The road to hell is paved with good intentions – this is an old adage that can really describe what’s currently happening with Full Tilt Poker. As it turns out, one of their biggest hurdles to paying out their user base stemmed from a credit problem. They have actually credited millions and millions to the accounts of US players despite the fact that they haven’t even received the money yet. This problem created a deficit of $60 million, and now they’re going to pay the players with money they never even had. But it isn’t really as bad as it sounds, so though this might have contributed to Full Tilt’s difficulty, it certainly does not explain everything.
A Failure of Epic Proportions
The whole issue stemmed from the use of e-checks. Once a user deposits an e-check on Full Tilt, the poker site would immediately credit it to their account. Users, in turn, would be incredibly happy about the fast service. However, e-checks normally aren’t cleared for several business days, which can be a rather annoying wait for players who are anxious to make their deposits. This occurred way back last year in September until February this year. People actually noticed it happening and the issue was talked about extensively. By March, Full Tilt was already trying to rectify its mistakes. However, the deficit had swelled to $60 million at its peak.
Not as bad as it looks
They did warn users extensively that they would be getting the money owed to them by March. Some of the users cooperated, and thus Full Tilt was able to get back about 70% of the money they lost. As such, it doesn’t really mean that all $60 million is money that Full Tilt won’t be able to get back. What happened to the other 30%, you ask? Well, Full Tilt hasn’t been able to recover it. Some opportunistic players saw it as a chance to mooch some money off the site, so they emptied their bank accounts before the money owed could be taken from them. This was a sly, dirty strategy, and it cost Full Tilt roughly $18 million, but the site was practically asking for it when it had become negligent with the payments. There’s no telling if they lost more than that during the incident, but the incident might just be one of those holding the site back from paying out.
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