New Terms at Fulltilt - your players have only 60 days to deposit

[Aidan]

Originally Posted by PPP

I suspect the announcement about the in house rake back program is very very very very bad news for rakeback affiliates.

Definitely. Hopefully this doesn't become standard for current poker rooms that allow rakeback.

[PPP]

Originally Posted by Aidan

Definitely. Hopefully this doesn't become standard for current poker rooms that allow rakeback.

Um, hopefully it does become the standard. I'd give up players after 60 days in a heartbeat if every cardroom started their own rakeback program instead of this looney systemt the small cardrooms have now.

[Aidan]

Originally Posted by PPP

Um, hopefully it does become the standard. I'd give up players after 60 days in a heartbeat if every cardroom started their own rakeback program instead of this looney systemt the small cardrooms have now.

Well, I guess thats your opinion. I have a balance of rakeback and non rakeback sites. Although it wouldn't too fair for the affiliates that have worked hard in the rakeback industry. Just like this 60 day shit.

[corpfan1]

Some interesting things on FT rakeback sites:

One, and only one Full Tilt Poker account per person is permitted, at any given time. Previously closed accounts cannot be re-opened; new accounts must be created. Players cannot collect rakeback for play on pre-existing accounts; however, accounts which have never been used for real-money play may be abandoned and their owners then permitted to open new accounts.

NOTE: If you have previously created an FTP account but have not played for real money, you are permitted to create a new account. However you must use a different email address than you originally entered.

[PPP]

Originally Posted by Aidan

Although it wouldn't too fair for the affiliates that have worked hard in the rakeback industry. Just like this 60 day shit.

What wouldn't be fair??? It's perfectly fair for Full Tilt to open their own rakeback site. I compete with Full Tilt itself to send Full Tilt players already. There is nothing "unfair" about that, or them setting up some form of marketing that other people use now.

[Notspot]

the rest of the FT team in Ireland is off for the weekend

They have internet and mobile phones in Ireland too! They know exactly what's going on here - they just hope we'll have all calmed down by Monday.

Aside from the 60 day thing - From a personal point of view I actually like the idea of an in-house system of rakeback for loyal high value players - it's an ludicrous system at the moment.

I think this will be become the next big shake-up of the whole industry. Players would much rather receive their rakeback direct from the room, feasibly they could receive higher rates and what poker room isn't going to want to offer some kind of direct cashback - they're in a competitive market and now a few have started the rest will have to follow.

Not keen on what this could mean for us as affiliates, but I think we're all gonna have to get used to it.

[Darko]

Originally Posted by Jeremy

I am trying to be politically correct here, and I really am hoping that FT will come to their senses on this. I think I speak for every affiliate when I say this feels like a big fucking slap in the face to us non rakeback guys.

And in reality this actually sucks for the rakeback guys as well as they will lose their players after 60 days also.....although their conversions tend to be much quicker.

Let's put 2+2 together here. Fulltilt is opening up their own rakeback portal and can now re-market the millions of play money players in the database (whom all of the sudden will not be connected to an affiliate). Then they can take advantage of our marketing to bring in fresh sign-ups and have them all to themselves in 60 days.

This is so blatantly obvious that I am actually somewhat offended. FT has a major dilemma on their hands about rakeback, and this dilemma has been brewing and waiting to come to a head for a couple years. I mean, if I signed up back in 2005 and now rake $6k a month, there is no reason I shouldn't be able to get rakeback, regardless if I signed up through an affiliate or not (from a players perspective)

Maybe my entire basis that there is no reason for third parties like affiliates to manage rakeback is starting to make more sense now. From day 1 rooms should have been running their own rewards schemes.

But anyways, we affiliates did not create this mess. And surely there has to be a better way to handle this with affiliates than just bending us over and saying knock knock........ in 60 days we are taking back millions of "play money" players for ourselves.

The FACT is that thousands of players DO convert each month. Nobody believes the 60 day thing as we can all look at our stats and disprove it.

If this doesn't have to do with rakeback, it has to do with greed. I challenge anyone including Jessica, Warren, Ellen, or anybody at FullTilt to explain to us (your customers) how we are NOT getting royally fucked on this deal. I'm not certain you can, if indeed this new 60 day policy is going to be enforced.

If Fulltilt wants to increase their liquidity, conversions, and retention by making rakeback more readily available, then I propose they launch an internal rakeback method for ALL affiliates to promote and re-market to our play money players.

Again I am trying to be politically correct here, and I very much enjoy working with the team at FT. But as the leader of this community, I am also not going to just watch my friends and fellow affiliates get treated with so much disrespect after we have all busted our asses and made Fulltilt #1 on our sites for the last few years.

Well im still in shock over this - and J's post above explains even more why full tilt have done this.... its not only to shave 15-25% of affiliates earning but its also to remarket to Hundreds of Thousands of OUR players from there own in house rakeback program.

