Everyone Asks: Where is the Money?

In case you were not sure, Super Bowl XLII made it clear. The ban on online gambling in the US has caused the market considerable damage.

With an exceptionally large volume of bets at sports books sand betting sites leading up to the super Bowl, earlier this month, payment processing companies were unable to deal with it all.

The biggest processors – companies like Neteller and MyCitadel – have left the US market soon after the ban was passed, late in 2006.

Now, websites count on their processors, smaller, less formidable companies. As the industry prepared for the Super Bowl betting traffic, the processors caved under the pressure before the game even began.

The volume was exceptionally high, with super Bowl bets (Las Vegas included, but mainly online action) reaching billions of dollars. The mess caused had the websites busy themselves with fielding calls of complaints from their customers, instead of directing their efforts to solving the problems.

For now, the result is that payouts are not same-day, and a backlog was created. Not a terrible outcome, considering what could have been.

But as for the future, it might be that the industry will retreat to the days of old, when payouts were issued on two or three assigned days of the week, instead of daily.

Sports betting websites are obviously not satisfied with the current situation that has Neteller and other leading payment processors out of the game, leaving them to partner with and count on somewhat risky processors in faraway places, with little online gambling experience, such as Asia and Russia.

The dissatisfaction with the post-UIGEA industry is understood. In fact, we all share it - website operators, payment processors, and gamblers too.