Newsletter: 26th May 2006

Hello and welcome to the 79th Issue of The Insider! As always, we've got plenty of info for you as we continually ensure that we provide you with the best gaming experience online. There are a lot of new developments on the site and we want to make sure that you're fully kept up to speed on everything we're doing at GameAccount.com. So, let's get a move on as it's been a busy couple of weeks!

In this issue: New Loyalty Scheme now live! Get weekly cashback of up to 2.5% of your stakes! New Panic Solitaire Hi-Score Instants! FREE Panic Solitaire and Tournament Blackjack Hi-Score Instant Game for every Real Money Player! Brand New Panic Attack Knockout Tournament! Follow Our Top Blackjack Tips, Hypergammon - The New Backgammon Game on the Block!

NEW Panic Solitaire Hi-Score Instants!

Fancy a big cash payout but only got a few minutes to play with? Then New Hi-Score Instants Panic Solitaire game is for you!

Start playing the Hi-Score Instants Game on the Panic Solitaire page and the higher your score, the more you win! Just play this fantastic version of the traditional Solitaire game as normal and work towards a high score. Build it up to the below amounts and you'll be a instant cash winner:

It's never been easier or quicker to win on Panic Solitaire!

FREE Panic Solitaire and Tournament Blackjack Hi-Score Instant Game for every Real Money Player!

That's right, we're so proud of our new Hi-Score Instants for Tournament Blackjack and now Panic Solitaire that we're offer ALL REAL MONEY PLAYERS a free game on each!

Just log-on as normal and follow the directions on the screen to claim your free Panic Solitaire Hi-Score Instants Game AND your free Tournament Blackjack Hi-Score Instants Game! And remember, any winnings you may receive from these are yours to keep!

Brand New Panic Attack Knockout Tournament

Worried about when you're next winning opportunity will come along? Don't Panic! We've got a fantastic new Panic Solitaire 6 Round Knockout Tournament that pits you against players from all over the world for some fantastic cash prizes. Pair off against an opponent and if you beat their score, you'll move up to the next round. Make it to the semi-finals and you're guaranteed to win £5 / $8 / €8 / A$13, even if you lose! What's more, the losing finalist will win £10 / $16 / €16 / A$26 with the tournament winner claiming a fantastic £50 / $80 / €80 / A$130, all for just a £2 / $3.60 / €3.60 / A$4.60 stake! What better way to pay the bills than by using your Panic Solitaire skills!

Hypergammon - The New Backgammon Game on the Block!

We've been busy working on improving our Backgammon game to ensure that it's the best online and we're proud to present our newest development - Hypergammon!

This fantastic new variation on the traditional game may offer new challenges and require new strategy but it's so easy to pick up that you'll love how quickly you could be winning!

Each player begins with three pieces rather than the usual fifteen so you'll have to adapt your normal game but the basic premise remains the same - move your pieces around the board using the dice and eventually move them off your end to claim victory! However, in Hypergammon, you'll start with one piece on each of the three furthest points of the board (the 22-point, 23-point and 24-point) so it's going to take a different kind of game to get them all home before your opponent!

You can currently play 1pt games of Hypergammon in our Backgammon Lobby, just open up a table and challenge a player. What's more, if you fancy a bit of practice, why not give one of our fantastic Bots a game? Just create a table and challenge either Beginner Bot, Rookie Bot, Amateur Bot or Pro Bot to a game (£1 games only for now - they need a bit of practise too!) and hone your skills to perfection. With 3pt, 5pt and 7pt Hypergammon games in development and ready to launch very soon, getting practising now on the quickest Backgammon game around!

Other Improvements to Backgammon

Hypergammon isn't the only development we've been working on. We've made further changes to Backgammon that are bound to make it even better!

You asked for 5pt Match Play games and we've delivered! No need to settle for 3pt or 7pt matches any more and, what's more, you can now stake £25 on any Backgammon game! The speed of gameplay has also improved so, alongside our fantastic easy-to-use lobby, we've giving you the best Backgammon game online!

New Bonus Loyalty Scheme now live! Get weekly cashback of up to 2.5% of your stakes!

Fancy getting up to 2.5% of all your stakes paid back to you every week? Of course you do, and what's more it couldn't be simpler. Just play your favourite games and we'll do the rest with our fabulous new Bonus Loyalty Scheme!

Our new Bonus Loyalty Scheme explained....

Our brand new loyalty scheme will reward you each time you play a cash-game on our site. It's quite simple - for every £1 / €1.47 / $1.47 / A$2.48 that you spend, we give you 100 loyalty points. We have split our scheme into three levels - Bronze, Silver and Gold. You only need to play cash games to the total value of £25 / €37 / $47 / A$62 to get to our first Bronze level. So if you play 5 games of £5 a time or 25x £1 games, you'll receive 2,500 loyalty points, regardless of whether you win or lose any of these games.

The more you play, the more you earn. At the end of each week we look at how many points you carried over from the previous week, how many you have earned that week and what loyalty level you have reached. Amazingly, we then pay you back between 0.5% and 2.5% of all your matched stakes back to your account as cash!

The levels are as follows:

Make Sunday Your Payday!
So, what do you need to do? Absolutely nothing! Just carrying on playing the games that you love everyday and we'll keep a track of how many points you are earning. Then, on Sunday night, we'll tally up your points total, add up points carried over from the previous week and pay you your rebate of up to 2.5% of your total matched stakes!

