the fine print on Mansion's withdrawal policy

http://www.mansion.com/content/legalpopup.aspx?p=LegalWithdrawalPolicy

To summarize: Before you can cash out from mansion you need to send them a scan of your driver's licence or passport with your picture and signature clearly visible, plus a scan of the front and back of any credit card you used to make a deposit on Mansion with the signature clearly visible (although you are allowed to redact all but the last four digits of the credit card number on the front and the entire CVC number on the back).

The official reason for these requirements is that they want to make sure you're of legal age to gamble and to "safeguard the integrity" of Mansion--and of its players (?!). The REAL reason might be because Mansion is on Scam Artist Island (i.e. Gibraltar) and can get away with selling your personal information to the first identity thief who wanders along and offers them enough money.

hmmmm, NO
mansion is not the only site that needs you to verify all your information by scanning and showing them ur ID and Passport
it is for security reasons, dont be paranoid, they are not going to scam u

Here's my correspondence with Mansion so far. My email to their support address says:

"Unlike most online poker sites that are located on Godforsaken islands where Wyatt Earp is still sheriff, the national bank operates out of a Winnebago, the poker server is on a laptop in some guy's breakfast nook, and residents can get away with any criminality against mainland country citizens they wish, you make your cashout policy fairly easy to find before a player has deposited. That makes me half-suspect that you run an honest operation but you'll understand if I don't trust you just because you *say* you're nice guys.

"I am very, very concerned that there is nothing stopping you from selling a photocopy of my driver's licence and credit card to the next professional identity thief who offers you enough money. The main reason for my concern is that I am in Canada and, from my viewpoint, you are located in a lawless jurisdiction, and I'd have a very, very hard time suing you for assisting in the theft of my identity. Can you do something to reassure me so that I feel comfortable making my first deposit?"


And here is their response within about an hour:

"Thank you for your email. Your Service Request Number is : 1-176205188


"We will endeavour to respond to you within the next 48 hours.



"Should your enquiry be one of an urgent nature you may wish to call us on +350 41000 (International Call Charges May Apply) and one of our Member Service Specialists will call you straight back.


"In the meantime, you may wish to browse our comprehensive "Help/FAQ" section which can be found on our website www.mansion.com.

"Thank you for contacting MANSION and we look forward to being of assistance.

"Kindest regards

"MANSION Member Services"

go to your bank, tell the teller u want to withdraw all ur money from the bank. what do they do next? they ask u for ur ID,see what happens if u tell them u dont want to give them ur information cause u think they will selll ur ID

My bank is physically located in my country and regulated up the wazoo. If they decide to sell client information to identity thieves not only are they open to horrendous class action lawsuits but large swathes of bank employees might go to prison, expensive boards of inquiry go on for decades, there is a national scandal, and even if the bank doesn't suffer a run that bankrupts it the government might well revoke its certificate to operate--which means its shareholders lose $2 *BILLION* a year in dividends. Meanwhile, some poker site on some out of the way island where they still duel with muskets over a personal insult is completely out of the reach of all civil and criminal consequences, plus they are thousands of miles away in a place I'm never going to visit and I have absolutely no way to see what they're doing with my information. So there is a difference. I'd have to be plumb f***ing insane to send copies of sensitive personal documents to *any* poker site that is not incorporated in a mainland country. To bodog or Ladbrokes, I'd send copies of my ID. To some f***stick island-based poker site, NEVER.

I'd say dont play on the "some f***stick island-based poker site". No problems.
Stick with the big poker sites.

Calissa007 said:

I'd say dont play on the "some f***stick island-based poker site". No problems.
Stick with the big poker sites.

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I'm not concerned about losing money. I'm concerned about someone else having a photocopy of my passport! If a small island-based poker site has a reasonable cashout policy, I'm not concerned about dropping $50 on them to play their $2.20 SNGs. With the more reputable sites I wouldn't be concerned about dropping $500. But the security of my passport is potentially worth a LOT more to me than those amounts of money because having my passport information sold can mean anything from financial fraud to me being unjustly locked up in a foreign prison while traveling. And what's to stop some underpaid junior flunky at the poker site who maintains the paper records for a low salary from selling those records if enough money is waved under his nose? I'm surprised people find this so hard to understand.

I had to do the exact same thing on cakepoker to make a W/D.

Fax passport, drivers license, credit card.... and a utility bill.

But it was worth it.

There is no real danger imo.

Standard. Suck it up and get on with it.

