Online Poker the Finnish way: you win or your money back
@ 10:57 am http://www.winneronline.com/articles/january2008/finlandnetlosses.htmÂÂ
The Social Ministry is drafting up a new law which would refund money back to people who lose in online Poker. This will make it difficult for Finnish online poker players in the future. Online poker businesses will not want Finnish customers if they will have to refund their money back when they lose. This will be interesting to try to apply this law on jurisdictions that aren’t under Finnish law. My wife and I speculated that it could only be done by making the credit card companies refund the money since they are typically nationally based. (ie. A Finnish person doesn’t usually go around using a French credit card, for example)
I personally feel that if someone is betting their money in online poker and loses, they deserve to lose their money. It is not a very smart move to bet your money in online poker. Why should the nanny state make special, hard to apply legislation to take care of people who knowingly throw their money away. When one enters into a poker game, they are full aware of the possibility that their money will be lost.
 I believe there is also no online poker in Finland, since I believe it is illegal to have here, that the law might be seen as nationally discriminatory. I don’t believe the Finnish gambling companies are required to refund money to people who lose in gambling games. The law seems to target poker specifically, but gambling is gambling and losing money is losing money. What can you say when a country officially sanctions gambling, monopolizes it and even encourages people to gamble their money, showing how it will be used for charitable purposes. Take the Rahaautomaattiyhdistys RAY for example. Then they get all bothered when people gamble online. You can find RAY slot machines in just about every kiosk, bus station, grocery store, etc. The whole country almost is like one big casino. The people always gathered around the machines don’t appear to be the sharpest pencils in the drawer, nor do they appear to be people who have a lot of disposable income to throw away.
Other countries have problems with people playing online poker, but not to the extent that there is in Finland. Apparently, there is a disproportional amount of people playing online poker here.
I believe that the reasons for this ban-attempt are typical Finnish envy and hatchet & axe-egalitarianism.
Lets examine a typical poker game. You pay, for example 11 dollars to get into a tournament. 10$ go to prize pot and 1$ goes to the casino. Top 10 percent of the players get paid, with very top-heavy payout structure; winner might get 50-20 percent of the whole pot.
In comparison, RAY reports that 89 percent of slot machine input is paid back as winnings. This is very close to poker rake, but on the long term everyone loses that 11%, whereas it is actually possible to win in poker! Poker is a zero-sum game, thus some need to lose in order for some to win. This is what doesn’t fit the Finnish mentality. It’s ok that everybody loses a little, such as in RAY games. But what, someone actually winning and winning big when a great majority loses a little money! No way, they want nobody to win.
Poker is great entertainment. For the 11$ in my example, you usually get around 0,5-1,5 hours of play, perhaps over 2 hours if you are successful. That’s not much even if you lose, even less considering that even the worst players sometimes get to the best 10%. RAY games take your money much faster.
Comment by T — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 1:27 pm
“It is not a very smart move to bet your money in online poker”
Works for me as poker pro. Poker is actually the only popular game where you do not play against the house. 5-10 percent from pot goes to house as rake per hand played.
Many poker firms are located legalwise on small tax-free island like Isle of Man and in their terms&condititions they use “EXCLUSIVE JURISDICTION”-clause, so the laws of USA (total ban) or Finland or whatever means jackshit.
Our collective asses would also be sued by Island of Malta to EU courts in case this comes a law.
Comment by tim73 — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 2:13 pm
[I]in September 2006, just before adjourning for the midterm elections, both the House of Representatives and Senate passed legislation (as an amendment to the unrelated Safe Port Act) that would make transactions from banks or similar institutions to online gambling sites illegal.[I/] From Wikipedia
It sounds like a similar law that was passed in the US a year and half ago regarding online gambling. They can’t regulate the use or access to the site, so restricting credit card access is their only option. Although forcing a refund is a rather strange way of doing so, especially considering that most online gambling houses are off shore, as stated above.
If this law does pass and the refunds are available, I will definitely be blocking some free time to gamble on Finland’s “risk free” gambling program.
Comment by Mike Giordano — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 2:32 pm
While they are at it, why not also include that you forfeit your winnings to the state, if you win.
I just wonder how this will work. I would think that trying to collect under this law will open you up to a tax audit. It is also a good way to make sure that no bank ever issues you a credit card again.
Watch the credit card companies now raise rate to compensate for this potential added expense for operating in Finland. Then again, good luck trying to collect from entities outside Finland. That includes the credit card company doing the transaction. The company inside Finland is only recording that a charge was made outside Finland.
This is the dumbest law yet. It will just increase the number of gamblers, if they reduce the risk of losing.
Comment by Fred Fry — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 2:34 pm
It will just increase the number of gamblers, if they reduce the risk of losing.
The goal of the proposal is to encourage on-line poker rooms to bar Finnish would-be customers. Whether that works depends on whether Finnish poker players really could get their losses back. (Of course, if you’re certain to get your losses back, the risk has been reduced to the point that you’re no longer gambling.)
Comment by a lamb with no guiding light — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 3:01 pm
A feel good law. Not enforable…but but we feel good.
Comment by winter “Yea, Proton Power, now in remission†— Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 4:16 pm
“This will be interesting to try to apply this law on jurisdictions that aren’t under Finnish law. ”
I think it means that foreign gambling operations can’t sue Finnish residents (or their cc companies) for their gambling debts in Finnish courts. Generally, I believe you are right in that it’s nationally discriminatory; the same way Veikkaus and RAY are.
