Inside sweepstakes casinos and player complaints, with Mike Cuneo of SweepsGuard

Sweepstakes casinos are not regulated the way casinos are, so players who are refused payment have little recourse. Mike Cuneo, a former craps dealer and online poker pro, built SweepsGuard after a sweepstakes site shut his account. He tells Low Rollers host Eric Raskin, senior editor at ThirdPlanet Media, how complaints work and where the model is heading.

In this episode

• Cuneo wrote sweepstakes postcards full-time, starting with Chumba and its sister sites, until he was accused of software-assisted cheating; he says he was owed about $25,000 worth of postcards (10:45, 11:07, 11:59).

• SweepsGuard has recovered over $42,000 for players, but he puts the share of disputes paid back at around 10%; the most common outcome is no reply from the site (15:36, 15:43, 16:14).

• He grades sites A to F, with 24 of 372 at grade A; slow pay or no pay is the biggest complaint, followed by deceptive bonus terms and denied KYC (22:37, 23:21, 23:48, 24:03, 24:29).

• Asked if sweeps should be shut down, he says yes if you are objective, but that states should update their laws. He expects gaming licences and consolidation with big brands (17:17, 17:52, 26:13, 26:23).

• Operators are moving to card pack rips, which he says lets them back into all 50 states (27:15, 27:26).

• Raskin opens on the Ninth Circuit ruling against Kalshi and New Jersey's petition to the Supreme Court (3:09, 3:30).

Episode from Low Rollers by Casino Reports, published on YouTube.