Poker Rooms double player donations to Haiti Earthquake appeals

January 20, 2010

The tragic news of the earthquake in Haiti taking an estimated 200,000 lives and the struggle of 3 million Haitians to rebuild their lives in the face of tragic natural disaster has affected everyone and the poker playing community is no exception.

Following the news many appeals for aid to help have gone out, governments have promised cash, rescue crews have been working around the clock and charities are mobilising.

As a result several poker rooms have launched earthquake appeals promising to match any donation made by their poker playing customers … effectively doubling any money raised which will go directly to the charities helping out the victims of the earthquake.

This is a great gesture on the part of the poker rooms and poker players showing that we as a community are NOT just in it for ourselves … Poker players too have a generous heart.

Pokerstars players alone have already contributed in excess of $475,000 to the pokerstars fund which will be doubled by pokerstars themselves, likely raising in excess of $1 million …

This is a massive achievement when you consider that a huge country like Australia has promised $10 million.

For those players who wish to donate via your favourite poker room they have setup up Haiti appeal “no play tournaments” in the lobby where all entry fees will be collected, doubled by additional funds from the poker room and directly sent to the charities …

PokerStars … Approx $475,000 raised + $475,000 matched = total $950,000

The appeal is running until noon on January 31, donation methods below:

In the PokerStars lobby, go to Tourney > Special and enter one of the dummy ‘Haiti Earthquake Relief’ tournaments listed there. ‘Buy-ins’ range from $1,000 all the way down to $1. You will not need to play an actual tournament, instead all of the ‘entry fees’ go straight to the fund.

Alternatively you can make a private player transfer for any amount to the account ‘Haiti Fund’. Go to ‘Requests’ in the client top menu and select ‘Transfer Funds’.

FullTilt Poker … Approx $264,000 raised + $264,000 matched = total $528,000

Aid for Haiti Tournament were running until 17th Jan & donations can still be made by transferring funds to the “Aid for Haiti” account. Fulltilt will match / double all donations made to the fund which will be sent to the Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders and UNICEF.

Other Site Appeals … Cake Poker, Absolute & Ultimatebet

Calvin Ayre Foundation / Igaming Industry … As well as poker players donating to the cause, Bodog founder Calvin Ayre has appealed to the igaming industry to raise $1 million for the Oxfam Haiti fund. The total amount of money donated to Oxfam on behalf of the online gaming industry will be announced at the LAC awards dinner in London on January 28th.

4kingpoker.com / scrawnybob will be making a modest donation to the appeal via pokerstars and also via Calvins foundation appeal with oxfam … Every little helps and I hope our forum members will also find some spare cash in their bankrolls to help some of the 3 million people and families who are alot less fortunate in Haiti … Donations on Pokerstars or Fulltilt can be as little as $1.

Written by admin · Filed Under Scrawnybob's Ramble