So, for example, let's imagine you carried over 4,000 points from last week (when you were at the 0.6% rebate level) and played cash games to the tune of £200 this week (e.g. 20 games at £10 stakes each). This generated 20,000 more points and gives you a total on the Sunday night of 24,000. This now puts you in the Silver category with a rebate level of 1%. We then pay you back £2.00 for your £200 of matched stakes (£200 x 1%), no questions asked!

Note, though, that on Sunday night, we also deduct 15% from your total points balance rewarding those who maintain or improve on their loyalty level the following week. So in this example, we would take away 3,600 points on Sunday night, leaving you a total of 20,400 to carry over into the next week. You would only need to play £6 of cash games to stay in the Silver level that week - or more if you wanted to move up the rankings towards the magic Gold level.

So you see, we'll do all the hard work and pay you real cash on Sunday night!

Follow our Top Blackjack Tips

Tournament Blackjack is the game everybody's talking about - especially now we've extended our Frantic Fives and Famous Fifteen Tournaments to run 7 DAYS A WEEK! So, with all these extra Blackjack winning opportunities, it's more important than ever to make sure you're fully clued in on the game to stand the best possible chance of claiming some fantastic cash prizes. We've picked out our 5 top tips that may not turn you into a Blackjack expert, but will certainly give you a little more confidence next time you make a trip to the table!

Analyse the Dealer's Hand
Effectively, you must imagine you're playing the Dealer's hand as well as your own. Some players assume that the Dealer's face-down card has a value of 10 (there is roughly a 1 in 3 chance that it will have) so you may want to play your hands accordingly when deciding whether to Hit, Stand etc.

Similarly, it may pay to have a system dependent on the Dealer's face-up card. If the Dealer shows a 6 or less, you could afford to Stand on a lower total or split your cards as the Dealer has an increased chance of going bust. However, if the Dealer is showing a 10, Picture Card or an Ace, you'll know that you're going to have to get a high total so you may want to keep Hitting (obviously trying not to get over 21!)

Use the Split
Knowing when to Split your cards is a vital component in winning big. Most player will generally always Split Aces as, in Tournament Blackjack, you have the added advantage of Hitting as many times as you like after Splitting. However, you may want to think carefully about Splitting 10's or Picture Cards as 20 is a very strong hand to Stand on.

Use Insurance Wisely
If the dealer shows an Ace, you'll be offered the option to take Insurance on all of your hands. Some players advise doing this on 2 or 3 hands only. That way, if the Dealer does get Blackjack you're partially covered and if he doesn't, you won't lose too much.

Keep some Stack Spare
Try not to bet all of your funds in an entire round. By keeping some of your stack in reserve you'll be able to Split or Double Down if the opportunity arises and it will also keep the Unplayed Hands penalty down to a minimum if it all goes wrong!

Know When to Play Defensively
If you think you've raised your stack enough to win the Tournament, start betting in minimum amounts and take Insurance when necessary to ensure that you conserve your funds. You don't want to blow it all if you're so close to winning!

Of course, these tactics will not guarantee you success but having a good strategy could be the difference between losing regularly and winning big money. However, if you've got any other tips you may want to share, send us an email on feedback@gameaccount.com and let us know. We'll give cash prizes for any top tips we publish in the next edition of The Insider.

Now you've got the tips - have you got the skills to win on our fantastic Blackjack Tournaments!

Our Frantic Five now run 12 HOURS A DAY, 7 DAYS A WEEK with scheduled tournaments running every five minutes from 12:00pm - 12:00am BST. What's more, with 2 fantastic variations available, there's never been a better opportunity to win than right now!

Frantic Fives Fixed Prize - The winner takes all in this quick-fire £10 / $16 / €16 / A$23 Fixed Prize PayOut!

• Frantic Fives Accumulator - There may be no prize seeding here but that only means greater payout ratios to be either split between the Top 2 or to be all won by one top player!

You want more? You got more - try our Famous Fifteen Tournaments now TWICE DAILY!

Tournaments start at:-
United Kingdom & Ireland: 8pm & 10pm
Europe: 9pm & 11pm
North America: 3pm & 5pm (EST)

But remember, these tournaments are only open for the first 15 minutes of the hour! Enter as many time as you like and finish in the Top 10 to win a share of the fabulous £50 / $80 / €80 / A$130 PayOut!

It Pays To Have Friends!

Bring your family members, office colleagues or long-time friends online to GameAccount. Refer a friend today & get paid in the process! Here's how:-

Head over to the Refer-A-Friend section on the GameAccount homepage. Tap the email addresses of your friends into the boxes provided and we'll send them an email invitation to join on your behalf!
When your friends sign up and deposit to play for prizes, they'll be awarded up to £10 / $16 / €16 / A$26 as a first-time deposit-matching bonus.
As the referring friend, you'll be automatically awarded with up to £10 / $16 / €16 / A$26 as well for each friend who started competing for prizes.
Each month, the Top 3 Referrers are each awarded £100 / $160 / €160 / A$260 extra!

As always, call us on the telephone and let us know what you think. From the UK on 0207 292 6260, International 0044 207 292 6260 or the US on 011 44 207 292 6260.

Or simply email customerservices@gameaccount.com and let us know what you think!

Let's Hear From You

Simply email customerservices@gameaccount.com with your comments!

We always love to hear from you (good, bad or otherwise).

The WhisperMan, inside GameAccount
+44 (0) 800 652 5056