I think I once wrote something like, “The long Full Tilt Poker frozen funds nightmare is almost over.” Something like that. I suppose, though, that by “almost,” I meant “your guess is as good as mine.”
But now, NOW maybe I can say that the four year (FOUR YEAR!) ordeal is coming to an end. The Garden City Group (GCG), which is the Full Tilt Poker Claims Administration for the U.S. Full Tilt Poker deposits that have been lost in limbo, posted a notice on its website (fulltiltpokerclaims.com) that the next round of payments will be going out this month. The pertinent portion of the message is as follows:
GCG has been informed that the Department of Justice Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section has approved a new round of payments, which will mark the commencement of payments to Petitioners who have disputed their FTP Account Balances. In addition, payments will be made to Petitioners who have confirmed their FTP Account Balances and recently cured deficiencies. In all, the distribution will include approximately 3,500 Petitions totaling approximately $2.8 million.
Disputing Petitioners who are being paid this month met one of the following established criteria approved by the Department of Justice: (i) a dispute of $500 or less, or (ii) a dispute between $500.01 and $2,000, if the difference between the FTP Account Balance and the disputed amount is 20% or less. All other Petitions with disputed amounts are still under review and, if found to be valid, will be paid in upcoming distributions.
So it looks like there will still be further rounds of refunds for those U.S. players whose refund amounts are still in dispute. One day, eventually, we will be done with this.
The issue at hand dates back to April 15th, 2011,best known as Black Friday, when the indictments against eleven principals of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, and Absolute Poker were unsealed. The three poker sites were amongst the last to still serve U.S. customers and all immediately withdrew from the U.S. market. PokerStars continued to operate in other countries, but Absolute (along with sister site UltimateBet) and Full Tilt completely closed up shop. Absolute just up and disappeared along with their players’ money, while Full Tilt’s management stuck around for a while to try to sort things out (whether this was an honest attempt to fix things or just for appearances is subject to debate).
Normally, a poker site closing is disappointing to its customers, but in Full Tilt’s case, it was even worse, as all player deposits were frozen by the U.S. government. On top of that, there wasn’t even enough money to reimburse players because Full Tilt’s management had used player funds for the site’s operations. When PokerStars reached a settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in 2012, it purchased Full Tilt and agreed to make all of Full Tilt’s former customers whole. Full Tilt’s “rest of world” customers got their money relatively quickly, but it has been a multi-year slog for Full Tilt’s former U.S. customers, who have been subjected to the DoJ and GCG’s process. The process has not been unreasonable in what has been required of players, but it has certainly taken a long time to get everyone reimbursed.
