Mansion Poker in the doghouse

December 24, 2007

This used to be a wonderful time of year for online poker.

Two or three years ago, you couldn’t clear your e-mail fast enough, so thickly did those Christmas freeroll offers rain down upon you. They were the natural consequence of a booming market and so many online rooms trying to grab a piece of it.

I knew at the time that it couldn’t last and said so. Sadly, comparative austerity has arrived. If Christmas still represents a freeroll frenzy, then no-one is telling me about it. Nowadays, I have to make do with offers of bonuses that fail to materialise.

Earlier this year it was Oddsmaker Poker, promising me a generous donation in my account if I would just open one with them. I did and am yet to receive a cent.

Now Mansion Poker join the Wagering War wall of shame. Install us, register with us and e-mail us and we’ll credit you a free $15 directly into your account, they said in a letter.

I did all of this over a week ago. Fifteen minutes of my life I’ll never see again and I still haven’t a penny to show for it. Maybe they and Oddsmaker have some detail tucked away in their small print with which I failed to comply, in which case I suggest they need to spell it out in the large print if it’s so fundamental.

Either way, this is an open letter to every other online poker room that may have the name ‘Jeffrey Prest’ on their ’special offers’ mailing list.

Do yourself a favour and remove it. As some of you struggle to fulfil even your ordinary offers these days - like keeping your word - I am closed for business where your special offers are concerned.

If I patronise your rooms now, it’s on my terms. Shove your bonuses where the sun doesn’t shine.

And take a hint from the room whose logo this blog is proud to carry. Not only do Full Tilt pay me, they pay me when they say they will. Unfailingly. Every month for close on three years. They could drop me tomorrow and it will still have been a pleasure doing business with them.

[photo courtesy of No Prawns’ Photos]