Captain Spins - Withdraw confiscated - rule # 9

Hi yata08 - welcome to ThePOGG.com.

Please read our Complaint Guidance to ensure that you fully understand how our complaint management process functions.

As we are the ADR for the White Hat Gaming license under the Malta Gaming Authority license there is certain information we have to provide you now.

You can find all the relevant information about this service here – http://thepogg.com/terms-of-use/ and the terms of use for our complaint service here - https://thepogg.com/terms-of-use-for-dispute-resolution-service/

To summarise.

– Use of this service does not preclude your seeking redress through court proceedings .

– This service is free to use for both the complainant and operator.

– At any point during the procedure the submitting party retains the right to withdraw their complaint. This does not preclude our right to continue the discussion with the involved operator of general issues related to the complaint (i.e. insufficiently clear terms and conditions).

https://thepogg.com/terms-of-use-for-dispute-resolution-service/

– You are not obliged to obtain independent or legal advice or representation, though you may choose to do so.

If you have any questions about the above, let me know.

Sadly there is nothing we can do to assist you in this instance.

Regardless of whether the term stated $5CAD or €5 (and the White Hat Gaming sites are geotargetted to show Canadian user the Canadian terms) $8CAD would exceed the maximum allowed bet.

The current exchange rate €1 = $1.44CAD. That means that if the maximum bet was €5, converted that would be $7.20. $8 is significantly higher than this limit.

Even looking at the exchange rates for the last year, €5 has never converted to as much as $8CAD:

At its highest point, in December last year the exchange rate was €1 = $1.57 CAD, meaning that the €5 limit would have been $7.85, still below the $8 CAD bets you were placing.

Given the above there are no grounds to argue, regardless of the currency that the maximum bet term was expressed in, that your $8 CAD bets were compliant with the bonus terms. As such the operator are within their rights to consider the bonus contract void and reset both parties to pre-contract conditions.

Sorry we could not be of further help.

ThePOGG

Hi,

Thanks for you quick answer. Please take the time to read it more than once and consider these words as my distress as a new customer on Captain Spins, this is really important to me as you are the only ''neutral'' actor to find a solution before going to Malta Autority.

By law, this is considered abusive as the well known online casinos with Malta Gaming are not using this kind of rule written in a way that we cant even be aknowledge of. Moreover, in all respect, they can fix it by sending us an advertise while we play (this is the miminum to do to inform us), i aknowledge my misinterpretation of that rule and tried to cut in half but they dont even made me a proposal....how is that fair for me? We are 2 entities binded by a contract, they cant take all the rights for themselves and throw our rights out of the window. Small caracters in the lowest part of a website is exactly the same as a loan contract which have an effect of putting all the blame on us as customers. This void their unilateral decision because they didnt took action in any way to prevent me from breaking a rule. They are responsabible as much as we are.

No notice of any sort is clearly abusive. Malta ‘’Consumer affairs act part VII’’ articles 44 to 47. Unfair contract terms.

Here is the list of what is directly attached to my case. There are quite a lot of these articles being directly bypassed by Captain Spins account team in their unfair decision toward a new customer.

1) I never had a chance to become acquainted to the terms of the welcome bonus. The information has not been provided to me when I registered or was provided in such a way i couldnt even read it or understand it.

2) Captain Spins is taking the exclusive right to interpret the terms of the contract. I said it more than once, it was not 5$ CAD, i shouldnt be tied to this only because Captain Spins think it is that way. I t was not clear to me, it is completely unfair to think i was aware because i repeated it more than once, this is not what was on the registered page.

3) They imposed on me all the burden of proof....by cutting all my chances of discussing with them, blocking my account (still blocked by the way without any notice). How can you let them go away with that is beyong me, this is really frustrating as i am an experienced online player with a very good reputation, Someone somewhere has taken advantage of my situation => all their agents tried to understand what was going on...at the very least, their customer service was trying something. Their account team and complaint team just didnt want to cooperate with me, resolving this issue. My voice is as important as theirs, there is no way i should be treated like that because all they repeat is ''rule # 9'', nothing else to say.

4) Where any term is ambivalent or any doubt arises about the meaning of a term, the interpretation most favourable to the customer shall prevail.

