Party Poker skin WPT poker(owned by bwin.party) closes shop and steals your loyalty points/bonus

[4betlight]

English is not my first language so need to get that disclaimer in first.

So what happened:

-05-19.2015 user AcraCvet randomly noticed on WPT poker site that is closing on 3rd June 2015(no email or notice to players) and posted in 2+2 official Party Poker thread
-official rep confirms the closure
-after that WPT emails players

Why is this a problem you might ask?
1.)If you are clearing a bonus ------>any bonus or part of bonus that has not been fully released before 3rd of June 2015, will be forfeited. Lets say you bought a $15.000(or any other amount) bonus this month which needs to be cleared before released, you are simply cheated out of it. This is ridiculous especially as you only have 2 week notice

2.)Players should spend their points before June 3rd. Unused points will be lost if not used before 3rd of June 2015.
-lets say you played less lately so your status was reduced and now you have no time to get your loyalty status up so only thing you can get is products from the store with Huuuuuge markup. Example: price for the Iphone 6 128GB is 52630 points for the lowest loyalty level, which you would have to pay $26315 in rake for. Yes you read it right. Lets say the price of Iphone is $800. You are effectively getting 3% rakeback.

-if you are their top level tier player there is still no options to change your points to anything else than store products, since you have no time to clear the bonuses available to be bought in the store. Lets go back to the Iphone prices for their top loyalty grinders. Price for those is 20900points which is $10450 in rake. Again the price of Iphone is $800. You are effectively getting 7.7% rakeback as their most loyal customer. This is daylight robbery. And who wants products from online poker store anyway; but they give us no choice.

Like that wasn't enough they upped the prices for iphone on 20th May(I already used the new numbers in calculations)




-rep stating that is a business decision and not open to discussion

Solution:
1.)Let us change loyalty points to cash at reasonable rate
2.)transfer points/bonuses to Party Poker/Bwin skin
3.) extended the notice for 3-6 months before closing shop



This is pretty much the whole story.

[Dan Druff]

I agree, this is a crappy and unfair situation.

Unfortunately, there is little you can do.

They will claim that these points are "promotional" and hold no real value.

I reject that claim, because these so-called "promotional" points are a big part of the reason people are playing there. It could easily be argued that many grinders would not have played on that site if the loyalty points were not sufficient.

Pokerstars did something similar when the DOJ shut them down on Black Friday. You were forced to cash out your FPPs in "blocks", robbing you of value. You also had a remainder of points at the end, which became worthless, again robbing you of value. And finally, your points were cashed at the rate according to your current VIP status, which was ridiculous, because it rewarded active players at the time and screwed players (like me) who had taken a short break from the site. I was Supernova when I earned those points, so I should get to spend them at Supernova rates if I can no longer play to earn Supernova back.

Anyway, Pokerstars didn't give a shit, and idiots lauded them for being "generous" to cash out these points, not realizing that these points represented real value that they earned -- equivalent to rakeback. They weren't a gift.

Back to your situation...

I understand all of your issues. There isn't time to clear bonuses. The notice given was too short. And given the lack of time to clear bonuses, you are stuck instead buying overpriced merchandise in the store as the only viable option, thus KILLING the value of the rakeback you thought you were getting.

It's a big screw job, but I don't see them changing anything.

Shame on bwin.party for this.

[SamGrizzleJanFisherBaby]

The original posters english is not even close to bad enough to preemptively say sorry for. People who favor making grammatical corrections to comprehending ideas best they can should die in a grease fire.

Many times in my life I have been fucked by loyalty programs changing or vanishing.

Planet something points on little bags of chips in my lunch changed to the catalog of stuff you could get to shit after i had massive amounts I was saving, ended up with a shitty non digital camera that worked on old style film when that was not modern tech.

I saved marlboro miles for years assuming I would get some big ticket item when I cashed them in. I had a huge moving box full of the sides of cigarette packs, all my friends helped for years it was fucking insane, they all of a sudden stopped the marlboro miles, stopped sending catalogs of shit you could use it on in the time leading up to the end and the box is worthless was never used and maybe thrown away.

