RELEASED: Fortune Audits

On Fri Feb 03, 2006, we sent this email to Fortune Affiliates.

On August 19th, 2005, an APCW Advisory Board Member raised concerns about tracking issues at Fortune Affiliates. The specific concerns surrounded the “Fortune Buddie” tool, which is offered to players by Fortune Affiliates during downloads of casino software.

The APCW then conducted a series of audits on Fortune Affiliate properties. All APCW computers where clean machines which had never been used for playing at online casinos. Additionally, the registry of each machine was checked for MicroGaming cookies and software, and all cache’s were cleaned.

We experienced the following results:

AUDIT ONE:
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Audit One- Info:

On August 23rd, 2005, an APCW auditor visited the Desert Dollar Casino through a member link. That auditor entered an email address ( XXXXXXX@yahoo.com ) and downloaded casino software with the Fortune Buddie.

Audit One – Issue:

After completing the download, the stat for the “hit” and “download” tracked correctly. Then the auditor visited Havana Club Casino using the Fortune Buddie. The auditor then performed the “regedit” function on the computer to find the MicroGaming cookies associated with Desert Dollar Casino and Havana Club.

The Desert Dollar cookie was stored as an “ehr” tag that tracked directly to the correct affiliate tag ( see attachment #1 ). However, the Havana Club cookie was stored as an “MS” tag, which is associated with either internal tracking and marketing at Fortune Affiliates, or Slick Street Marketing ( see attachment #2 ).

The APCW Director then spoke with Fortune’s Affiliate Manager David Sack on or about August 30th, 2005. During that conversation, the APCW Director was informed by Mr. Sack that the affiliate tracking through the “Fortune Buddie” was not possible. But that players who used the “Fortune Buddie” would be tracked correctly ( and thus credited to the appropriate affiliate ) when they opened an account with the same email address originally used.

Audit One – Conclusion:

The APCW feels that the tracking logic with the “Fortune Buddie” is extremely flawed. A tracking system dependent upon players entering an email address exposes the opportunity for lost affiliate revenue. In doing so, the Fortune Affiliates have conceded that their stats can not be guaranteed accurate.

AUDIT TWO:
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Audit Two- Info:

After our conversation with Affiliate Manager Sack, the APCW conducted a separate audit with a different auditor on September 5th, 2005. This time, the auditor used an APCW affiliate member’s link to visit the Royal Vegas Casino. The auditor download the casino software and once again elected to install the Fortune Buddy when prompted by Fortune Affiliates.

The auditor then played at Royal Vegas Casino, depositing $20 and losing it all. The account ( x x x x x x x x x x x with the email xxxxxxxxx@hotmail.com ) tracked to the correct APCW member.

Audit Two – Issue:

That same day, the same auditor used the Fortune Buddy to access Havana Club Casino ( noticing an MS tag in the link ). The auditor opened a new account at Havana Club ( x x x x x x x x x x x x x ), using the same account info ( name, physical address, phone, etc ), the same email address, and same payment information. The auditor deposited and lost $50 at Havana Club Casino. However, the account created through the Fortune Buddy did not track back to the original affiliate ( see attachment #3 ).

Audit Two – Conclusion:

On the surface, it appears that the tracking with the “Fortune Buddie” is more flawed than we previously believed. On this audit, the player did not get credited to the affiliate account even when all the information ( most importantly the email address ) was the same on both accounts.

AUDIT THREE:
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Audit Three- Info:

Five days later, on September 10th, 2005, we sent the same auditor ( on the same machine as the previous two audits ) to the Desert Dollar Casino. To get to the Desert Dollar, the auditor used a link that was emailed to him by Fortune Affiliates. This email account was the same one he registered with the Royal Vegas Casino ( xxxxxxxxxx@hotmail.com ) and had previously tracked correctly.

The link within the email sent to that address was an “MS” tag ( see attachment #4 ).

Audit Three – Issue:

The auditor downloaded and registered an account with Desert Dollar Casino using the same account info ( name, physical address, phone, etc ), the same email address, and same payment information. They did not make a deposit at this time, and the account ( player and download ) didn’t show up on the affiliates stats.

