Merge Gaming Network preparing to reenter #US #Poker market in August 2011

Source: World News Report

LADERA RANCH, CA, August 14, 2011 /24-7PressRelease/ -- It's official: Carbon Poker is returning in the USA!

This is undoubtedly amazing news for Americans who have been scrambling for weeks now to find a quality online poker site that is trusted, licensed and backed by a reputable gaming platform. Since coming into the market several years ago on the Merge Network, Carbon Poker was already one of the rising stars of the industry. Great software, unique graphics and features, as well as some of the softest competition out there got many players hooked on the site. Traffic, however, grew exponentially after an April 15th indictment of the owners and CEO's of PokerStars, Full Tilt and UB/Absolute, collectively known as the "Big 3" in the poker world.

After skyrocketing to the top 10 most trafficked websites in the world, Carbon Poker made a surprise announcement that they would be leaving the USA market for a brief period while they worked on their mounting customer service problems and cashout issues. After making the move official on June 1st, affiliate managers for all Merge skins went on a public PR spree to vow that they would be back within several months, something not even the most optimistic of poker players could have believed given the current legal climate of online poker.

However, after just being out of the market for just about 2 months, Carbon Poker reps have been quietly making it known that they're aiming for an August 15th comeback to the U.S. - with August 31st being the LATEST date that the site will be operating again in the states. It has been well documented by several unnamed Merge sources that Carbon has ramped up their customer service department to handle increased support loads and have also improved their processing and cashout timeframes, offering better options and decreased wait times on withdrawals.
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Cliffnotes:

- Merge still doesn't know how to publish a proper press release
- Blackout period for new US sign ups will supposedly end no later than August 31st 2011
- Better support and cashier yet to be determined ...

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#Merge Gaming Network new US sign up blackout now in effect

As previously mentioned a few days ago, the Merge Poker Network has a 2 week backlog for customer support and cashouts are even worse. They were simply not prepared for the tremendous traffic after Black Friday (April 15th 2011) and within those few weeks, they are considered around 70% growth.

In the meanwhile, the customer support team was barely able to handle all requests and after losing Quicktender recently, the main deposit option was credit cards and the general success rate due to the enormous number of transactions was only at around 20%. There have been rumours that CarbonPoker as flagship of the network had a success rate of 70%, but this has not been confirmed yet.

It appears that the announced blackout period for new sign ups from the United States has now come into effect as of June 5th 2011, it is yet another careful step of the network after disabling rakeback deals for new sign ups after June 1st 2011 and the implementation of the new VIP program. Existing players are not affected by this an can still play business as usual. About one month ago, as of May 1st 2011, PlayersOnly / PlayAces was the first Merge skin to disable new sign ups from the US and this current move will be network wide.

There is no confirmation as of how long this blackout period will last, the most common consent is 4-6 weeks and this is a temporarily solution to catch up on the support and money transaction backlog in order to ensure that all issues will be taken care of in a more timely manner. Several skins have already announced to hire more staff for customer support in the very near future and it is also important to clarify that the Merge Gaming has no intention to leave the US market either.

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The new Merge Gaming VIP program

As of June 1st 2011, new players are not eligible for rakeback anymore and the new network wide VIP program has been implemented to replace this and favor the active players. Soon we will also see a "blackout" phase for new sign ups from the US, this is a security measure of the network owner to handle the dramatically increased traffic and number of sign ups after April 15th / Black Friday. For more information, please click here: Merge Poker Network temporarily disabling New US Player Signups?!

Below are the details of this new player rewards program:

The Ace-High VIP Program

Welcome to our all new Ace-High VIP program. A program that is designed to reward your loyalty on your terms!

The program is simple. As you play poker for real money on our software you are awarded VIP points. To advance through the different levels of the program you need to meet the point requirements for each level. The higher your level, the greater your rewards. Different levels are eligible for different freerolls, and at any time you can use the points you have earned to buy into one of our many daily guaranteed tournaments. Once you reach level 7 you can choose to exchange your points directly for cash, at a more favorable rate the higher your level. It really is that easy. No complex calculations, point multipliers or time-based qualifications. Just play poker, and pick how and when you want to claim your rewards!

VIP Program FAQ

How is my VIP level calculated?

The calculation is total VIP points earned minus total VIP points decayed.

Is it possible to go backwards in the VIP tiers?

Yes it is, but only if you don't play for the Decay Period. If the Decay Period is 60 days, then you must go 60 days without earning a VIP point before the nominated amount of Decay Points will be removed from your VIP balance. Please note that the deduction will only happen once every Decay Period, so if the Decay Period for the level is 60 days then you will only have points decayed once every 60 days.

How does the Exchanges Per Month rule work?

You are allowed to exchange points for cash 3 times per calendar month at each tier you qualify for. That means that if you qualify for the very top tier, you can exchange points for cash 3 times in the calendar month at the top rate, but also 3 times each month at each of the lower rates should you wish to.

If I exchange points for cash will I drop in VIP levels?

No, you will not. You will lose whatever points you exchange from your balance, but the calculation for your VIP tier is based on lifetime points earned minus lifetime points decayed. Spending points does not alter your VIP level in any way.

How do I get into the freerolls at my level?

The VIP program detects if you are eligible for the freeroll automatically and allows you to hit the register button if you meet the requirements.

When do the freerolls run?

The freerolls run on the last Sunday of every month starting at 13:30 Software time. There must be at least 5 players registered for the tournament to start.

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Merge Poker Network temporarily disabling New US Player Signups?!

