It makes sense to me in my situation. With hyper aggro opposition I was doing a lot of check-calling, and ultimately check folding by the turn/river when the pot became too big and I was at risk of facing a huge river bet. I know I was playing very badly but in my situation and against these type of opponents I was out of my depth and giving up a lot of equity.

With the "security" offered by IP, rather than check calling multiple barrels and usual folding by the river I began to check-raise a lot of flops/turns with semi-decent hands when the stack sizes meant that my opponent would then have to think hard about their next move when previously they'd just run me over. It probably almost didn't matter what hand they had as they would have worked out I was going to fold enough times for them to barrel a lot and still turn a profit as very rarely was my hand nutty enough for me to risk playing back at them. When they started to realise I was willing to take enough of my hands all the way I found myself neutralising their aggression - and in many (although not all obviously, there are some fierce players out there) cases this was their biggest weapon. IP for me leveled the playing field considerably.

Better players probably wouldn't need the security of IP to play correctly. As I said, I'm not advocating it for everyone as every persons situation in unique, as are their skill levels, emotional control and BR management.

All I was trying to do was show that there are plenty of people/situations in which this is a very sound investment. If it's not for you then so be it - but please don't try to "educate" everyone that it is a -EV investment to them all when I can pay testimony to the fact that for me, for sure, it has been.

The way CS handled Matt111's situation in the very beginning of this thread = I'd stay away : /

I don't think anyone has mentioned that IP puts their money on that the sights are honest, i.e. they are betting heavily on that the cards come out fair. There are so many threads about doom switches when cashing out or that regs would get sucked out on more - but by insuring their AI EV they would loose a ton if that would be the case.

I'm not really thinking that online poker is rigged, but that was just something that came to my mind when thinking about IP.

Reef, didn't it get a happy solution in the end? The CEO apologised a bunch of times.. Obv it was handled very badly by them at first, and I do agree that they should have someone with less of an attitude being in contact with the customers.

I doubt I'll ever use the service, but I do think its a nice idea and hope the best to them. Maybe I'll try it someday when taking shots. I mean it sucked so bad to loose two stacks in an orbit at NL400 when my AI EV would have been positive.

I love this product as a variance reducer and am willing to give up small EV equity to use it. I have 2 requests

1) Please don't change the way all-in equity is calculated. The way IP calculates it now evens out the variance much more than the way HEM calculates it.

2) Please seriously consider the thoughts in post #192, that would be a huge addition for plo players.

Pretty sure something is wrong with party fast forward hand histories. The session results in Holdem Manager and session results in InsuredPlay don't line up at all.

We really appreciate your post, thank you.

Yes. The size of the customer base is one of the factors for us in deciding which tournaments to offer bubble insurance for. There are other things too, mostly constraints to prevent cheating (both us and other players through collusion or staking) and fraud.

Adding a new site requires quiet a bit of work. We want to expand but we probably won't be able to in the near future. Our focus at the moment is on perfecting our current products.

We're financially secure within the limits we set and we have no plans to increase them in the near future. We're not after a quick win, we have turned down players from the highest stakes. Here is one: https://twitter.com/Wizard0fAhhs/sta...20119306276864

I hope he does not mind me posting that in this context. To be fair, he's not affiliated with or endorsing us in any way. And this is not a proof of our reliability. It's just an example to show that we are careful with the risks we take.

I handled that pretty badly. There is no denying it. But luckily we have CS staff that are better than me in handling these situations. I think Matt111 is satisfied with the way we handled the issue. I think he's still using InsuredPlay.

Thank you. You're right about that. We have made quite a few calculations before we started InsuredPlay. The results gave us enough confidence to proceed with this business. But surely there is the risk that RNGs aren't fair.

Thank you for your feedback. We are evaluating both your points. As I mentioned before, a change in these aspects of our product requires a lot of due diligence.

Can you please report the exact issue to support? We will find the cause of the discrepancy and resolve it as soon as possible.

Thank you.

I would like to have more information on MTT's bubble insurance. On the site there is not much we can see except the possibility to insure some tournaments. I play on party poker mostly 22$ tournament. How come I can't find any of these tournaments? It seems like there is only tournaments of PS on your site. Would mind giving some more infos on the terms of using bubble insurance. It doesnt state on the site that you don't endorse for the moment tournaments of 5-20$ BI, it would be nice if it was mentionned on the site.

My mistakes if any information is written somewhere else and I haven't seen it. But I read the entire FAQ page.

We do not offer bubble insurance for MTTs on Party Poker at the moment. We offer the service mostly for $20+ MTTs on PokerStars. But we do not have a list of supported sites, tournament types or buy-in ranges. Because occasionally we add tournaments on other poker sites as well. For instance, we offered bubble insurance to most FTOPS events. We also add tournaments with lower buy-ins from time to time.

EK, can you please answer my 2 questions below:

1. From the website FAQ I understand a pot of 200 big blinds, in which Hero invested 100 big blinds, is counted as TWO insured hands for Hero, not one (at that particular stake). Can you please confirm this?

2. Would IP consider tweaking the fee scheme so as not to punish mid & high volume players for taking a break? For example, I may qualify for Level 5 fee for 3 straight months, but then I take a 2-3 weeks vacation, so when I get back I'm punished for taking the time off. As a way to implement that, instead of using the last 30 days as the determining period for the fee level, you could use the best or average of the last 2-3 consecutive 30 days periods. That way, a player that has put in good volume for 2 months straight, enough for him to get to Level 5, could afford a vacation without being penalized too much for that when he gets back.

Thanks!

Hey I have to start off by saying I think its a good idea even though i prob got owned in the following example.

