I signed up for a PokerStars account a couple of days ago. My girlfriend (living together) also signed up at the same time (from the same IP address). We tried it out for a little while on the play money tables and decided to put some money in.

I put $15 into my account and the transaction was accepted. I then tried adding $15 to her account and the transaction did not appear to go through. I then found that my account was frozen and I received a Credit Card Validation form through email to be filled out.

The form required an excessive amount of personal information... photocopies of my ID, the credit card, recent utility bill, and recent credit card bill. I'm not willing to give all of that info to any company.

Now, it seems as though I can't play there unless I fill out the form so I will have to find somewhere else. My question is, how can I get my $15 back? I never played a single game with it and I refuse to provide all of the information that they're requesting in the form. I'd rather lose the $15 then give all of that info out. Is that my only option? What about a chargeback?

I had a problem like that back in 08 when my two other people in my household signed up. They made me send emails telling who was who.

The credit card you buy in with must match your account details. that is why it did not go through and then they locked both accounts

Now for the information they are requesting....all (reputable) online poker sites will require at some point that you send them all that information. It is a safeguard to make sure someone isn't using your info to play...

If you don't feel comfortable sending this info, then you wont be able to cashout ever after buying in with a Credit Card.

These sites have alot more to lose than they stand to gain by stealing your personal info to use like you are thinking....your too paranoid to play poker in general just give it up


You could try depositing through W.U., but the min is $100 and they still might need that personal info to verify your account (not 100% sure)...just send them your info or eat the $15 lol

You broke the rules so you pay the price. Providing all the details is standard procedure and be prepared to do it in the future if you want to play online poker.

If they really won't let you withdraw then they're effectively stealing your money and a charge back seems completely justified. I'd first make absolutely certain they will absolutely not let you have access to your money without giving them the information they want. Alternative you could see if they are willing to accept your documents with sensitive information redacted. Eg - show the last 4-6 characters of the credit card, but black out the others, black out your government ID number, etc.

Before making such claims, I suggest you try reading the Terms of Agreement.

Withdrawals have stipulations. If you're not willing to abide, don't deposit/play.

Indeed the sites all basically state they can take your money for whatever reason they deem sufficient and you have no recourse. However just because the state it in their T&C does not make it international law.

It's completely understandable not wanting to give so much information to an online poker company. Of course I've also been extremely critical of the little game the sites play of allowing people to deposit with minimal to 0 validation and then piling on the mountains of 'validation requirements' when people actually try to get access to their money. That just seems plain shady. At minimum perhaps a pop-up explaining that extensive documentation will be required should you wish to withdraw? I'm sure it's tucked away in the T&C but the truth everybody knows is that nobody reads those anyhow and Stars goal should be to help players have as smooth a playing experience as possible.

You're aware of the high cost of processing deposits and withdrawals right?

You think they should just eat that cost because you changed your mind?

Then there's the money laundering aspect.

I do agree that it may be a bit more ethical to get all that identity validation upon account creation, but their modus operandi is to profit. So the current procedure works better for them.

Just send them what they have asked for, many players have gone through the same thing before. Your girlfriend will also have to send in documentation if she wants to play. Btw, Im pretty sure it's prohibited in the T&C to fund multiple accounts with the same credit card.

As stated before their request for your info is completely standard and they even have to do this to prevent multi accounting, cheating, money laundry and other nasty things. So the first choice would be to simply send them what they want.

But tbh the first thing that came to my mind was trying to cancel the transaction by contacting your credit card company. This should be possible as long as the deposit wasnt done more than a week or so ago.

On the other hand this would be a sure way to make Stars ban your and your girlfriends account for all times.

And this would inadvertantly raise the cost of other players playing experience so please don't go with this method.

This happened to me. Email them about the situation, provide the necessary documents, and the problem will be rectified in a few business days.

Edit: All the money will then be put into 1 of the accounts.

super standard requirements for any poker site. As somebody else said either give them the docs they want or eat the $15, easy choice. Also - it's only $15.

Also - if you're not happy supplying this information to Stars (the largest and most reputable online poker site) then DON'T deposit on any other site either, because pretty well every site will ask for this information before you're able to withdraw a cent.

It's normal for a poker site to ask for the sort of ID they did even if you didn't break there rules. You can blank out part of the credit card info if you want.

Sending documents is standard indeed. However, i don't know how other sites resolve this, but it ALSO seems standard to me that if you don't want to send these documents, the funds are still yours. If they don't want to process them back to you, obvious chargeback in my opinion.

It's only 15$, so in this case it may not be worth it, but where do other people draw the line then?

And yeah as said above remember this because indeed if you don't want to send the documents, no poker for you i'm afraid, or at least no cashing out.

Hello Players,

We believe that PokerStars has already resolved this situation to the apparent satisfaction of the account owner in subsequent emails to/from PokerStars.

At no stage did we ever seek to confiscate any funds from this player, and, indeed, we offered to refund the player their account balance if they did not wish to send a copy of the relevant documents.

In addition, some players mentioned 'blacking out' various numbers on credit cards. As part of our compliance with various standards relating to data security, we specifically ask players to send any copies of credit cards with only the first 6 and the last 4 numbers visible - sending the whole number through requires us to destroy that information and re-request it without the full credit card number visible.

I hope that this information is helpful.

Sincerely,

Michael J
PokerStars Security Team

I can confirm what PokerStars Michael J said, they did allow me the choice of using the money or getting a refund. I chose to use it and had fun Thanks PokerStars.