I ask you to revise your position and intervene in my favor in respect of Malta Gaming laws. The good faith cannot be only on my side, they can do something, at the very least, let me get back the 4 000.00 $ withdraw as money to play on their website and give me back my account. Just to let you know that all rules were respected, one was just not interpreted the same way for me and them. I had no rights to express myself and all they did was to my detriment IAt least a consequent gesture would be appreciated as i have been through a lot since that day. I hope there is still a little bit of humanity and flexibility in their actions. This is serious misconduct toward customers. You should not tolerate such actions.

Hi yata08,

I'm sorry to hear that you are unhappy, but as already clearly explained to you, the terms in this case were not in any way unclear or misleading and you did not abide by them. That being the case there is no claim for us to contest on your behalf.

Currently no regulator requires operators to enforce maximum bet terms automatically. The responsibility does lie with player to abide by the terms they agree to. And as far as 'notice' goes, the terms and conditions are clearly displayed with every advertisement and you have to actively opt in to the promotion, confirming you agree to the terms and conditions, before you will receive a bonus.

And as already pointed out to you, even if we accept the maximum bet term that was displayed to you as €5 rather than $5 CAD (taking the interpretation more favourable to the player), your bets still significantly exceeded the limit. There's no posibility of misinterpretation in this instance. You either kept you bet below the €5 limit or you did not. Reviewing the exchange rates for a full year prior to your issue, $8 CAD has never been below the €5 limit. We have taken an interpretation as favourable as it is possible to take towards you and you still were in breach of the promotional terms.

For your information, we act on behalf of the Malta Gaming Authority to manage complaints against this license. Contacting the MGA will simply result in you being directed back to us.

Finally, you retain your legal right to pursue this via the relevant court systems, however there is nothing further that we can do to assist you.

ThePOGG

Hi,

Look at how it is written :

The maximum bet allowed while the welcome bonus is in play is CA$5. Should you bet higher than this while the welcome bonus is in play, the casino reserves the right to confiscate all winnings.

The casino ''reserve the rights'' is not the same as ''the casino confiscate all winnings''. There is a flexibility here that they should consider. 8 $ CAD is not significantly higher than 7,50$. It is 6 % more and around 10 % of the bets were made at 8 $. More than 20 000 bets were made; 18 000 under 8 $ and many of those were made after the wager X 35 was completed.

For me, this implies that 1 single bet higher than the max bet is vigourously looked at which is abusive.

How to define ''significantly higher'' is a thing of law. I dont see any information about that on their website.

Matter of good faith, i am at the rendez-vous and they dont which is unfair on their part. Cut the apple in half is not that difficult to achieve, it is the base of a good relationship with your customer. So in the end, what matters the most to them is to make their customers angry? On your side, it doesnt matter either? Not even a gesture to apology for the time i lost trying to understand what was going on as a new customer? I had several emails with them. They just kept repeating the same ''rule # 9'', no explanation and you agree with this attitude for real? A license is given to this kind of fraudulent operator? Wow, insane. Captain Spins is the worst operator i have seen in years, hopefully this will be revealed to you by many more customers in a near future to make you realize that you should investigate a lot deeper in their operations and take out their license.

Hi yata08,

Yes they reserve the right to. Which means 'they can if they want'. That's what YOU agreed to. What you are asking for is for them to overlook your infraction. That is a business decision for the operator to make. Not a contractually enforceable requirement that the regulatory appointed complaint management service would be able to enforce. If the operator feels that commercially you're a customer they want to keep happy, they may choose to do so. Otherwise they will not.

As to what's significant - it's irrelevant. The rule is absolute. There was a clearly defined figure. If you exceeded that figure, you violated the term. It could have been by $100 CAD or $0.01 CAD. Either way, you've not abided by the term.

And it does not matter whether it is every bet, or a single bet. You agreed not to bet over that amount, not to keep X% of your bets under that amount.

As shown in our initial response, at no point in the last year was $8 compliant with this limit. Had the exchange rate moved in a way such that the limited floated up and down over $8, we could have made a case but the basic facts are that over the period of your play, the exchange rate never even came close to making $8 a compliant bet. So there is no case for us to argue.

The real issue here is that you did not read the terms or, if you did, you didn't actually check the exchange rates/contact support to determine what would be a compliant bet. That is an unfortunate decision, but not something that represents a claim against the operator.

As stated previously, I'm sorry to hear you are unhappy, but there is nothing further we can do to assist you.

