eWallet Updates

Moneybookers

The Moneybookers' credit card verification showed up on my online statement, so I plugged it in and my limit jumped up to $9500. Unfortunately, CIBC VISA processed the US$2.14 charge as a cash advance, and dinged me a CDN$5 cash advance fee (along with interest, of course). I called CIBC's customer support line twice to totally bitch about. I mean, why the hell would I advance myself $2.14 while incurring a $5 service charge? I tried to explain that the $2.14 was a fee for setting up my Moneybookers account, and wasn't truly a cash advance, but they wouldn't budge. They said that Moneybookers is classified as an online gambling merchant on their system, and that any and all charges from them would be billed as a cash advance. Oh well, at least it was still cheaper than setting up my ePassporte account, which had a US$5 fee for the inital $100 load.

I also received the snail mail address verification from Moneybookers. It arrived pretty quickly, after only about a week, since it was actually sent from a Mail Boxes Etc. from Campbell River, BC. After I plugged in the verification code, my limit jumped up to $16,200. I still have the bank account verification to do, though. If I can do a wire transfer for cheap from my sister-in-law's bank, I'll go ahead and do it, otherwise I'm sure I can live with the $16,200 limit.

Also, a Full Tilt rep on the 2+2 forums confirmed that they will be adding Moneybookers as an option soon, so if others follow suit, in particular PokerStars, then I'll probably end up using just Moneybookers as my primary ewallet.

ePassporte

I went ahead and tried to verify a second credit card, after not hearing back from them about my inquiry as to whether a second credit card would qualify me for Select status. I used my second CIBC VISA which I use for business purposes, and again it was no problem to get the amount of the pending transaction. However, this time after I plugged it into the ePassporte website, it said that it was the wrong amount. I adjusted the converted amount up by one cent in case it was a rounding difference from the currency conversion, but it gave me the same error and then locked me out of the verification screen. I converted the amount myself based on a couple recent currency exchange rates on my online VISA statement, and it was apparent that ePassporte's conversion rate was way off from CIBC's. I emailed them about the problem using their internal messaging system, but I wasn't hopeful for a quick resolution. They never replied to my previous inquiry, and from the messages on the 2+2 forums, their service is supposedly slow and not very helpful. To my surprise, though, they replied the next day and said they processed my verification manually. I then checked my Select upgrade status, and it said that I now qualify, so I went ahead and paid the $5 fee for the upgrade. All my limits have now doubled, with the most important one, the single cash transaction limit, now at a more useable US$1000.