We concluded that this player’s ( and download ) didn’t show up because they had not registered until after the download. Therefore, we elected to take a different course of action with this account instead of depositing at that time.

We took no action with this account for several months. Then, on February 2nd, 2006, we decided to re-visit the Desert Dollar Casino as these audits were drawing to a conclusion. We used the same auditor on the same machine. Before attempting a deposit, the auditor contacted customer service at Desert Dollar and informed them that he had an account with the casino but didn’t recall his player account number. The customer service operator was able to pull up the auditors information ( including his other accounts at Royal Vegas and Havana Club registered during our previous audits ).

The operator told the auditor that the Desert Dollar Account he had opened back in September was considered a “fun” account and suggested our auditor re-download the software and register a new account.

Audit Three – Conclusion:

It leaves us completely baffled that the customer service representative could tell instantly on their computer that our auditor had three separate accounts that were all connected to the same player, while at the same time the affiliate tracking software cannot seem to accomplish this.

In our opinion, there is no reason that one software program ( used to track affiliate commissions ) could be so weak at simply cross-referencing player information while another software ( used by customer service ) can pull up that very same data whenever it’s queried.

We believe that this apparent disparity between the two programs is at best suspect, and at worst deliberate ( because we believe it could be accomplished if desired ). In any case, we feel this is not acceptable.

At the time of this report ( February 3rd, 2006 ), no statistical information was being reported to the affiliate about this audit.

AUDIT FOUR:
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Audit Four- Info:

On August 23rd, 2005, the APCW conducted the original audit in this investigation on the Desert Dollar Casino. This account was opened using the email address xxxxxxxxxx@yahoo.com , the cookie was stored in our registry using the “ehr” tag for the appropriate affiliate.

We received several emails from Fortune Affiliates in the days and weeks after we registered that account using that email address. On January 29th, 2006, we decided to send an auditor through the link provided in one of the email solicitations.

Audit Four – Issue:

The auditor clicked through the link in the email to Havana Club, which was an MS link. They downloaded and registered an account ( x x x x x x x x x x x ~ See attachment #5 ) using the email address listed above ( And in the first audit ) which correctly tracked the “hit” and “download”.

The auditor deposited $20 and played through the money.

Audit Four – Conclusion:

The stat for the $20 casino gain never showed up in the affiliate stats for January or February ( see attachments 6 & 7 ) as of February 3rd.

The only conclusion we can come to is that the original account at Desert Dollar was a “fun” account and therefore this players information did not track correctly. There are, however, several problems with that theory:

1. The Desert Dollar account showed in the stats, so we know that the real stats interface recognized the account.

2. We used the same email address to register the accounts, and we know that Fortunes customer service software can cross-reference player data if they choose to do so.

3. We were assured that, no matter what, affiliates would get credit for player activity if the email address was the same.

If there is some sort of technical loophole in the way we conducted this audit, it would revolve around the fact that the first account didn’t deposit, but the third account did. Whatever “glitch” this is, our lack of faith in tracking players through email addresses seems to have been justified. And it begs the question of how many players affiliates may have through issues such as this.

AUDIT FIVE:
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Audit Five – Info:

As we prepared this audit, we couldn’t help wondering about Fortune’s marketing practices. We decided to investigate how their cookies worked, how they go after players via email, and what they had to say about cross marketing to players affiliates brought in.

Audit Five – Issue 1 ~ How Their Cookies Worked:

Cookies are what help to give the proper affiliate credit for the players they bring in, so we conducted an experiment. All auditors cleaned their cache’s a minimum of TWO TIMES between the visits in this audit. None downloaded.

We sent three separate auditors to visit 7 Sultans Casino via affiliate links, MS Tags from emails send from Fortune, and by directly typing the casino name into their browsers. The results were interesting:

1 > We went to a portal we’ll call “Affiliate Site One” and clicked through to 7 Sultans, then to the download page. The tracking code for “affiliate one” stayed in the url the entire visit. We then closed the casino and went to “Affiliate Site Two” and clicked through to 7 Sultans again. The second affiliates tracking code showed up on the main casino page, but when we navigated to the download page the code for “affiliate one” returned. THIS IS WHAT’S SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. TRACKING IS CORRECT.

