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Subsequent to the United States Congress passing
a bill
prohibiting transactions
from financial institutions to online gambling sites, Neteller has stopped making transfers between US citizens
and gambling sites, including poker rooms. In terms of online poker, Neteller remains available to customers
all over the world.
For players where it available, the most convenient way to deposit and withdraw funds from online poker sites is to use an
e-wallet service. Neteller has been the market leader for several years.
Neteller is a publicly traded company on the London Stock Exchange. There are no charges to transfer money to and from
cardrooms who use Neteller, except you need to do a few things to make use of all the Neteller features.
The first thing to do, after reading this handy dandy page, is sign up for an account. Click the link above. This
will take you to the Neteller website. The initial sign-up page is very simple, just a handful of questions.
When you sign-up make sure you use the email address you use with the online cardrooms. Unlike PayPal where you could have
multiple email accounts sending and receiving money, with Neteller you can only have one. So, a secondary step is for
you to go to all the online cardrooms you play at and change any email addresses to the one you use with Neteller.
 The
next step is to "certify". Players do this by verifying a bank account. (Some users may become certified by faxing
a copy of their passport and both sides of a personal credit card.) You give Neteller your checking account information,
and they make one tiny deposit and one tiny withdrawal from that bank account (amounts like six cents and four cents). After
your bank registers these transactions (two to four days), you enter the amounts on a "Verify Your Bank Account" page.
This process allows you to transfer money into and out of Neteller and your checking account with no fees (assuming your bank
allows electronic transfers). They say a transfer from your bank account will take two to four business days, but they start
counting the days the day after you make your request, and I doubt they ever take two days, so assume a transfer will
take one week, including weekends.
Once you certify, you receive more generous deposit limits. The limits are flexible. If you want higher ones,
contact Neteller support to find out what they require.
This simplifies the cashout process. When you cashout, choose to
cashout to Neteller. Once your money is on Neteller, you can then transfer it to your bank account (again, taking two to four days)
or get a check mailed or delivered.
If you are a particularly paranoid person, it might make sense for you to set up a completely new account at your bank that
you use exclusively with Neteller. Keep a few dollars in it to keep it active, then whenever you cashout just transfer
the money out of this account into your principal checking or savings account. Likewise when you want to deposit money to an
online cardroom: deposit money in your special account, transfer it to Neteller, then transfer it to the cardroom.
While Neteller is free to transfer to the cardrooms (unless a cardroom decides to pass on the fees to you),
there are fees for some related transactions. For example, if you use a credit card to deposit to Neteller,
you will be charged a 3.9% fee on the deposit. You will also be limited to $400 until you certify your account. Once
you have certified your account you will be able to use your Credit Card to fund your Neteller Account for up
to $3000 in a rolling thirty-day period. Most credit cards will view Neteller transactions as cash advances.
Another possible fee comes into play if you wish greater speed than the two to four days needed to move money to and
from a bank account. Neteller offers an "InstaCash" transfer -- essentially, immediate bank transfers,
but with a cost of 8.9%. I doubt many poker players will want to pay that much juice just to move money a couple days
faster. In contrast, FirePay offers a flat $1.50 fee for an immediate transfer.
Neteller has a page of phone numbers and email addresses for easy contact.
Neteller policy is to withdraw your funds using the same method as they were originally deposited. So if you deposit $20 by
credit card, then you must withdraw $20 back to your credit card. Any subsequent amounts may be withdrawn using other methods.
Also see Firewalls Spyware & Online Poker Security for online privacy suggestions |
