Stanjames - Stole my commsissons and are kicking me out.

**casinog** · 15 February 2013, 8:03 am

Hello all,

I have been an affiliate with Stan James since around 2004.

At first they were great and paid promptly.

So in around 2009 I fell ill with an immune disorder and couldnt devote much to time as I was in and out of hospital.

Over this period they have new affliate team and during this time they stopped paying me and moved to a a new system. At around 2012 I started to get better and couldnt login to the system. After a few enquires I discovered their new system and they gave me login details. Over the years my players had accured and earned 5 figures of commissions.

They gave me login details again in October saying my account was closed because I had not brought in enough players.

So 2 weeks ago I couldnt login to their system at all and didnt know why and neither did they!

I met them in LAC conference and explained the login problems I had been having. I got my account working on Thursday and today on Friday I receive the following email:

E-mail as follows:

"I am writing to let you know that the affiliate account you hold with StanJames.com will be closed. This is because since the account was re-opened in October 2012 on condition or an improved performance yet your registrations and new accounts have not improved to a satisfactory level. Any commission earned between October 2012 and January 2012 will have been paid to you on a monthly basis via the payment method you have set up on the account."

So despite only regaining control in late October 2012 they locked me out of my account twice. Citing that I had not increased registrations.

I had devoted time to bring them players, paid PPC over the years, done SEO and now they have chosen to only paying me for that SMALL time frame and not over the previous years!

Anyone know a good contract lawyer in the UK ?

Also anyone know who the CEO is of Stan James is it Denis Kelly ?

**universal4** · 15 February 2013, 2:32 pm

Another quota screw job.....

Quotas are bad for ALL affiliates and for those that didn't believe when I said it YEARS ago, it will eventually bite you in the ass somewhere.

Rick
Universal4

**foxtucker** · 15 February 2013, 3:16 pm

Is there an easy way to find out which affiliate programs have quotas? I'd like to check if I'm working with any of them and drop them like a hot rock.

**Doolally** · 15 February 2013, 3:40 pm

I'm on a warning with Stan James that the same will happen to me if I don't get more players. I pulled their links. Luckily, I never promoted them much anyway so won't lose anything but it's bad for affiliates.

BetVictor also have the same clauses and have stopped paying me too so watch out for them! Lost a bit with this one.

**FictionNet** · 15 February 2013, 4:00 pm

Glad to have read this thread. I won't get into promoting Stan James now, it'll avoid a similar issue in the future. Thanks for the warning.

**Pmig** · 15 February 2013, 4:49 pm

I also confirm this behaviour from stan james, I never promote stan james a lot and got pulled out some time ago after platform migration.

Some affiliate programs can't see the market over years, only look for a limited on time numbers and make huge mistakes, pulling out good affiliates and that lead to not getting new affiliates and a tarnished reputation.

**alin04** · 15 February 2013, 5:04 pm

I will never promote Stanjames. I don t need in the future headaches.

**bradz21** · 15 February 2013, 6:26 pm

Yeah we had the same issue with bet-at-home.com

Dear Affiliate Partner,

we have recognized that your affiliate activities have declined during the last twelve months.

We are contacting you because we really want to reactivate and continue our co-operation, as we are still considering you as an important partner of bet-at-home.com Affiliates!

Nevertheless we have minimum-requirements that need to be fulfilled in order to keep your affiliate account on the current commission-level.
We expect that you as one of our affiliates should at least refer 5 new depositing accounts during the next three months. (observation period will be the 1st of October 2012 until the 31st of December 2012)
If you fulfill this requirement we will keep your commission structure on the current level.
If you are not able to reach this level of 5 new depositing accounts, the percentage rate of the Revenue Share for your account will be reduced to a rate of 5%.

You will always have the chance to return to your former Revenue Share commission-level by delivering 5 new depositing accounts in the next observation period, which will then be the quarter after December 2012 and so on.

Please note that we will inform you again in January 2013 about the new results and the next steps.

