We have been discussing Pic Club over at APCW and to our surprise, Chuck Kidd (founder of Pic Club) dropped by to answer our questions.
The following is Mr Kidd's response to our comments....
I'm still on the fence as far as the legality of such a club but, it seems to be a viable alternative for those in the States.
My name is Chuck Kidd and I am the CEO and Founder of PIC-Club. My friends call me CharlieK so lets keep it on that level.
The idea for PIC-Club was conceived just 1 week after the UIEGA was passed when I read the new law and found that they had excluded trading companies. See they can't turn of Charles Schwab, E F Hutton or the Chicago Commodity exchange from using the wire services to transfer money. So with a little help and encouragement from a group of poker playing friends I bought a trading company and PIC-Club was born. The company that owns PIC-Club is Ledvil International a fully licensed and authorized trading company. We just happen to be the only one that ever thought of trading in poker.
I first introduced at this idea at a Poker Conference in Dec. 2006 in Costa Rica. It was well received by some and others found it silly. One man that didn't find it silly was a speaker at the conference and happens to be one of the foremost legal minds in this industry. He was impressed with the idea and it was with his words of encouragement that I pressed on.
After obtaining good legal council and getting the opinion of all 50 states laws as they pertain to online poker, PIC-Club was launched on April 22. 2007 with one poker room willing to give us a try and help us develop this unique concept in gaming.
I have controlled the growth of PIC-Club very carefully as we are dealing in your money. As a poker player I remember the frustrations of deposits being lost and customer service being useless. I vowed to make PIC-Club the dominant force in the industry for processing your funds into and out of a poker room in a manner never used before and doing it in a safe, secure and accountable way.
We are a CLUB; when you join you add to our strength in numbers, we are over 5000 strong and growing. This gives us some bargaining power to obtain the best deals for you at the poker rooms. The poker rooms have always had the upper hand, as there was never a reason to stop doing business as usual. Well the PIC-Club is changing how poker rooms do business with the players.
I read in this forum a concern about our fees. Let me assure you that PIC-Club makes no money from the players. We only charge the cost of processing to our members. If it cost PIC-Club 5% to process a credit card, that is what we charge you. Our company makes its money from the poker room every time you deposit your money into your playing account.
While we are on the subject of money let me address our CSA (common shares account). This is an account that all members of PIC contribute to. This is your money not ours, it sets in a bank collecting 3.5% guaranteed interest. $1.00 from every deposit goes into this account. We also deduct .05% of winning withdrawals from a member and add it to this fund. Last year in December PIC-Club added 6.8% to the total CSA pool. That means that PIC-Club members at Christmas time received 14% on those dollars. Easy math there, $1.00 in $1.14 out. Heck even the worst donk in the world who lost every hand he ever played that year made money from PIC-Club if he was a member. You tell me what other processor offers this.
We are growing, getting stronger every day. With the BetCris family of poker rooms joining us and the Merge Gaming Network now live at the PIC-Club, we service over 50 rooms. Everleaf Gaming, home of Poker4ever and their 35 rooms have just joined us and will be live very soon. If your favorite room isn't using PIC-Club why not drop them an email and tell them to wake up.
I will stop by from time to time to answer any questions you may have and you are also welcome to stop by the PIC-Club and ask our customer support for help on any issue. Just so you know, our customer support is made up of online poker players working from their homes as they help you. If you have read any of the online forums you will have seen from the postings that our 24/7 support team is world class.
Here's the link for those who want to check out their website.
Drop into The Pokerkeep to check out our review of Carbon Poker, the flagship brand of the Merge Network.
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