But the state will try to sidestep EU law for as long as possible, while collecting profits in the meantime. These nanny state actions are nothing more than protectionism for the state monopolies.
Just curious, what would prevent gambling operations from accepting advance cash payments sent via post?
Comment by Kristian — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 4:25 pm
Kristian, I suspect that you can’t play unless you put the money in up-front.
Comment by Fred Fry — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 4:52 pm
Yes, but the foreign gambling companies would obviously block purchases via credit card. After all, they wouldn’t be able to collect the debt, since those cc companies seem to have big time-windows for reversing charges.
But cash sent via post should be ok from the gambling operations’ standpoint, right? They could simply credit the sum to the gamblers’ respective online accounts. Wouldn’t that be the best workaround?
Comment by Kristian — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 5:08 pm
“cc companies seem to have big time-windows for reversing charges.”
Or if these laws get passed, they could be prevented from transferring the money in the first place.
Comment by Kristian — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 5:27 pm
Are you actually denying there are any cases where individuals become compulsively dependent on gambling? That would fly in the face of most medical research. Not that ignoring facts would be in any way new for contributors here…
Comment by Rich — Fri, Jan 18th, 2008 @ 11:33 pm
T@1: It’s ok that everybody loses a little, such as in RAY games. But what, someone actually winning and winning big when a great majority loses a little money! No way, they want nobody to win.
We have Lotto though, big wins and a lot of losers.
I think the main reason behind this ridiculous suggestion for a law is that the Finnish gambling organizations decided not to launch their own online poker site when the time was ripe and now they’re losing “customers” to foreign businesses. The Swedish government’s poker site is now in the top 10 of most popular sites in the world (according to http://www.pokerscout.com/).
Comment by Pave — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 2:08 am
Rich:
“Are you actually denying there are any cases where individuals become compulsively dependent on gambling?”
Well, trying to combat addictions by unenforcable laws hasn’t proven to be very succesful so far. Take the neverending holy war on some drugs and the Finnish alcohol monopoly, for instance.
Comment by Freeridin' Franklin — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 11:18 am
Unfortunately this is the classic finnish way: some people have mental problems, lets treat the whole nation.
The idea is retarded, but luckily can’t pass since we’re in EU and they will say to stop this shit if it goes anywhere forward.
I think usually when you have a mental problem and you are harmful to to yourself and your family you get sent to a institution or at least in same way your rights as a person are restricted inevitably.
Unfortunately this is of course evil-nazi -thinking(tm), because naturally we all have to suffer from the ill of others collectively.
Which is the prime reason for example alcoholics get 0 sympathy from me(because they said if I pay taxes on booze everythings just dandy and I don’t have to fucking care).
Comment by philtard — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 11:46 am
A couple of observations of Finland that bring a smile to my face:
…WATCH YOUR WALLET! 
During my many escapades in Finland,I would venture into a convenient…KKK…(!!!) supermarket..(where were the employees wearing white sheets and hoods!?)…ROTFLMAO!..I don’t think this supermarket would cut it in good ol’ amerikkka…there would be outrage from certain groups of people,maybe leading to riots!
In these “KKK” supermarket/OLUT dispensers,waiting at the end of the checkout counters was a bunch of ONE ARMED BANDITS/wallet emptying
monsters…ready and willing to suck up remaining MARKA/EUROS after buying rediculously expensive food and OLUT4A…Slot machines are everywhere in FUNLAND,as if Finland is an expansive casino.
Even in the malls in Finland I saw mini gambling stores with a bunch of slot machines..
On the Europa,Symphony,Serenade ferrys,and even Nordic Jet high speed ferry,many opportunities to get drunk and flush your tourist money down one armed bandits abound!! Have fun, get drunk and lose your shirt gambling you American dog tourists, seems to be the strategy
that Suomi wants to inflict!
If that does not make you happy,there are the numerous THAI massage parlors in Helsinki and Tampere to sooooth your aching wallet.FINLAND is indeed FUNLAND!
Comment by infinndel — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 3:03 pm
Poker is great entertainment. For the 11$ in my example, you usually get around 0,5-1,5 hours of play, perhaps over 2 hours if you are successful. That’s not much even if you lose
RAY games take your money much faster.
This is another case where state causes more problems than good. It is ironic that the “Ministry of Social Affairs and Health” writes this new law.
I guess if government claims “health” and “social reasons” then it sounds more legitimate than if they tell the real reason: to protect the state monopoly.
Comment by Anonymous — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 3:41 pm
“Slot machines are everywhere in FUNLAND,as if Finland is an expansive casino.”
Yes, there are over 16 000 slot machines scattered around the country. That is a lot for 5,3 million people. Pretty much every kiosk, supermarket and gas station has a few of them.
Comment by tim73 — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 6:40 pm
Well, despite the assclownery of the government, which I never deny; pray note this is just a waste of tax monies… its a survey for a proposition. And the proposition needs to go through parliamentand get approved, and then signed by the president. Unless it is deemed a constitutional law by the constitutional college, where it needs to be approved by two parliaments. Anyhow, to go through the parliament colleges the law can taka anything from 2months tro two years, so I wouldn’t be worried right now. This is what we Finns call “kiva tietää”…
Comment by Hank W. — Sat, Jan 19th, 2008 @ 6:55 pm