The Casino Guru Forum is a community of players interested in finding the best online casinos and sharing insights into what they have discovered.
Yet, one of the Casino Guru Forum’s most popular discussions centered on the fact that some Curacao-based operators have begun using incorrect Merchant Category codes or, in other words, mislabeling their payment transactions, not recording them as casino/gambling transactions, as they should, but resorting to other, generic labels.
The discussion is among the most popular threads on the Casino Guru Forum and has already elicited 3,247,729 views along with 17,890 replies by thousands of members. Casino Guru Forum members acknowledged that the practice could be harmful and exploitative, but stopped short of picking one side or the other.
The majority of members argued that by mislabeling banking transactions, operators dodged self-exclusion blocks, and thus jeopardized player safety in the process. Many players argued that it appeared that some casinos are exploiting their vulnerabilities and not respecting the fact that they are self-excluded or coping with a gambling problem.
Self-excluded players ought to be stopped at the front door, but because of mislabeling the transactions, some forum members pointed out, some deposits went through anyway. While the arguments seemed to favor one point more so than another, a poll sought to calculate how people felt about these so-called disguised deposits.
The poll asked: "Is it okay if casino deposits appear as non-gambling payments in your bank records?" The poll again demonstrated that the community argued against the practice – 408 votes (27.9%) answered that it was dishonest.
However, 394 votes (26.9%) argued that "Yes, if it helps payments go through," seeming to favor the practice. For 22.% or 327 people, it was alright only if the users were informed, and 335 votes (22.9%) admitted that the issue didn’t matter to them.
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