Tennessee club rips off poker players

[Steve-O]

http://www.pokernewsdaily.com/poker-...ee-club-22187/ (the full article is at the link)

A group of more than 70 Tennessee poker players have filed a class action lawsuit against the Chattanooga Billiard Club (CBC) and its owner Phil Windham for allegedly cancelling an annual poker tournament for which the players qualified.

In the Complaint, filed by attorney Hoyt Samples, the plaintiffs explain that the CBC hosted a free poker tournament every Monday night for more than two years. Anywhere from about 70 to 100 players would participate. The winner of that tournament would receive a CBC gift certificate in the amount of 40 cents times the number of players in the event. Those who reached the nine-handed final table plus the two players on the final table bubble would qualify for the free monthly tournament.

The winner of the monthly tournament would receive a check in the amount of 40 cents times the number of players in the weekly tournaments leading up to it. Typically, the next few finishers would also receive CBC gift certificates, though it does not appear those were formal, listed prizes. The weekly tournament winners and the monthly tournament final table members all qualified for the free annual tournament.

The winner of the annual tournament would receive 20 cents times the number of players in all of the weekly tournaments (we are assuming 20 cents is multiplied by all of the weekly participants – this is not exactly clear in the Complaint). All told, CBC contributed one dollar towards the weekly, monthly, and annual tournaments combined for each weekly participant.

The annual tournament was a heavily publicized event. Flyers were posted at CBC locations and the tournament was promoted on the CBC website. According to the Complaint, the flyer read, among other things, “Monthly Winners Also Qualify for a Huge, Annual Deep Stack Tournament … WITH AN EVEN BIGGER PURSE!”

Though the tournaments were all free, the CBC and Phil Windham had a natural incentive to host them, as the venue would be filled with patrons who would order food and drink.

The Complaint alleges that in late spring of this year, Windham announced that the weekly and monthly tournaments would be cancelled after the big annual tournament, to be held in August. Windham did say it was possible that the tournaments would continue if food and drink sales made it worth it.

On June 25, Michael Morelan, the unpaid tournament director, asked a CBC assistant manager when the annual tournament would be. The assistant manager checked with Windham who said there would be no annual tournament and that was the last week for the events, period. Morelan called Windham for clarification and Windham told him, “This is the last week of poker. I am not going to put out any more money for poker. It is my money and I am going to keep it and there will be no annual tournament.”

When Moreland scolded Windham for misleading the players, Windham told him that if Morelan would put up half the prize money, the tournament would proceed. As Morelan made no money from the tournaments, he refused.

The lawsuit lists eight counts against the CBC and Windham:

Count I: Consumer Protection Act Violation
Count II: Fraud, Deceit, and Misrepresentation
Count III: Civil Conspiracy and Intentional Misrepresentations
Count IV: Intentional Misrepresentations
Count V: Negligent Misrepresentations
Count VI: Unjust Enrichment
Count VII: Breach of Contract
Count VIII: Class Action

[jsearles22]

Lets put some dollar figures on this complaint. I am going to error on the high side.

Say there were 100 runners each week. On a weekly basis they paid out $40. The winner of the monthly tournament would have received $160. So before the annual tournament, after 12 4 week months the casino would be out $3840. If they held the annual tournament as planned they would stand to pay the winner $960. This entire promotion would cost the casino $4800 for a freaking year! Throw in promotional costs & the apparent extra prizes and you are still looking at easily less than $10,000. The casino will now spend that much and more on legal fees. Given the bad press they will receive, this seems like a full on retard move.

Also an aside, some people had to have qualified for the annual tournament multiple times. There would be 48 weekly winners plus the final table members from 12 monthly tournaments (so 9 X 12 = 108). In total there is a potential for 156 annual tournament competitors. If these weekly events only drew 70-100 on average, so guys probably had 4-5 entries. This would obviously make the tournament +ev for them as there would have been even less competition.

LOL at grinding all of this shit for a $960 tournament at the end of the year

[Sloppy Joe]

Lets put some dollar figures on this complaint. I am going to error on the high side.

Say there were 100 runners each week. On a weekly basis they paid out $40. The winner of the monthly tournament would have received $160. So before the annual tournament, after 12 4 week months the casino would be out $3840. If they held the annual tournament as planned they would stand to pay the winner $960. This entire promotion would cost the casino $4800 for a freaking year! Throw in promotional costs & the apparent extra prizes and you are still looking at easily less than $10,000. The casino will now spend that much and more on legal fees. Given the bad press they will receive, this seems like a full on retard move.

Also an aside, some people had to have qualified for the annual tournament multiple times. There would be 48 weekly winners plus the final table members from 12 monthly tournaments (so 9 X 12 = 108). In total there is a potential for 156 annual tournament competitors. If these weekly events only drew 70-100 on average, so guys probably had 4-5 entries. This would obviously make the tournament +ev for them as there would have been even less competition.

LOL at grinding all of this shit for a $960 tournament at the end of the year

Cool story, bro.

[Jasep]

They aren't giving away 40 cents per player every week, they are giving away a gift certificate for 40 cents per player every week, assuming they have a 20% food cost it is costing the place .08 per player each week, the monthly tournament has between 27-36 players (depending on if there is a regular tournament on the 4th week), that one costs the guy 14 Dollars.

Lets assume if 80 people qualify, than 80 people play regularly... so its about 20 bucks a month out of pocket for the owner.

No business in the world wouldn't pay 20.00 a month to bring 320 people in their establishment

The main event should cost the guy.... $800 dollars... and in order for it to cost him that much that means 4100 people had to spend significant time in his restaurant over the course of a year... Sounds like the most amazingly cheap advertising ever...

Taking an ad in the bargain book is like $1200 for 3 months and your lucky if it produces 50 customers.

The whole thing just seems a bit silly to me... oh and lol at error

[ftpjesus]

They aren't giving away 40 cents per player every week, they are giving away a gift certificate for 40 cents per player every week, assuming they have a 20% food cost it is costing the place .08 per player each week, the monthly tournament has between 27-36 players (depending on if there is a regular tournament on the 4th week), that one costs the guy 14 Dollars.

Lets assume if 80 people qualify, than 80 people play regularly... so its about 20 bucks a month out of pocket for the owner.

No business in the world wouldn't pay 20.00 a month to bring 320 people in their establishment

The main event should cost the guy.... $800 dollars... and in order for it to cost him that much that means 4100 people had to spend significant time in his restaurant over the course of a year... Sounds like the most amazingly cheap advertising ever...

Taking an ad in the bargain book is like $1200 for 3 months and your lucky if it produces 50 customers.

The whole thing just seems a bit silly to me... oh and lol at error

My whole problem and where he's going to lose is the killing the annual tournament. If the guy didnt want to run the poker tournaments afterwards thats his choice but the tort in this whole thing is that he cancelled the year end tournament which means all those who freerolled into it (since it was basically that you had to satellite from one tournament level to the next) have a cause of action essentially. But then again it is TN and the whole thing could be tossed by some conservative judge who thinks poker is a sin. I agree I think the guy is foolish in that he was likely getting more customers in based on the tournament then an ad however what we dont know is whether or not he had complaints from other customers (given its a billiards club and people generally probably are hustling and gambling on 8 and 9 ball I would find it hard to believe). To me I think this is either a simple case of this idiot not thinking about the actually outlay vs income potential (considering they were gift certificates it would get the winners back into the establishment and you hope they spend more then the GC) or hes getting some wretched advice from somebodyelse.