At the end of pokerstars I had to use all my points on crap all at once as I exited. ended up with a leather poker stars bomber jacket that the zipper broke on even though I never wore it out of the house because it was embarrassing and dumb, some short short short short cargo shorts, and some signed books. That may seem like a great haul to no one ever but I would have rather had MTT buy ins.

Most recently I spent Four years collecting coins that were given out during mlb.com Beat the Streak contest. I never spent one and was saving for a big ticket prize. At the end of last year it was written on the website that the coins would not go away and to get ready for better prizes next year. They stopped using the coins at the start of this year and have not responded to my satisfaction to 5 plus emails and one written letter. They lied to me and stopped the coin aspect contest without warning while lying about it.

I have four cigar boxes filled with players cards from places I may never go back to with points that will disappear if they have not already. This plus more stories like them that I can not recall on the fly have lead me to a place I am now: An active member My coke rewards and the Comp card at my everyday casino Maryland Live. I use my points with these programs as I get them never waiting more than a few weeks to empty the reservoir of points on whatever available. I do this because so many times the rules have changed on me or I was left out dry. I do not have a list of stories about how rewards programs got much better in the middle of me participating in them.

[thesparten]

Why is wpt online closing???

[thesparten]

Just found out "lack of traffic"

That sucks! For a big name like that not being able to attract just enough traffic to stay open!!!

I was introduced to online poker through club wpt. I'm sure there going well.

I actually tried to open an account on wpt "real cash" when I decided I wanted to start to play real poker...

Obviously I couldn't and then I found lock poker, lol..

That would have been the only site I would leave a.c.r. for. If stars came to new York I wouldn't leave a.c.r.

It's a shame. They could get enough players? Wow!!

[ChoakMyDee]

Boggles the mind. The WPT brand should be a guarantee for them to print money in the coming years, especially considering the looming relaxed poker laws in the US.

[4betlight]

I believe this might not end here. If bwin.party sale go through what happens to the party poker/bwin loyalty points? But that's pure speculation.

[thesparten]

Boggles the mind. The WPT brand should be a guarantee for them to print money in the coming years, especially considering the looming relaxed poker laws in the US.

I'm also amazed how they couldn't get enough traffic to.at least stay open, wow!!!

Club wpt has 12k members paying 25$ a month for 100k in freerolls.

I have downloaded the wpt.eu client and tried to join years ago, of course I was denied.

It's a big shame..

I really don't understand how they could not make it with that brand..

[4betlight]

thx for bringing this up on the radio

[smithbk]

An active member My coke rewards

So, would it be poor bankroll management to have, say, 2773 points on there?

[SamGrizzleJanFisherBaby]

An active member My coke rewards

So, would it be poor bankroll management to have, say, 2773 points on there?

I would say yes. They recently lowered the quality of everything you can redeem for. So the points very recently had more buying power. Saving up points on my my coke rewards is risky and getting more risky.


Also I stayed at a hotel over the weekend that replays the same full days of tv for many of its 'channels'. I watched very little tv and saw over 100 WPT online poker adds. That first day before I knew about them repeating old tv I thought they were still paying for these adds. This is interesting to me bc it is clear they failed after promoting this hard. I didnt watch enough poker with commercials on cable to know this.

[Dan Druff]

I hate to admit this, but I also have over 2000 points on MyCokeRewards.

And I feel like a fool wasting my time entering them, but I just can't stop.

The reason I don't spend them is because I keep waiting for one of those specials where you can redeem points for 12-packs of Coke for a very low points price, but I kept missing them all, and I haven't seen them in awhile.

It's also depressing looking at what's available for my points. Like, once I shoot them off and get something worth $75 or whatever, I will feel like a complete chump for entering so many for such a small reward, so I just keep holding off.

It might be time to just give up and buy things with them.

I got royally screwed on Stars (to the tune of $1800 in value) after Black Friday when they came up with their unfair redemption policy.