Hi,

I am a regular at mid stakes cash zoom on Pokerstars. I play full time and rely on poker to earn a living.

My father plays recreationally. He decided that he wanted a break from online poker, so he self excluded for 6 months. The next day i started my daily grind and all was fine. However half way through the day I received an email from pokerstars saying that I would not be able to access pokerstars as they had to take measures to ensure that my father would not be able to access their site.

I didn’t take it too seriously at first as I thought that it must just be a mistake, and it will get dealt with. However almost a week later, they are standing firm in their decision. No matter how much I email them, explain that I rely on poker as my income, and borderline beg them, they refuse to budge on their decision. I am not allowed to access pokerstars for 6 months until my fathers self exclusion has run its course.

They have said that I have done nothing wrong, but their decision will not change. This is terrible news for me. I was wondering if anyone could help me? Is there anyone in particular who I could speak to in regards to this?

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thankyou

post screennames of both accounts

post ALL emails to and from pokerstars regarding this

I am happy to post emails, although the theme of the emails are:

"We cannot risk a player who is on self exclusion accessing our site. we are not implying that you have done anything wrong, but our decision is final".

I do not see the benefit of posting screen names.

.

Do you live in the same house or ever use the same computer? Hardly the biggest leap that this can happen if either of these are the case.

Yes we live in the same house, however we do not use the same computer. We play totally different games. He plays for cents... he plays MTTs recreationally for like $0.20 cents and stuff. I play mid stakes full time.

here are some of the emails:

> Thank you for contacting us.
>
> After a careful review of your account, we can unfortunately not allow you back on our sites until the 06/12/2017.
>
> This is due to your close association with user "***", who currently has some outstanding issues with us. For privacy reasons, we are unable to provide you with any further information or details about these particular issues. Even though this impacts you, we cannot share private account information with other users – just as we would not share your details or account history with a third party. We do not imply that you have done anything wrong, however we cannot take the risk that the related user gains access to our sites via your Stars Account.
>
> As such, please contact us back after the date listed above, and we will gladly assist you regaining access to our sites.
>
> Please do not attempt to create any other accounts in the meantime, as this is a violation of our Terms of Service. If we discover a new account, it will be closed without notice. You will be liable for any loss that could occur and any remaining funds could be confiscated.
>
> We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause, and appreciate your understanding in this matter.
>
> Regards,

what are his "outstanding issues" with stars?

also, ask them if you moving out of your dads place into your own place would allow you to resume playing. If they allow that then just move, im sure your dad would understand especially if you are a full time midstakes player as you say you are.

how many hands has your dad's account played at your normal stakes?

His outstanding issues are that he self excluded for 6 months. I have already asked if i move out would that make a difference. They said no. My dad has even offered to permantly close his account if that helps. They also are not interested.

not even one. They have no reasonable reason to suspect that my dad would ever play on my account. apart from that we live in the same house.

Closing the account doesn't mean he can't use yours from stars pov. There have been some other cases like this and the result were allways stars banning all the accounts that are connected in some way. So I would not recommend to close your fathers account if you want to play stars in the future.

if the above is true and you are legitimately a MS reg, then have them escalate it to mgmt, and have them review it

if you posted your, or your dad's, account name, then someone working for stars would be able to look into it from this thread and help you further

If a stars rep were to PM me, i would happily let them know my stars name/dads stars name.

I really appreciate everyone trying to help.

new account, no PMs, etc

This seems crazy. It can't be standard for Stars to block an IP address if just one member of a household asks for self-exclusion, can it?
I think someone at Stars may have pressed the wrong button somewhere, as you're apparently being treated as if your dad was actually banned.
Can you post a screengrab of the email where it says words to the effect of:

I think they need to take self-exclusions quite seriously. Gambling problems, licenses to operate etc. Obv not saying in this case but in general.

Stop living with your parents? Then you can actually call yourself a poker pro. (Two birds)

It seems extremely standard to me. If I ran a poker room and was serious about a self-exclusion policy, this would be something I'd insist on.

That's assuming, of course, that the self-exclusion wasn't clearly unrelated to a gambling issue.

Well no, of course permanently closing the account wouldn't help. I think the only thing that would help in relation to his account would be if he lifted the self-exclusion - but presumably if they are shutting you down, it's because they feel the self-exclusion can't be violated and likely won't allow it to be reversed.

Now as for moving, that seems like a more reasonable solution. I'd think there might be a shot, if you really did move and proved it, that they would allow you back. But of course that's assuming we have the whole story.

Least its nt like the time one dad logged onto his sons account n decimated his sons br ..

Id definitely think moving n proving it would be fine butstars says no so just move sites gg stars for 6 month

So he plays 20c MTTs. Why does he feel the need to self exclude?
Or does that come under the 'and stuff'?

So if you play nanostakes you shouldn't self exclude? Maybe he thinks he plays too much, tilts or read 2+2 about the rakechanges and makes a stand.

Inquiring folks would like to know.

Assuming your father plays 20 cent MTTs and his son grinds for income, stars decision to exclude son is pretty harsh IMO, although I can see why it would be a decent policy most of the time.

The thing is even if your dad says he doesn't want his son excluded, they're sort of obligated to ignore his wishes once he excludes himself. I also think it odd that they assume you'd let him on your account...maybe changing your password or something and promising to not let him on your account might help?

Excluding yourself from playing 25 cent MTTs is weird, but maybe he just doesn't want to think about/play poker for a while, even if you play 25 cent MTTs I think that aspect could be a problem you'd rather avoid.

Harsh but fair. Stars is saving themselves from a headache in the future. Lets say for example Stars allows him to play dad gets itchy fingers and plays on sons account and proceeds to donate sons entire roll. Is Stars at fault? Or is Son at Fault? Heck it doesn't even have to be the father that loses the money. The OP could lose his entire roll in one night and then fire off an email saying my dad was playing on my account. Just easier to self exclude both of you. Your only options are wait out the 6months then email stars or move out.

Give up poker, it will be the best thing to happen to you.