Don’t you have a clause that states that affiliates cannot play under their own account? That’s fairly standard and not at all objectionable. It clearly makes sense.
Occasionally an affiliate will test tracking – usually a friend will do it but sometimes they do it themselves. But that tends to involve one minimum deposit, is no further trouble to the program and is usually ignored. Beyond that playing under your own account is a no no and should be in the T&Cs.
We have had programs in the past openly advertising that they welcome affs playing under their own accounts – undoubtedly because many affs are players themselves and will play their earnings back. But this is not at all common.
Re. opposing camps: I am about as easy to work with as they come, any program I work with will attest to that. I see it as a simple thing: “If you make a profit, I make a profit. Let’s do it!”
That said, I have staff and I need to watch the bottom line just as much as you do. I don’t do this as a hobby, but as a full fledged business with a ton of expenses, just like you.
So once every so many years I experience a trend in the industry that is harmful to affiliates, even illegal. And I get on a soap box. We are an unregulated industry for the most part, and no one will look out for us if we don’t do it ourselves.
And if you think about it, these issues usually hurt the entire industry, not just affiliates.
Quotas will dry up the influx of new affiliates, because they are least able to meet quotas. It took me almost a year to make any money worth mentioning. With a quota, I would not have been able to build the business and would not be here today.
What a quota does for a program, is take a small number of productive affiliates with high value player bases by the balls and force them to continue to send more of the same or forgo monies earned. Those who cannot afford to forgo monies earned to avoid living in an environment of constant extortion, will be forced to limit exposure to the programs with the quota in order to assure they have future earnings.
New programs will not have access to these established affiliates. They will be picking up the new affiliates who cannot meet quotas yet.
The entire industry growth will be crippled. Think about it!