Pokerstars Partners Versus Affiliates Battle Heats Up

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Tuesday, October 14th, 2014 | Written by Charles Washington

PokerStars, the world’s most popular online poker site, has been undergoing a number of significant changes over the past few months, not least a change of ownership following Amaya Gaming’s acquisition of its parent company the Rational Group on August 1st for $4.9 billion. Other major changes include PokerStars dramatically cutting back on its team of sponsored pros, the site rolling out the first of its gambling games in the guise of Spin and Go’s, as well as Pokerstars Partners now having terminated its contracts with a number of long-standing affiliates.

Naturally, PokerStars has received criticism from those most affected by the policy change, with former affiliates accusing Pokerstars of having ripped them off and labeling its decision as merely a “greedy financial decision”.

Affiliates contracts terminated

Towards the end of September, a number of PokerStars affiliates, including many with long-standing accounts, started receiving emails from PokerStars informing them their affiliate contracts had been terminated. In addition to losing an important source of future revenue, the affiliates affected were also informed they would no longer receive money for those players they had introduced to the site from a long time ago.

One affiliate representative from Best Odds Corp stated that his letter of termination stated that according to Pokerstars affiliate program terms and conditions 8.4; ‘We may terminate this Agreement at any time on 7 days’ written notice.’

When the representative responded to the Pokerstars letter by reminding that no such TOS was agreed when Best Odds Corp first became an affiliate in 2004, he subsequently received a follow-up-mail from Ryan Harper, the Acting Head of Affiliates at Pokerstars, stating:

“The decision was made to terminate the contract because the overall low level of monthly acquisitions does not justify the high monthly payment.”

Affiliates slam PokerStars on issue

Needless to say, many of the former affiliates have expressed disgust over their apparent mistreatment and accused the site of killing off its super affiliate accounts. The Best Odds Corp representative, for instance, had enjoyed a successful affiliate relationship with Pokerstars for more than 10 years, and was still continuing to drive new players to the site in spite off an online poker industry in decline since 2007.

Speaking on behalf of the affiliates who now feel they have had potentially millions of dollars stolen right from right under their feet, Markus Sonermo, owner of Poker.org, wrote:

“I congratulate you (PokerStars) on your short term gain. But know one thing, me and the people like me we will never forget. And we will never go away because this business is what we do and know and love. And we don’t do business with people who steal from us no matter who owns it.”

Odd changes regarding initial deposit bonus

In addition, many of the affiliates still in a business relationship with PokerStars have been complaining about changes made to PokerStars’ initial deposit bonus which they say are more underhanded maneuvers designed to skim of their potential earnings. As explained by jspill on the twoplustwo forum:

“The $600 welcome bonus was always a 17x multiplier, $10 released per 170 vpps. ~32.3% rakeback. 6 months to clear, after each of up to 3 qualifying deposits. Now it’s 20x multiplier, 27.5% rakeback, the 6 months now 4.”

In fact, such is the perceived level of betrayal by PokerStars that a number of former affiliates have even suggested banding together to file a lawsuit against Amaya, although at the same time other affiliates have pointed out the difficulty in forcing such a case against the multi-billion dollar company.

Online regulars also come under fire

Online regular players at PokerStars have also come under attack recently, after speaking out against the new Spin and Go games introduced to the site. Regular players rely on playing against weaker recreational players in order to continue playing profitably, but the fast-paced, three-handed format in which a player can win up to 1,000 times their buy-in within minutes is viewed by regular as leveling the playing field whilst killing their own action. Such suggestions received short shrift from PokerStars’ top sponsored pro, as well as its unofficial spokersperson, Daniel Negreanu, who said:

“Do you know what kills games and destroy the poker ecosystem above and beyond all the things mentioned? Winning players. Yup, you guys lol. The winning players as a whole win a lot more money than the company makes each and every year. Yet, oddly, they still offer VIP programs to the very people who are essentially ‘killing the games.”