If there is a special need for new advertising materials, which will help you increasing your affiliate traffic, please do not hesitate to contact us again.

Guess at least they did pay us a monthly average compensation package. What a joke..

**xecutable** · 15 February 2013, 6:35 pm

*rant on*

Don't you just love it when a program that's way over its head, decides tell you how much you should be promoting them. Instead of asking you like a civilized partner "Hey, I see we are not being promoted. May we ask why, and what can we do to improve this, so you can give us more exposure" they try to take the high road by forcing you to promote them.

Affiliates are free spirited people! Most of us do not like being told what to or not to do! We own our sites and it's our decision what, who, how and how long we should and will promote someone on them!

Some of these programs can't even create a decent conversion rate and they know it. Instead of reworking their structure and marketing strategy, they decide to increase the traffic flow to increase revenue, on your back you see!

*rant off*

That being said, there are plenty of quality programs left, which you can choose from, that will not close the door on you, won't push you for extra promotion and pay fast!

Come on extra promo is earned by some sort of a deal or $$$ not threats for account closure!

**-Shay-** · 15 February 2013, 7:46 pm

Originally Posted by xecutable

*rant on*

Don't you just love it when a program that's way over its head, decides tell you how much you should be promoting them. Instead of asking you like a civilized partner "Hey, I see we are not being promoted. May we ask why, and what can we do to improve this, so you can give us more exposure" they try to take the high road by forcing you to promote them.

I can count the number of programs on two fingers that have taken the approach of asking what THEY can do to improve (and thus increase exposure). In most cases, if other programs would follow suit, they'd almost certainly get more exposure from us.

**thebookiesoffers** · 16 February 2013, 4:31 am

FFS when will programs realise that more players doesn't instantly mean more profit

Stan James are on here so it would be good if they aired their views and not ignore the issue

**casinog** · 16 February 2013, 7:03 am

Chances are they wont reply they just don't want to pay my past commissions.

Its down to greed and bad management.

**universal4** · 16 February 2013, 3:25 pm

I remember one of the very first programs to ever introduce a quota after the fact.

At the time they were sponsors here (this was years ago - prior to the Casino City involvement).

They were VERY upset about how vocal I was against them instituting this new "term".

They privately went to Cindy to ask for my removal from the GPWA, "since I was a small affiliate and they felt that I would likely not post good information very often anyway".....

It's funny, back in those days the with they were one of the only ones for years that ever tried to get a quota past us, and now it is becoming more common. Our best defense against this kind of term is to not promote programs with quotas, and drop those that institue them when possible.

Rick
Universal4

**FictionNet** · 16 February 2013, 3:54 pm

Originally Posted by universal4

I remember one of the very first programs to ever introduce a quota after the fact.

At the time they were sponsors here (this was years ago - prior to the Casino City involvement).

They were VERY upset about how vocal I was against them instituting this new "term".

They privately went to Cindy to ask for my removal from the GPWA, "since I was a small affiliate and they felt that I would likely not post good information very often anyway".....

It's funny, back in those days the with they were one of the only ones for years that ever tried to get a quota past us, and now it is becoming more common. Our best defense against this kind of term is to not promote programs with quotas, and drop those that institue them when possible.

Rick
Universal4

Good of you to not identify the program, presumably due to it being a long time ago, and you being a thoroughly decent chap. I assume Cindy told them to coitus off.

**universal4** · 16 February 2013, 5:05 pm

Well they were right about one thing.....I never really posted a lot.....

They didn't stick around these parts long after that.....

Rick
Universal4

**justbookies** · 17 February 2013, 5:41 am

Shocked to read this about Stan James, a firm I always thought was one of the good guys.

**GCG** · 18 February 2013, 12:34 am

IMO they have been a fishy program from the start, never got any players from them now I know why.

**justbookies** · 18 February 2013, 4:39 am

I have done fine with them over the years. I know that I have tracked players that go back many years and I would not question their ethics relating to that. Plus they have a good industry reputation in the UK, including supplying odds data to independent bookmakers.