6♣2♣ 8.33%

3♠7♥ 91.67%
4♣5♥6♦2♠6♥
Pot
Total Premium
Net won from insurance
$21.76
$20.00 (fee $0.05)
-$20.00

I got it in on the flop...i know im a donk (was trying to suckout vs overpair LOL) and honestly just wanted to go all in to see what would happen with this insured play....I thought that maybe I could choose what hands I want to insure ... stuff like that.
the fee really isnt a lot bc it is 0.25% im guessing....would have been 25 cents at 1.49 % rate?
Now how much would I have been credited in my IP account if I would have lost this hand...and do u pay fees on a hand where u have the nuts ? and is it pf all in and flop all in ?

another question....i decide to play sunday mill for example...with 10% bubble insurance u take 21.50 + 2.15 (23.65$) (correct me if im wrong with any info im throwing out there)...does this cover me for an extra 600 places in a tourney with 6000 people. basicall on 960 paid....i can get 175$ back approximately if I lose between bubble and bubble + 600 spots?

Thanks a lot and good luck, I think you have a very legit and reasonable price for this product...even though u already made 20$ off one hand lololol.

Your understanding is correct. The hero does not necessarily need to have put 100 big blinds, but if the total pot is 200 big blinds, the hand counts as 2 hands toward your fee level.

We will be introducing another aspect to levels which will be based on the number of hands you played in that year. Players who play a certain number of insured hands within the year will guarantee to hold the level for a certain period of time. We believe this will resolve this issue.

Thank you!

The calculation seems to be correct. Your equity in this hand is $1.81, minus the $0.05 fee, you would win $1.76 from insurance if you lost the hand. You won the hand but your total net winning is still the same: $1.76. Because you won 21.76 on the table and lost 20 from insurance.

This is basically what the product does. It always guarantees you win your equity regardless of the result of the hand.

If the other player was using insurance, he would win around $20 minus the fee from insurance.

Yes that is correct. If 6000 people enter the tournament and you buy bubble insurance with 10% coverage, you get your buy-in back if you finish 600 places before the paying spots. Your net winning from insurance would be 215-23.65 = 191.35.

Thanks

Thank you for the quick answer, EK.

This fee level system is so flawed - it punishes those who move up, discourages from taking shots. If someone who's barely making level 5 at the lower stake decides to e.g. play 3 tables at it and 1 table at the next stake, or, even worse, all the 4 tables higher, hands at the higher stake will be insured according to level 3, eating 3 times more dramatically into an already lower winrate at the higher stake. Does InsPlay help move up at all?!

I think the following fee system would be fairer: take the 0.25% (level 5) fee if the rolling total size of insured pots over the last 30 days is greater than 30000 times the rolling average stake over the last 10 minutes, and so on. (The 10-minute evaluation period seems insensitive enough to the variance in hand durations, but sensitive enough to closing and opening tables of different stakes.)

Software seems to have stopped working. Website appears down. My last insured hand did not go through, though my window still says "tracking" under it's status for ipoker

Seems to be back up and running now and credited me for the hand in question

Emre Kenci, you guys should add a VIP level 6 and level 7 for even lower fee (maybe 0,20% and 0,15%). The max level doesn't have to be easily achievable by everyone, but the super high volume grinders would definately be happy to have another level to aim for.

Thanks for the feedback.

We are working on a solution to address this and a few other issues related to the fee structure.

with the cashout to neteller im thinking players with their neteller in other currencies get a little shafted cause last time i check neteller exchange rates sucked.

if im right on this cashing out in euro and gbp would be appreciated

also, im assuming insured play just shuts off if the hand is run twice on stars? from what i see the hand isn't even recorded ?

Run it twice hands are not supported. We receive the hand information but the website won't show those hands.

It's best to have a USD account on Neteller or Moneybookers for transfers from/to InsuredPlay. We are planning to add multi currency account options in the future.

Thanks.

Serious question, and a apologise if it's been answered before somewhere.

Has anyone verified the formula they use to calculate equity is correct/accurate?

If they are dealing with literally millions of insured hands in the long run - isn't a great way to make money by just adding/subtracting a few pips in the declared equity either way?

I know once the cards are up there are a finite number of end boards - but a few pips go a long way...

/paranoid

Even if some pips (1 pip = 0.01%) are stolen, I guess they're small in comparison with the fees. Is there a decisive difference between 0.25% and 0.27% fees?!

@Emre Kenci

Do you have any data showing how many PLO hands on average end up AI? (ideally for both HU and 6max)?

Also is there any data showing how much variance is reduced by using your service? HEM shows standard deviation in bb / 100. I wonder what is ev-adjusted standard deviation?

I play HU PLO, my variance is around 190bb/100. What would be ev-adjusted variance if I used your service? I know you can't tell me exact number, but you probably did calculations based on data from your customers...

In 6-max microlimit PLO with a tight style, expect to stack off pre-river in 0.5-0.8% of all hands, pay 0.4-0.5 bb/100 in fees (at the 0.25% level), have EV-adjusted std dev (i.e. after insurance) of 60-80% of the overall std dev (it depends both on the playing style and the looseness of the field; these numbers differ dramatically for different networks in my DB).

In HU (I have no sample for it, sorry), you'll get thrice more insured hands because you VPIP thrice more, so fees will rise as well (less than by 3 times because there are no multiway pots).

I guess the EV-adjusted to overall std dev ratio is slightly bigger in HU as there are no MW pots where you're looked up more often, so you're less dependent on showdown winnings and less variance is removed by insurance. I'd expect 130-150 bb/100 EV-adjusted std dev in HUPLO.

But of course wait for feedback from HUPLO regs.