M
MrUnlikely
Enthusiast
Silver Level
pokerstars were by far the biggest site and players didn't have many good choices. Pokercsout currently says GG Poker has 75000 players while pokerstars has 55000.
While pokerstars seems to have made some effort to continually improve software etc, I think the biggest theme is trying to squeeze more money from a player pool while they had little competition. Increasing rake and decreasing rewards and two well known changes. Like so many greedy companies, they created an environment in which a competitor could thrive.
Having played pokerstars for over a decade, I can say they have had terrible customer service- the worst I have exerienced from a large company in my long life. Most recently, a simple limit change took 8 days, despite being approved after about 5, and I was still waiting for my account to be unlocked when I decided I had had enough of their poor service and would rather not support them. Of course I messaged them numerous times- it does feel like they add a day to the wait time for every message I send. Finally, I had had enough and I took a 6-month time out to ensure they don't get any of my money in the near future. I also let them know, but of course I don't expect a reply. If pokerstars had the kind of management that looked into problems and fixed them then they wouldn't have had bad service for decades. If and when they did get around to replying, they would no doubt copy and paste something about being busy, as though that is a reason for poor service. If it was a special day, like a public holiday, sure. But not every day for the last ten years.
Sometimes people say that their customer service is not bad, and that they usually get a reply within 48 hours. Personally, I think that in this business, you should be replying almost instantly, certainly within hours, and not days. 48 hours might not seem too bad, but lets say they want a screen shot, or want some other info, and you quickly send it in- expect to wait another 2-3 days.
So, now pokerstars has real competition, and it seems like they are on their way down. I don't think they are going to be able to change their poor service culture and predatory behaviour. The net is full of reports of their poor service and they haven't improved in decades. Maybe they will, but not before some heads roll. They had complete market dominance, and now they are quickly becoming one of "the other" sites, while GG poker becomes an empire. They had maybe 80% of the worldwide market, and maybe 20% now.
While pokerstars seems to have made some effort to continually improve software etc, I think the biggest theme is trying to squeeze more money from a player pool while they had little competition. Increasing rake and decreasing rewards and two well known changes. Like so many greedy companies, they created an environment in which a competitor could thrive.
Having played pokerstars for over a decade, I can say they have had terrible customer service- the worst I have exerienced from a large company in my long life. Most recently, a simple limit change took 8 days, despite being approved after about 5, and I was still waiting for my account to be unlocked when I decided I had had enough of their poor service and would rather not support them. Of course I messaged them numerous times- it does feel like they add a day to the wait time for every message I send. Finally, I had had enough and I took a 6-month time out to ensure they don't get any of my money in the near future. I also let them know, but of course I don't expect a reply. If pokerstars had the kind of management that looked into problems and fixed them then they wouldn't have had bad service for decades. If and when they did get around to replying, they would no doubt copy and paste something about being busy, as though that is a reason for poor service. If it was a special day, like a public holiday, sure. But not every day for the last ten years.
Sometimes people say that their customer service is not bad, and that they usually get a reply within 48 hours. Personally, I think that in this business, you should be replying almost instantly, certainly within hours, and not days. 48 hours might not seem too bad, but lets say they want a screen shot, or want some other info, and you quickly send it in- expect to wait another 2-3 days.
So, now pokerstars has real competition, and it seems like they are on their way down. I don't think they are going to be able to change their poor service culture and predatory behaviour. The net is full of reports of their poor service and they haven't improved in decades. Maybe they will, but not before some heads roll. They had complete market dominance, and now they are quickly becoming one of "the other" sites, while GG poker becomes an empire. They had maybe 80% of the worldwide market, and maybe 20% now.