Source: HoldemPokerChat

The Merge Poker Network will temporarily stop accepting NEW US players in a few days in order to catch up on a backlog of customer service requests. Even more importantly though is the fact that this is also the case for all poker money transactions as well. As it stands right now, the customer service has a 2 week backlog and cashouts are much worse.

They simply were not prepared for the influx of players they’ve received since Black Friday and are feeling growing pains. Only NEW players are concerned by this, for all existing players it will be business as usual. As of June 1st 2011, they already disabled the daily rakeback for new sign ups as well and this is another careful step to make sure they will be able to handle the traffic.

The only part of this story that HoldemPokerChat was not able to confirm yet is if this is the case for all Merge Skins or just those that use the Merge cashier and customer support. HoldemPokerChat has been told that the temporary ban on new US players is just supposed to last about a month, however from past experience in dealing with the Merge Network Fonzi from HPC is guessing that "it will last through the end of the summer".

New processing options as well as more customer support personnel are in order to handle the extra traffic, but especially the recent action of the DoJ has shown that they are also going after sportsbooks and their payment processors as well and everybody is more careful in this business, you simply don't know what will happen next week. After the crackdown of AP/UB, PokerStars and FullTilt, the Merge Network was one of the contenders for the US players that were seeking a new home.

A few Merge Poker skin operators complained about the current processing problems and with the loss of QuickTender / UseMyWallet the main option became credit cards. Shocking number: the current success rate for successful credit card transactions is roughly 20%!  According to HPC it is rumored that for Carbon Poker the success rate is closer to 70% which "leads to believe that the Merge Network was putting their site Carbon Poker ahead of all others".

You may understand that this internal info is another tough pill to swallow for US online poker players, but let's keep the fingers crossed that it is the right step in a more regulated online poker experience. It would be even worse for the Merge Gaming network if they don't take the necessary steps to make sure all issues will be taken care of in a timely manner.

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Additional Changes on the Merge Gaming Network - France blocked, some US states restricted!

Source:  Holdem Poker Chat

It has already been announced a while ago that the Merge Gaming network will not be offering rakeback anymore as of June 1st 2011 for new players. They are working on a new VIP Rewards program and this will soon be released.

Today, Merge Gaming issued an internal statement that affects players in France and the United States as well. Due to the legal development in France and the necessity to have a license issued by the government to operate online gambling for French players, they have now also pulled out of the French market as well, similar to the iPoker network and Everest for example.

1) Players from France will no longer be able to play for real money on any skin of the Merge Gaming Network. This applies to new and existing players and they can only access the cashier from now on to withdraw their funds.

2) Furthermore, players from the following US states are now restricted from creating new real money accounts on any skin of the Merge Gaming Network:

- New York
- Washington
- Maryland
- Missouri
- Louisiana

Existing players are not affected by this, but this might be the first additional shockwave after yesterday's Black Monday and it becomes more and more frustrating for online poker players from the United States. As usual, we will keep you updated when we hear more.

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The „new“ Merge Gaming network?!

When I first started playing online poker years ago, I found poker.com (now PDC, the domain was sold for one Million USD years ago) and that was basically the very first site of the Merge Gaming network. Back in the days, the emoticons were the biggest attraction and you could enjoy the play money tables with some friends and just chat. The cash game traffic was low and you could get entry to the 50k and a few other tournaments with guaranteed prize pool by earning comp points – at that time dealt and not contributed.

Over the years a lot of things have changed, the emoticons are still funny though and they always seem to come up with new entertaining versions. The rewards system at the tables has changed from dealt to contributed and all the small stack grinders cannot benefit from it anymore, the active players now have an advantage.

A while ago, a bigger software update came out and now you can resize the tables and it is by far easier to play up to 12 tables at the same time, definitely an improvement. You also get 35% daily rakeback as you play, but this will soon change since it won’t be available anymore for new players as of June 1^st 2011. If you don’t have a rakeback account on Merge yet, go for it before time is running out. But keep in mind that you can only have one active rakeback deal as per network policy.

The Merge Gaming network will also have a network rake race as of June 1^st 2011 and there will be changes to the current VIP system. The exact details are not published yet, but the active players will benefit from it. But there is something even more amazing and I thought this would actually never happen: A few years ago the network struggled to get more than 3000 players online at the same time, now we have more than 8000 and the numbers are still going up.

After Black Friday (April 15^th 2011), most players from the United States are looking for a new home and the cashgame traffic went up by a whopping 80% on Merge. New skins pop up every other month and the network, based at “Down Under”, is doing their best to keep up with the new increase in traffic. 

Where you could not find any open tables or opponents, you now cannot get on open tables anymore since they are all full on certain limits! For a short period of time, even Australians were allowed to play for real money but that was unfortunately just a short adventure and one of the consequences of Black Friday. I guess it was fun while it lasted for them, definitely not good for the mindset though.

You can now see more deposit options for players all over the world and even for Americans who usually have a tough time to get money on poker sites (beware of the UIGEA), there are some reliable methods available. Right now though many deposits don’t get processed and the network can barely keep up with the number of transactions.

Even though many might complain about the speed, the advantage is quite obvious: They pay higher fees but can also guarantee that the transactions are safe. It will take a bit of time for them to get used to the increased traffic and number of deposits, I am sure they will get it solved and it is just a matter of time. It might sound bizarre, but I don’t think that the Merge Gaming network expected such an increased activity in such a short time.

For most, Black Friday and the humiliation of the big 3 FullTilt, PokerStars and AP/UB from an American point of view gives smaller networks the opportunity to grow and establish a solid player base. Whether or not the other sites will ever get into the US market again is not really any concern for them right now. But will they be able to use that chance and keep up with the pace that all the players show so far? I guess only time will tell … .

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