And then every month they can market to all our signups from 60 days prior who have not made a deposit and offer those players all sorts of rewards like rakeback now they dont have to pay the affiliate his/her rightfull cut.

What a Joke they are off my main pages and will not be on any new sites of mine either.

To shave 15-25% of us and then remarket those players is a DISGRACE !!!

This is one of the biggest "fuck you's" i have seen

[corpfan1]

Originally Posted by TheDonk

Actually, I'll put my money where my mouth it, FTP is gone on my sites. I'll be removing them today. I've had enough of this shit, and Doyles Rooms, UB, AP, Stars and everyone else can benefit from now on. Many of us were only getting 6-10% after fee's anyway, so what is there to lose? Phuck FTP, I'm done with these pricks.

It does our industry a favor, if anyone wants to look out for their futures they'll join me. Otherwise you're helping to cause your own demise.

See ya FTP.

The only problem with this, is...

It also states on FT terms that if you don't send a new player within 60 days your account can be terminated and no MGR will be paid after 180 days.

A lot of us make $XXXXX from FT and this is a big chunk of our livelihood.

[Ridge]

I would love not to have to deal with rakeback. I only got into doing rakeback because that is what a lot of players want. This entire thing is a bit of a mess though.

I'm sorry to say that most of us pulling FT off our sites will do little good. The only way we can have an impact is if we have some sort of good press on this. There isn't a "Poker Affiliate Programs" magazine that I know of. It's past time for us to start one though. This is a case of us getting a raw deal, but again I doubt we will be able to do anything about it.

As for pulling them off our sites, I remember during the AP scandal there were tons of affiliates on this forum that swore they would never market AP again.. After the initial spotlight was lifted, many of those same affiliates had their reviews and banners back up. I suspect it may be the same with this situation.

I've never had much to say about Fulltilt, I'm not a big fan of their site or their program so this isn't going to affect me as much as many of you. Overall though, I think we may start to see more of this from other rooms and that will be a huge issue.

[Graham]

Originally Posted by Jeremy

I know everyone wants Ellen or Jessica to jump in here. In their defense I will say that Jessica just left for vacation and the rest of the FT team in Ireland is off for the weekend, so that is why there is no response from them.

I am trying to be politically correct here, and I really am hoping that FT will come to their senses on this. I think I speak for every affiliate when I say this feels like a big fucking slap in the face to us non rakeback guys.

And in reality this actually sucks for the rakeback guys as well as they will lose their players after 60 days also.....although their conversions tend to be much quicker.

Let's put 2+2 together here. Fulltilt is opening up their own rakeback portal and can now re-market the millions of play money players in the database (whom all of the sudden will not be connected to an affiliate). Then they can take advantage of our marketing to bring in fresh sign-ups and have them all to themselves in 60 days.

This is so blatantly obvious that I am actually somewhat offended. FT has a major dilemma on their hands about rakeback, and this dilemma has been brewing and waiting to come to a head for a couple years. I mean, if I signed up back in 2005 and now rake $6k a month, there is no reason I shouldn't be able to get rakeback, regardless if I signed up through an affiliate or not (from a players perspective)

Maybe my entire basis that there is no reason for third parties like affiliates to manage rakeback is starting to make more sense now. From day 1 rooms should have been running their own rewards schemes.

But anyways, we affiliates did not create this mess. And surely there has to be a better way to handle this with affiliates than just bending us over and saying knock knock........ in 60 days we are taking back millions of "play money" players for ourselves.

The FACT is that thousands of players DO convert each month. Nobody believes the 60 day thing as we can all look at our stats and disprove it.

If this doesn't have to do with rakeback, it has to do with greed. I challenge anyone including Jessica, Warren, Ellen, or anybody at FullTilt to explain to us (your customers) how we are NOT getting royally fucked on this deal. I'm not certain you can, if indeed this new 60 day policy is going to be enforced.

If Fulltilt wants to increase their liquidity, conversions, and retention by making rakeback more readily available, then I propose they launch an internal rakeback method for ALL affiliates to promote and re-market to our play money players.

Again I am trying to be politically correct here, and I very much enjoy working with the team at FT. But as the leader of this community, I am also not going to just watch my friends and fellow affiliates get treated with so much disrespect after we have all busted our asses and made Fulltilt #1 on our sites for the last few years.

Jeremy, It is good to see you stand up for the affiliates, great post!

This whole thing is really a big joke and pretty sickening to see that such a "professional" company would do such a thing... If this is not reconsidered / corrected as a community I think we have to stand up, band together and screw them back. I won't get into specifics of what can be done, but if they think they can get away with this, then they really underestimate the power of Internet marketing.

Also, for the AMs at FTP, if affiliates stop promoting your site, you will be out of a job! Might want to consider that It's not hard to persuade a reader of a review that there is a better site for him/her to play at.

I feel like an idiot now for posting all those nice things about FTP just a week ago.