<<< We cleaned the cache TWICE >>>

2 > We went back to the portal site of “Affiliate Two” and clicked through to 7 Sultans, then to the download page. The tracking code for “affiliate two” stayed in the url the entire visit. We then closed the casino and went to the email sent to us by Fortune with the “MS” tag and clicked through to 7 Sultans again. The “MS” tracking code showed up on the main casino page and STAYED when we navigated to the download page. The code for “affiliate two” never returned. THIS IS NOT WHAT’S SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. TRACKING IS NOT CORRECT.

<<< We cleaned the cache TWICE >>>

3 > We went back to the email sent to us by Fortune with the “MS” tag and clicked through to 7 Sultans, then to the download page. The tracking code for the “MS” tag stayed in the url the entire visit. We then closed the casino and went back to the portal site of “Affiliate Two” and clicked through to 7 Sultans. The tracking code for “affiliate two” showed up on the main casino page and STAYED when we navigated to the download page. THIS SURPRISED UP. TRACKING IS CORRECT?

<<< We cleaned the cache TWICE >>>

4 > We then typed in “7Sultans.com” into our browsers and visited the casino. We got a “7s_Direct” code in the url tag, which stayed through to the download page. We then closed the casino and went to the email sent to us by Fortune with the “MS” tag and clicked through to 7 Sultans again. The “MS” tracking code showed up on the main casino page and STAYED when we navigated to the download page. This means that the MS tag OVER-RODE the “7S_Direct” tag. TRACKING IS CORRECT?

<<< We cleaned the cache TWICE >>>

5 > We then typed in “7Sultans.com” into our browsers and visited the casino. We got a “7s_Direct” code in the url tag, which stayed through to the download page. We then closed the casino and went to “Affiliate Site Two” and clicked through to 7 Sultans again. The second affiliates tracking code showed up on the main casino page, but when we navigated to the download page the code for “7s_Direct” returned. WHY CAN AN “MS” TAG OVER-RIDE THIS “7S_Direct” TAG, BUT THE AFFILIATE TAG DOES NOT?!

Audit Five – Issue 2 ~ Going After Our Players:

We set up THREE free email accounts and visited 7 Sultans Casino three times. For each visit we used affiliated links and cleaned our cache between visits.

Our first visit we entered email address #1 and began a download but aborted it. Our second visit we entered email address #2 and completed the download, but never installed the software. Our third visit we used email address #3, downloaded, installed, and registered an account.

We are happy to report that, so far, we have noticed no difference in the way Fortune Affiliates markets to these players who have yet to make a deposit. However, just as mentioned in previous audits, subsequent email offers for other Fortune Affiliate properties used the “MS” tags and not the affiliates tags.

We were assured, you recall, that those “MS” tags were for tracking only, and that the email addresses would give the affiliates credit for the player. That claim has thus far not been demonstrated in our experiences.

Audit Five – Issue 3 ~ What About Cross Marketing to Affiliate Players?:

Last week, we were recently in contact with a Fortune Affiliate Manager who did not know we had been investigating these issues. We point blank asked him about cross marketing to our players, and his response was surprising.

He stated that Fortune Affiliates view cross-marketing to players brought in by affiliates as “internal marketing efforts”. Therefore, affiliates are due no commissions on players that they ( internal marketing ) convert to other casinos.

We conveyed this to Affiliate Manager David Sack, and as of this week that affiliate manager no longer works for Fortune Affiliates.

Audit Five – Conclusion:

There are some seemingly disturbing things going on here. It appears to us that the function of which tracking tags over-ride others is a bit selective.

We are happy to see Manager Sack take action when it is appropriate, and hope that the employee we spoke to was very mistaken.

CONCLUSION:
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The APCW holds Fortune Affiliates ( and in particular David Sack ) in the highest regard. We have always had a tremendous relationship with them, and they have always been quite responsive to our concerns.

These audits have opened serious questions which we hope have logical explanations, or perhaps we have uncovered operational errors that can be corrected.

In either even, we look forward to a reply.

Thank You,

J.Todd – APCW Administrator