Mansion has always been well-known to have the ID issue to withdraw

What are you afraid of having happened to you with a photocopied pic of your passport? Just put a banner on one of the clear parts of it saying " FOR REFERENCE ONLY " or something. That's what I did.

ChuckTs said:

What are you afraid of having happened to you with a photocopied pic of your passport? Just put a banner on one of the clear parts of it saying " FOR REFERENCE ONLY " or something. That's what I did.

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Actually, Chuck, that's a good suggestion. Thank you.

The REAL reason might be because Mansion is on Scam Artist Island (i.e. Gibraltar) and can get away with selling your personal information to the first identity thief who wanders along and offers them enough money.

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Might be - but isn't.

To Bodog or Ladbrokes, I'd send copies of my ID. To some f***stick island-based poker site, NEVER.

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My understanding is that various large UK gambling organisations, including Ladbrokes and william hill, have moved offshore recently.

I'm surprised people find this so hard to understand.

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Because you're talking bollocks.

I'd say dont play on the "some f***stick island-based poker site". No problems.
Stick with the big poker sites.

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if it bothers you that much...

pogreshilly said:

http://www.mansion.com/content/legalpopup.aspx?p=LegalWithdrawalPolicy



The official reason for these requirements is that they want to make sure you're of legal age to gamble and to "safeguard the integrity" of Mansion--and of its players (?!). The REAL reason might be because Mansion is on Scam Artist Island (i.e. Gibraltar) and can get away with selling your personal information to the first identity thief who wanders along and offers them enough money.

Click to expand...

Are you serious?

First, calm down. I understand that it can be frustrating for a site to accept these when you deposit money and then require more to cash out. Trust me, I know. When I was a noob to poker I too was bit by the same bug you were. I even started a thread telling everyone what crooks the site was. https://www.cardschat.com/forum/general-poker-13/stay-away-ultimate-bet-77515/

I soon realized that poker sites need to ask for this kind of thing to prevent fraud and\or money laundering.

They do NOT want your info so they can sell it to identity theives. They even tell you that you are allowed to blackout certain information that Identity theives would need.
They are asking for this information to make sure you are who you say you are and am not someone who has guessed the password to that account or someone else entirely just trying to launder money.

Rest assured that their requests are only there to protect your money from dishonest people.

When I signed up for a bookie called Betchance they asked for lots of ID, which is fairly common amongst bookies (including Mansion), and I emailed my standard ID scans, with four digits blanked out on the front of my debit card, and the 3-digit verification code on the back of the debit card blanked out. When they told me that I needed to send them a copy which didn't have any of the numbers blanked out, I told them to take a running jump, and that I would take my business elsewhere. Within six weeks Betchance had gone down the pan, owing various people a lot of money!

Having said that though, none of those people that were involved with Betchance have reported any problems with identity theft after their rapid demise, as far as I'm aware. I'm fairly sure that I would have heard about it, if it did happen, as I'm a regular user of two forums that deal with Matched Betting.

Given that in another thread you admit to trying to defraud Stars (though you have now corrected this mistake to your credit) you would think you would understand the sites feeling the need for these kind of security measures.

Irexes said:

Given that in another thread you admit to trying to defraud Stars (though you have now correted this) you would think you would understand the need for these kind of security measures.

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Hahahahahaha, definitely quote of the week!

pogreshilly said:

The official reason for these requirements is that they want to make sure you're of legal age to gamble and to "safeguard the integrity" of Mansion--and of its players (?!). The REAL reason might be because Mansion is on Scam Artist Island (i.e. Gibraltar) and can get away with selling your personal information to the first identity thief who wanders along and offers them enough money.

Click to expand...

Actually, both Bodog and Cake Poker have made me submit similar info before they let me make my first withdrawal, and I imagine most other sites will do the same thing (unless they already requested proof of ID at the time of deposit, which most of them do not, however).

What I do is scan everything into a pdf and encrypt it with a password, and I place document restrictions that prevent any sort of alterations to the file, including printing; that seems to have worked ok for me. . . . Of course, I also regularly monitor my credit file and I have a separate checking account for my poker bankroll, so I feel that my exposure is reasonably limited and I should be able to detect and fix any potential problems quickly and efficiently in case anything ever goes wrong.

Irexes said:

Given that in another thread you admit to trying to defraud Stars (though you have now corrected this mistake to your credit) you would think you would understand the sites feeling the need for these kind of security measures.

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lolz

Yes, what the pros at the matched betting forum recommend is - as email is inherently unsafe - you actually use your username at the betting site as the password to unlock the zip file. That way the staff at the bookies should be able to unlock it, but not anyone else who happens to obtain it...