NETELLER and BW what if...............

[JT_Chicago]

David and Jeff,
I have posted questions to you in the past at Bettorsworld and I have appreciated your rapid responses. I thought I would email you with my question first before posting again at BW then figured I should post it instead. My question is "What does Neteller do to insure the reliability of its merchants"? I know your site tells us that we the customers are responsibile for the merchants we use but isn't that a bit lame? We do not certify them, we do not have the information about them that you did when you certified them, and we do not have nearly the leverage Neteller does in dealing with them. I will not name names because it doesnt involve me but recently I have heard of a no pay situation with one of your merchants. They have been accused of a no pay and not even returning communications concerning this issue, yet Neteller will still let me transfer to them if I was uninformed. Can you add a message board for each merchant so people can relay their complaints with a specific merchant? This should come up when you choose a specific merchant to transfer to. Does Neteller contact these merchants when they are accused of a no pay? Does Neteller check into these merchants AFTER the are certifed? Has Neteller revoked privileges from any merchants in the past? Sorry for making this so long but I strongly feel you provide a service for which your company profits and yet you seem to not want any responsibility if YOUR merchants decieve, delay, or flat out steal from your customers. In closing I understand that the sportsbooks are a big source of your revenue but I can't help but feel like Neteller should get a black eye as well when a sportsbook fails to live up to its part of an agreement with a consumer who's money you facilitated transferring. You are already associated with BW so BW can be the mediator between a sportsbook and consumer with Neteller ultimately rendering a decision. This decision can be for a sportsbook to forfeit it's "float" and lose its Neteller priviliges. This float would be divided among the consumers harmed by them. Just a thought but with this BW-Neteller relationship and BW's reputation as a watchdog I think both of your companies would greatly benefit from this.
The book I heard of with the no pay is not a BW approved book and I wouldn't play there. However, I don't see why BW could not be a third party mediator for these non BW books. There are more than one watchdog site and it seems like there are more ways of transferring money everyday, so just imagine how much more powerful the relationship between Neteller and BW could be. It just might create the synergy needed to completely seperate yourselves form your respective competion. Sorry so long.
JT

[Jeff]

It's a good question.....I kind of look at a serviceS like Neteller as Western Union.

If you sent funds to a book via Western Union, and the book went under, Western Union wouldn't be a part of the equation. They did their job. They transferred the funds.

Same thing with Neteller. Their job is to transfer funds from point A to point B.

I suppose though, if there was a flat out stiff on their list of books, at that point, they should cease doing business with them, and in turn, protecting the next guy who comes along and wants to transfer to that book.

JT- Which book are you referring to?

[JT_Chicago]

Jeff,
I was talking about espnbets. Like I said it was not me so I am only going by what I have heard so take it for what it is worth. Regarding the Western Union reference, WU was not a service built for the gaming industry for that matter either was Visa or MC. Neteller is all about gaming and for that reason they should have a responsibility to ensure against a fraudalent merchant. Don't they protect the merchant from a fraudulent (sp) customer by accepting the CC for them then transfering the funds to the merchant. Why should we as players just accept the Neteller excuse of us being responsible for choosing one of their merchants. Sears affords the consumer the protection of a defective product from any of the manufacturers they sell products for. Maybe a bad example but you get the point. As players if we do not keep asking for this protection we will eventually be burned. I understand how Neteller can not completely protect us from a bad book but if they ask all of their merchants to sign an agreement to be bound by a third party mediator or not be offered their service I see no reason how this could negatively affect business. With Neteller having the ability to revoke the merchants transferring capabilities they carry the trump card. Sorry getting long again but I can clearly see how this could benefit BW and Neteller and only hurt the bad books that I feel strongly about this. I hope this could generate more responses and maybe eventually reach a middle ground. Do you see any negatives for you or Neteller?

JT

[Jeff]

Don't really see the downside but I definitely see your point. I mean, if ESPNBETS is still listed on Neteller, they should be gone. (I haven't checked).

[David Kahane]

JT thanks for your great questions let me try to answer them for you

NETeller does a great deal of due diligence on merchants that apply for accounts with us. This includes researching their reputation in the industry and using sites such as BW to investigate their reliability. We most definitely do NOT want to deal with merchants that have unsavory reputations. Having said this, we can only act on specific complaints that we are notified of and can investigate. We cannot act on unsubstantiated rumors and we cannot be responsible for the day to day business practices of each of our merchants.

We have, in the past, had clients contact us and complain about behavior of specific merchants. In those instances we have contacted the merchant and investigated the situation. We have pulled merchant accounts when circumstances, including but not limited to, complaints from mutual customers have been great enough to warrant this.

I respectfully do not agree with your point that NETeller doesn’t take “any responsibility if YOUR merchants deceive, delay, or flat out steal from your customers”. We do not want to be associated and will not do business with merchants that would use our service to defraud anyone out of anything. We do not arbitrate disputes, particularly when they do not arise from a specific NETeller transfer, however we most certainly will follow up complaints or concerns by our clients

When we developed the NETeller concept we wanted to offer a service to both clients and merchants that was “the same as cash”. When a transfer is made to a merchant and vice versa as soon as either party receives the transaction it is complete and irrevocable and neither party can “call the funds back” once accepted. Occasionally a situation arises when funds are sent and accepted and a problem or dispute subsequently arises. If either party notifies us at this stage, we investigate the matter and do what we can to assist the two parties in resolving their dispute.

To summarize, do we care if one of our merchants is using their NETeller account to defraud their clients? Yes! Will we assist to the best of our abilities when a client asks us for help? Yes! Do we mediate or arbitrate disputes with merchants? No we do not. Will we work with a respected third party to assist in a mediation or arbitration? We do not have a policy on this, but I agree with Jeff in that I do not see any downside here.

I hope this helps

David

[JT_Chicago]

David,
Thank You for your response. I think that your presence here definitely serves as a great customer service voice for Neteller. I appreciate and agree that my statement of Neteller not caring was exaggerated. I love Neteller's service and can't remember the days before it, thankfully! I just wish I could have coinfidence in using all your merchants and was trying to gain some conversation on how we can all work together, all being players, Neteller, and a watchdog like BW, to improve the level of coinfidence we have in your merchants. Other thoughts include a message board, not a forum, where complaints can be researched about each merchant. Maybe even have a rating system something like 75% of requests honored in 24hrs or less. Or 50% of request not able to be completed due to lack of funds. Something to help give us an idea on how each merchant conducts their business with Neteller. Sorry about the rambling and Thanks again for your input.

JT

[ShiftySheik]

ESPNBETS?? Now there's a book looking for a lawsuit.

[<rich>]

what kind of idiot would send money to a book that calls itself espn or britany spears my god
if someone is going to steal someelese's company or personal name to make money don't you think their going to steal from you? as for neteller i think al you can as is that they keep their eyes and ears open but they are not the sportbooks.

[<BWorld>]

Unfortunately, there are alot of people that simply don't know any better. They hear all the hoopla about online gaming and away they go, with little or no research.