Forum Moderators: skibum
Citibank, the nation's largest credit card issuer, has agreed to block all online gambling transactions that use its credit cards
Citibank to block Net gambling transactions [usatoday.com]
:( Thing about online sales via credit card the customer can make a call to the card company and get their money back making the vendor eat all costs.
First, there will be a heightened effort to veil the charge as something other than gambling. But, in the long run, its a major nail in the coffin for US gamblers.
Sounds like it's because they were getting some legal pressure from New York's attorney genral...
The agreement announced by the bank and Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is expected to significantly reduce illegal, underage and potentially addictive Internet gambling, Spitzer said. It applies to all Internet gambling transactions, not just those in New York
Citibank also agreed to pay $400,000 to nonprofit groups that counsel and help families hurt by gambling additions, the company said.
This is going to become an even bigger problem, since the feds also realize that most of the casinos are indeed offshore, and the money is leaving the country in mass quantities. That I believe is the bigger issue, than the paternal approach of the AG.
There are already several services that are "ghosting" for casinos, I think its going to be a game of hide and seek for a while.
Online gamblers, most of whom can no longer use U.S. credit cards to fund their habit, are about to lose yet another payment option.Under the terms of its planned purchase of PayPal (PYPL), eBay said Monday it intends to stop offering the payment service for Internet gambling transactions.
[wired.com...]
N.Y. subpoenas PayPal over gambling [news.com.com]
Surely if they block online gambling they will do the same for online porn! Right??
I doubt it. I think there are 2 problems with On line Casino's.
1) Some are run by dodgy people who may do a runner with deposited cash - this then leaves the cardholer with big claims against the card issuer.
2) Increase in addicts. If a Casino is out of state then many would be gamblers just couldnt be ****ed to get up and go and lose a few bucks. Being online the temptation is too easy. Sitting in the comfort of your own home with a cool beer creates a sense of well being and a lack of responsibilty.
I guess you can also add Dewey logging on and using Pop's gold card as a problem too.
I say Casino gambling is EVIL. There is no edge in the game. It should be there for entertainment only. If you are going away for a weekend then there is no harm in having a few games of whatever. But gambling at home with a game which is totally impossible to beat (bricks and mortar casino games are beatable put you will be asked to move on) is wrong.
Sports betting is not evil. It offers the chance for clued up punters to win by using tools they have which others don't have.
Wrong... sportsbooks are banned as well.
The land of the free seems to be cracking down on how its citizens spend their hard earned cash.
Perhaps it's time to move to sunny England...
I think this is wrong.
The UK betting industry is strong and is a world leader. A few years ago the big players moved offshore to get around the 9% levy that punters had to pay. The government realised that hundreds of millions of pounds was being lost each year to offshore sites so changed the way the tax was calculated such that punters pay 0% deductions on bets.
But this week two more internet betting sites collapsed taking a lot of punters money with them. I think this is the reason why credit card cos. are clamping down.
One question I'd like to ask is how do the CC co's. know what is a gambling site and what is not?
Are they also going to block service sites which offer information rather than actual bet placement sites?
I've had quite a few customers from the US, but none for a few months now.
[edited by: rcjordan at 2:44 pm (utc) on July 15, 2002]
When a transaction is made with a credit card, a code is included that identifies the nature of the business.
Gambling triggers off alarms, as does any online transaction, so the combination very often results in a decline, especially in certain countries.