ThePOGG

Hi,

Then if we go strictly by the terms and conditions, every bet made after the specific moment in time when the bonus was released is related to the cash balance and cant be affected in any way.

I have to get back these $ as well if we go by the rules. We are going back to the past but everyting related to the cash balance outside of the welcome bonus timeframe should not be affected at all.

We abide to the terms when the welcome bonus is activated but when it is released, we are not linked anymore.

Example : At 08:42 september 26, the welcome bonus is released completely, the wager X 35 being met. At this moment, i have 4 897,92 $ in cash balance ready to be withdraw. As i am now playing with my deposits and cash balance, i can understand that winnings gained while the welcome bonus is on countdown can be voided by rule # 9 but any $ won after this time should have been returned to me. At exactly 09:14 septembre 26, 30 minutes after the bonus being released (playing on my own cash balance), i am now at 7 590,42 $. These gains from 4 897 $ to 7 590,42 $ have been won with no maximum bet rule # 9 attached to it. I request a refund of this difference which is 2 692,50 $ from Captain Spins.

I have the excel files with all the bets made if you want to see the information. I could have sent 2 withdraws, one that would represents all the amounts gained and deposits made before the bonus being released and one with my own cash balance played and any gain coming after this point which are no more related to the welcome bonus terms.

At this point, i ask your help to get a refund of this amount which is mine. It is exactly like a deposit made with no bonus activated but as i was not even thinking that an operator could void everything without notice, i trusted their judgement and act on good faith as always.

Thanks for your understanding.

Hi yata08,

Going strictly by the rules, you will receive your deposit back, nothing more.

You entered the bonus contract at the point that you deposited and accepted the bonus. This was the Welcome Bonus, there was no cash balance prior to this. Due to the violation, all funds other than your deposit are void.

If you have continued to play after concluding the wagering requirement, but before the void funds were removed from your account, you have been playing with void funds as these were the 'cash' funds most recently added to the account. As such any wagers placed with void funds are also void.

I appreciated you are frustrated, but there is nothing further we can do to assist you.

ThePOGG

Hi,

The grey zone is exactly at this specific moment because my deposits are not related to the terms of the welcome bonus when the requirements are met. The cash balance is always taken out at first so when i have reached this moment, the time stops there, we get back to pre-contract terms and start with our deposits in cash balance. With my deposits restituted to me (790 $), i am now playing and winning 2 692,50 $ from this 790 $ and not from the bonus voiding amount. The withdraw being made 1 minute before, 2 days later or 2 weeks later dont matter at all as the time is stopped => back to pre-contract terms. It is the terms, we are not reinventing the wheel. It goes for all of us, not just for them. It’s yes when it suits them and it’s no when it hurts them, we are facing an issue here. You cant organise the terms in your favor whatever the complaint is; otherwise how can we count on an impartial actor to defend our position if it is founded for casino right at the start? I am not just frustrated, i am going to you to get your support and expose a big hole in an abusing system taking advantage of all the subterfuges to oversee the terms. For you, all of this and evey complaint you received (there are quite a huge amounts for this kind of rule by the way on thepogg) dont make you realize that something is going wrong with these operators? You dont try to look deeper into it, ask them to develop advertisements to protect the players? Ask them to offer alternatives? Really, i dont get why, in 2021, nothing is done to avoid such issues. A serious operator would never steal money on purpose and try to hide under overseas laws, being agressive in their methods and laughing of those who pay their salaries. Disgraceful. Please do act for a solution to protect all the future players that will be trapped in this big hole. Thanks!

Hi yata08,

This is not a grey area. You played on directly after completeing the wagering requirements, having not abided by the terms. Your play was with funds that were void due to your failure to abide by the terms and were with funds that were void due to this fact.

There is nothing for us to argue here. And there was nothing untoward in what's happened. The terms were clearly laid out for you. And even if they were in their most ambiguous form of displaying in a currency that was non-native, your bets were in breach of the term.

As far as what we can and cannot do - we do not set the rules. That is the regulator's job and beyond our authority. Each year we highlight the number of problems caused by max bet rules in our ADR report. It is up to the regulator to decide if/when they wish to act on this. To our knowledge, to date, no regulator has.

All we can suggest is that in future you actually read and abide by the terms of any promotion you accept to prevent disappointment later on.

ThePOGG