I have never understood why a semi-dormant affiliate is a problem for a program. It is not really any sort of overhead to that program (apart from just paying them for revenue that has already been generated by their small player base) and that affiliate may come good for them in a big way further down the line. Closing their account is only going to lead to serious negative publicity and so put off new affiliates from joining the program.

**universal4** · 18 February 2013, 2:21 pm

I have never understood why a semi-dormant affiliate is a problem for a program.

A semi-dormant affiliate is NOT a problem for a program, (but a LACK OF AFFILIATES IS).

Most programs just use the dormancy as an excuse.

Smart programs recognize that even semi-dormant affiliates, or even affiliates that produce zero players, are good for branding. If they have websites with banners and advertisements that promote the brand, that helps with BRANDING and exposure.

Quotas are just plain stupid and a slap in the face to affiliates of ALL sizes.

Programs that hide behind these excuses will talk about how non-performing affiliates cost them money when in reality they do NOT. All they cost are a handfull of records in a database, a database that already exists. Sure they get newsletters just like the performing affiliates, but I guess they expect us to believe that these newsletters are only created for the sake of the non-performers.

How many times have we read that 5% to 10% of an affiliates revenue often comes from 80% to 90% of the players we refer?

Well a smart program knows that a large percentage of their revenue from affiliates come from a smaller portion of affiliates and that a portion of affiliates will NEVER perform.

Rick
Universal4

**GarryMc** · 19 February 2013, 1:26 pm

First off we’d like to say that we truly appreciate all feedback (both positive and negative), and take affiliate feedback into consideration when making decisions regarding the StanJames.com affiliate programme.

StanJames.com Affiliates has increasingly invested in the affiliate channel over the past few years, focused on supporting both large and small affiliates alike. Stan James does not actively look to remove membership to the affiliate programme regardless of performance levels, instead enlisting the philosophy of asking questions, working with affiliates to optimize their campaigns, and providing the support required for a successful partnership.

StanJames.com view the affiliate channel and individual affiliate relationships as vital to the success of the business. We are proud of the changes we’ve made to management of the programme and improvements the StanJames.com brands in 2012. These include the widely successful ‘Stan and James?TV adverts for Sports, Mobile and Casino to increase brand awareness, improved Casino player offer and Casino re-launch, and the reintroduction of best odds guaranteed on horse racing. We would like to think that the StanJames.com brand ethos of being straight forward, friendly and accessible is mirrored in the way we approach our affiliate relationships.

It is important to note that StanJames.com does not institute a policy surrounding player quotas, and the commission structures that affiliates work on are strictly revenue based (unless negotiated otherwise). In very rare instances, we do evaluate specific cases related to affiliate membership when affiliates have been unresponsive and dormant for an extended period of time; that being said, we are only an email or phone call away and will always re-review circumstances should they change based on the desire to promote StanJames.com.

On that note, we always welcome any feedback on improvements that can be made by StanJames.com to the affiliate programme, and will always take this feedback into consideration.

As ever, we look forward to your feedback.

Kind Regards,

StanJames.com Affiliate Team

Thread: Stanjames - Stole my commsissons and are kicking me out.

LinkBack

Thread Tools

Search Thread

Display

Stanjames - Stole my commsissons and are kicking me out.

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to casinog For This Useful Post:

The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to universal4 For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to foxtucker For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to Doolally For This Useful Post:

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to FictionNet For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to Pmig For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to alin04 For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to bradz21 For This Useful Post:

The Following 6 Users Say Thank You to xecutable For This Useful Post:

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to -Shay- For This Useful Post:

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to thebookiesoffers For This Useful Post:

The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to universal4 For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to FictionNet For This Useful Post:

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to universal4 For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to justbookies For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to GCG For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to justbookies For This Useful Post:

The Following 3 Users Say Thank You to universal4 For This Useful Post:

Posting Permissions