Poker Stars Clarifies Credit Card Position
Written by Renee K | Wednesday, February 10th, 2010
Poker Stars has come out strongly against allegations that it has been falsely coding transactions to allow payment by Mastercard by its customers. The poker room said that does not, as a policy, recode online gambling transactions traditionally marked with the code 7995.
One question that comes to mind is, how will the average joe be able to deposit at Pokerstars when the “quick” deposit options are all gone. Will Poker Stars games get harder while sites that uncode transactions gain these players?
“Poker Stars does not, nor ever has engaged in the practices of miscoded credit card transactions,” said the poker room in a statement this week. “We have therefore been unaffected by any crackdown by Visa or Master Card to close down such miscoded processing accounts.”
The statement went on to say that the poker room allows the issuing bank to decide whether the particular gaming transaction should be approved or declined according the correct coding of the transaction (7995).
“The only way that Poker Stars is affected by credit card declines is when issuing banks in the United States (or indeed any other country) decide that they will decline 7995 coded transactions,” said the card room. “In such instances it is company policy to provide the player with an alternative payment method.”
Last week, poker players reported difficulties in paying for their online poker entertainment with their Master Cards, finally leading to the realization that the giant American payment processor has toughened its stance on the practice of paying for online gambling with the card.
It is not the first time that Master Card has attempted to block online gambling payments, but it is believed that the company has not managed to ‘crack the code’ until now.
Industry analysts believe that Master Card is preparing for the full and final implementation of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act that is scheduled for June 1st, 2010.
It is uncertain whether Visa, Master Card’s chief rival will follow suit and ban payment to online poker sites.
In the meantime, US poker players have plenty of other payment options at their fingertips, including ewalletXpress, poker checks and other similar, and no less secure, methods.
Check Out Other Related Articles
· Written by Renee K · Filed Under Poker Gossip · Comments Off
