Coin Tournament series.  We don't expect this to cause any delays, but certainly drop us a support ticket if you have any questions. 

[cjmoles]

See...this is the number one reason why I like playing at Betcoin:  It has the softest pool of players that can be found in the game at the moment.  Don't even have to turn on my "Bum Hunter!"  I already know where they can be found!  Everybody should be scoping out this field of players....it's like I'm staking bitcoin here!

[Saifulboy]

when tournies you are playing in froze, and u bust in all of them by blinding out , all they say is ' its wpns side '. but in reality it is betcoin side since most of the time wpn tournies run smoothly.



 dont bother asking for refunds after you give them all the necessary information they need.

[Betcoin.AG]

when tournies you are playing in froze, and u bust in all of them by blinding out , all they say is ' its wpns side '. but in reality it is betcoin side since most of the time wpn tournies run smoothly.



 dont bother asking for refunds after you give them all the necessary information they need.

What tourney are you referring to?  There is overlap between both support staffs and when you play WPN tournaments funds go to the WPN and the WPN refunds players based on particular situations directly back through Betcoin.  Please provide the information in a ticket at www.betcoin.ag/support

[Betcoin.AG]

See...this is the number one reason why I like playing at Betcoin:  It has the softest pool of players that can be found in the game at the moment.  Don't even have to turn on my "Bum Hunter!"  I already know where they can be found!  Everybody should be scoping out this field of players....it's like I'm staking bitcoin here!

cjmoles, thanks for joining and we appreciate your feedback.  We will continue to bring in new players to experience the fun of bitcoin poker and thank you for your support. 

[TwitchySeal]

We ran a 10 btc freeroll and we still have the bad beat jackpot funded with now over 18 btc!

The reason it's over 18 BTC is because you "unintentionally" took most of it from your players and decided not to give it back.

All funds collected for the BBJP prior to Aug 3rd should be distributed back to the players who funded it as fairly as possible.

Ethics 101 really.



Also don't want this blatant lie to get buried:

No we did not allow those players to play in the tournament but as you may know a bitcoin gaming website creates some unique challenges which we embrace.  

Dear Betcoin.ag,

Yes you did.

I don't have time to prove all of your lies are lie, but you won't get away with too many in a row.

Please stop lying,

Twitchy


https://www.betcoin.ag/collusion-soft-play-cheating-zero-tolerance-betcoin-poker
https://www.betcoin.ag/collusion-soft-play-cheating-zero-tolerance-betcoin-poker#comment-11099