I’ve written previously about the few online poker rooms that are still accepting new US-based real-money players. As a quick review, they are:

Doyles Room Poker – 100% bonus on initial deposits between $25 and $1000!

Bodog Poker – 110% bonus on initial deposits between $20 and $1000!

Cake Poker – 110% bonus on initial deposits between $25 and $545!

Poker4Ever – 100% bonus on initial deposits between $10 and $500!

I’ve just spent several hours running down as many details as I can about their deposit and withdrawal options, and their associated fees. It is frustrating to say the least. Often times, the information that they have on their sites is out of date, unclear, or is contradictory to information that they have published elsewhere.

So, as far as I can tell, only DoylesRoom offers online poker with no fees for certain deposit and withdrawal methods. Specifically, DoylesRoom offers no-fee Visa deposits ($20 minimum); in addition, they will credit to your account any fees incurred when depositing via Western Union or MoneyGram (both $200 minimum). On the withdrawal side,  they offer 1 free check-by-mail per month ($20 minimum), as well as debit cards ($5 monthly fee + per-load and per-use fees).

Remember the good old days of  the free (or nearly free) e-wallets like FirePay, NetTeller, eWalletXpress, EcoCard, Click2Pay, QuickTender/UseMyWallet? Me too.  The current e-wallets that are accepted by various online poker sites all have 5% or more fees by the time you perform one deposit and one withdraw. The online poker site itself does not charge any fees to use these e-wallets, but the fees to load the e-wallet and then make a withdraw are substantial.

• BoDog Poker supports MyPaylinQ, which loads via credit cards at 7% fee, or for free via Western Union (WU). But the only payout option is WU with a $20 MyPaylinQ fee + WU fees.
• Cake Poker supports MoneyLineWallet (MLW), which charges $4 per load from your linked checking account. However, Cake Poker cannot payout back to your MLW account. Even if they could, there are MLW payouts fees — via a check for <$1000 (the fee is $10) and via a Bank Wire for larger amounts (with a $55 fee (plus your bank may charge an incoming international wire fee)).
• Poker4Ever supports PICCLUB, which has the same load and payout fees as MyPaylinQ.

DoylesRoom.ag has decided to keeps its online poker room open to US players. They are even allowing new accounts to residents of the United States (except WA and MD residents). They have recently moved to the Yatahay Online Poker Network, joining a half dozen or so other online poker rooms on the network. In addition, they are offering a LIMITED TIME initial deposit bonus of 100% when you deposit between $50 and $1000.

Doyle’s Room deals Hold’em, Omaha, Omaha Hi/Lo, 7 Card Stud, and 7 Card Stud Hi/Lo tournaments (both normal and turbo) and cash games in fixed limit (FL), pot limit (PL) and no limit (NL) formats. You can easily find your favorite game using the filters provided in the poker lobby.

The easiest way to make a deposit at Doyle’s Room is with your Visa card. Otherwise, you can deposit via a Bank Wire or a Person-to-Person transfer; however, these deposit options are obviously less convenient than depositing via your Visa credit card. There is a $50 minimum deposit — this is perfectly reasonable, in my opinion.

Your best withdraw option is probably a bank draft / check. Checks can be requested for between $25 and $2500 once per week and have no fee! You can also choose debit cards as your withdrawal method, but there is a $5 monthly fee, plus a load fee of $2 each time that you load the card. Debit cards usually also have a per-transaction fee when you use the debit card to make a purchase.

Your online poker options are limited if you live in the United States. Doyle’s Room is a solid online poker room that you should consider for your online poker play.

02 Apr 2009 Update: I just received an email from Jessica M., stating in part that: “I”m please to inform you that a check for $xxxxx dollars has been sent and you should be receiving it in a couple days more (5 to 8 days). The check number is xxxxx.”

Check payouts from Doyle’s Room have been delayed for 8 weeks. I’ve been in contact with Doyle’s Room in the past days and have been told that all payout requests since around January have been delayed.

Doyle’s Room moved to the Cake Poker Network about that time, and also picked up new payment processors. It was explained to me that both of these events are responsible for the delay.

Unfortunately (it was explained to me) there’s nothing that can be done to expedite anyone’s payout; they are being processed FIFO (first-in, first-out), and I was told that my check is still weeks away from arriving at my Ohio address.

To make matters worse, Doyle’s Room does not offer any electronic payout methods such as QuickTender, eWalletXpress, or Direct Deposit. Generally, payouts via these methods take days, not several weeks.

As a result of the payout delays at Doyle’s Room, the fact that they have no timeline for when this issue will be solved, and the fact that I have seen no formal communication from them about these delays, I am recommending that: (a) existing Doyle’s Room players make no additional deposits at Doyle’s Room, and (b) poker players looking to open an account on the Cake Poker Network look elsewhere, such as the 5-star rated BetUS Poker and Cake Poker.

Finally, I have reduced the star-rating for Doyle’s Room from 4 (above average) to 2 (below average).

While I have a high degree of confidence that all payments will be made, I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. I’ll keep you posted on their progress toward resolving this frustrating issue.

(Note: The information present on this blog is intended for entertainment purposes only. Please check your local, state and provincial laws before you gamble online. If your local laws prohibit online gambling then we recommend you consider an alternative form of entertainment.)