Quote:
Originally Posted by Matt Savage
Entry fees and staff/dealer tokes have never been the responsibility of the World Poker Tour and is set by the host casino. I am told that the additional 4% withheld was not ever promised to the dealers in London and that Simon has made comment in the Blonde Poker thread but I cannot seem to find it?
I was not in London and the Tournament Director was Jack McClelland.
The WPT has some oversight responsibility for what goes on its events. And one of the main issues regarding this situation is regarding the schedule which was hosted on the WPT website:
http://www.worldpokertour.com/Shared...r_Classic.aspx
One of the reasons I played this event and consider playing other WPT events overseas is my belief that the WPT will oversee what goes on. For example, I doubt anyone would travel to play an event in Marakkech if it didn't have the assurance of reliability that the WPT label implies.
On to the issue at hand, the first problem is the fact that 4% was taken out of the prizepool. If you look at the schedule on that link, two events had asterisks which denoted that a % of the prizepool would be withheld for staff. Those events did not have juice specifically denominated.
The WPT Main Event did not have an asterisk showing that a % of the prize pool would be withheld for staff. And juice was specifically denominated -- £5000+300, which as you know is quite high.
The only reasonable conclusion to be drawn from looking at that schedule is that additional money was
not going to be taken out of the prizepool for staff. So not only was the withholding not disclosed beforehand (as far as I know, if it was I'm sure someone would have pointed that out by now), it was fairly clear that there was to be no withholding.
It really looks like the decision to withhold was made after the fact to satisfy the casino's obligation to the Bellagio tournament staff, which is totally unacceptable. Additionally, this withholding was unlike any other in that virtually none of it went to the dealers. Had this been disclosed beforehand I'm sure there would have been an uproar.
So at the very least I think this situation is in need of further explanation from Simon and everyone else involved. And I hope the WPT will be proactive in obtaining that explanation.