Coral admin error led to account misverification and consequent witholding of funds - resolved by player

[pok1290]

I joined Coral last week, deposited £100, received £50 free chips and made a substantial profit. Coral will now not allow me to withdraw my winnings and are refusing to answer my emails. My account has been suspended with no warning.

I am receiving automated emails saying that my personal details did not verify - I have identified that the reason for this is that their automated address finder has my address added incorrectly (in fact it does not even form a proper address)

They will now not release my rightful money unless I send them copies of driving licence or passport and 2 bank statements. This puts me at high risk of identity theft and is not something I am comfortable in doing.

My grievance is three fold:

1) They should not have taken my deposit money without verification if they were not prepared to return it; or should have explicitly notified me of the risk beforehand.

2) The reason for the initial verification failure is due to an administrative error on their part and would otherwise verify successfully if they correct this error and try again.

3) They are not responding to my emails other than with a regurgitation of the initial automated email. Nothing has been replied to regarding the address admin error or the account suspension (they are, however, sending me lots of spam encouraging me to use my account even though it is suspended).

Is there anything I can do to get them to discuss this with me? As far as I am concerned they are ilegally witholding my rightful money and using it to extort sensitive information/documents from me which were not mentioned before they took my money.

It is very frustrating and annoying that they not only have taken my money, but will not even communicate with me about it.

I am sure they could resolve this if they corrected their address finder to add my correct address details (I could not add them manually) and re verify.

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Regards,

Simon

 

[BMR Forum]

Did you spend any time reading the rules for the complaints?

In particular
IMPORTANT: Bookmakers Review cannot help bonus and multiple account abusers. Furthermore we cannot assist anyone that doesn't have or cannot provide the documents the online bookmakers require to authorize payments.

If you are concerned about identity theft you should not bet online. There is nothing we can do to help if you can't or won't provide the documents to Coral.

 

[G-Man]

Your issue also seems related to online casino, as you mention chips - casinosreview.com (Coming soon).

If you check Corals terms & conditions they clearly state:

"4.5 If, upon completion of the KYC (Know Your Customer) verification, we are unable to verify Your details or You are ultimately shown to be underage or unable and/or unwilling to provide proof of Your residential address, or other information required to verify Your identity, we will within a reasonable time:

- return any residual balance, up to the value of Your initial deposits, at the time of the unsuccessful verification however;
- any excess winnings will not be credited.

4.6 We may decide to carry out further verification checks or request extra documents to confirm Your identity, age and address at any time. This is to satisfy our licence obligations, routine security checks and to safeguard the integrity of Your account."

Players are advised to read these in full prior to opening an account and depositing money. Simple.

 

[pok1290]

Thank you for your responses, the issue is now resolved. Sorry if you feel I wasted your time but am new to this area and was just looking for advice.

After several ignored emails and much patience on hold I did get through to speak to a real person at Coral; they admitted and corrected their administrative error and the verification went through fine as I'd initially expected.

Without wanting to dwell I do feel I need to defend myself from the responses quickly: For the record this is the only on line account I have. I bet on football matches and adhere to a strict system and staking plan. I opened an on line account because I have been ill and unable to get to my bookmakers. I took up the introductory offer they had but I don't feel that make me an abuser.

Although unhappy about sending paperwork unneccesarily my gripes were more to do with not getting a response from customer service and not being able to get the admin error corrected, and 24/7 support is something your site mentions as being a legal obligation for bookmakers.

As I say, live and learn - I think I'll take your advice and stick to the non-virtual world once I am recovered and take a betting sabbatical in the mean time...

 

[BMR Forum]

We were not suggesting you had more than one account.

We quoted a rule that has a reference to multiple accounts, but the relevant part in your case was the one about the provision of documents requested by the bookmaker.

Anyway, it's good to know that you were able to speak to them and they corrected the administrative error.