For those who have never heard of subscription/sweepstakes poker sites, they are becoming quite popular in North America, particularly the US.

Basically, due to the government and state to state laws, someone came up with a legal way to play poker for \”prizes\” and not gamble.

The idea is great, user pay a monthly subscription to a site which offers poker play for prizes. Of course under sweepstake laws, you can have full access through \”mail in\” without paying the fees and basic membership (free) gets you in some but not all the games.  The big money, forums and things like virtual trophies or prize packages are offered to exclusive members for a low price, $10-$20 a month.

Some reputable examples would be, SpadeClub (a Cardplayer company), Pureplay, and a few others backed by big names like Mike Sexton, Barry Shuman, etc.  They hide nothing, don\’t use fancy terms and conditions and their ownership and Head Office are easily found.

For seasoned players, although play is generally lose and freeroll type mentality, during a sub sites Beta version, this is the softest and juiciest virtual environment around.  SC offers $100,000 in prize money every month, with (3) 5k and 30k tourney each month.  The payout ladders on these sites suck as it becomes more saturated, the money increasingly difficult to reach…but thats not why you can calll subsite play risky…..

SpadeClub first 40k event had 555 players competing for a top prize of 10k and the field paying like 200 spots.  Great odds for little risk!

So now everyone wanted in on this type of deal, including the scam artists who put up a few sites.  Soon a few more copycat formats poped up…each promising huge prizepools for a monthly fee.  Players kept these sites secret…word of mouth saw slow growth and the sharks rolled in the huge overlays.

Well, overlays mean a site is losing money, and if they can\’t cover it while they wait for growth, now what!

More and more we found out the hard way.  First Fleetsreet Games closed it doors, with winning players holding 100,000s of thousands in unpaid winnings.  Thankfully, Poker Stars eventually assumed the debt and took over the player accounts.  Not after a long, angry wait.

Next we had Zozoos…they just sent out bad cheques….many players not only didn\’t get paid, to add insult to injury they incured huge bank fees for all the returned cheques.  They where out time, out of pocket and out of winnings.  Thankfully, DrCheckraise members united, other forums joined and the owner was cornered legally.  For fear of jail time, he has been clearing the debt, all be it very slowly.  And at first he laughed and said too bad.

There are a few others closing the doors.  Again Drcheckraise in a battle to get members paid on another site.  This one will remain nameless for a short period, give them a little time to make good.  Those that want to protect themselves can follow a link I will post.

The site offered games for a subscription.  To cash out you had to transfer to a casino site.  To cash out of there you had to match winning with a deposit and meet a rake.  To cash out of there, you had to transfer to yet another site.  Each time going through a slow identity validation and messages of \”being processed\”.  Now, one of the sites in this tangled web is being moved, but don\’t worry the money is safe.  Ya right.  When will it be good to go?  Soon. 

And this list of these deadbeat subsites continues to grow.  Great players racked up hundreds and thousands in winnings in this soft overlay environment, trusting it was a easy as getting paid by the original and reputable sites.  All for little investment.  Sub sites always use the phrase  \”No Risk!  No money to lose…etc.\”

Well except your dues and everything you win.  Plus each countries tax withholdings (since it is not offshore, legal and bound by government).  Plus all the time you spent playing.

For a player….the equivelant of losing everything including pride by being duped.

Back with link soon, or use my sidebar to go to Drcheckraise and follow the threads.