If you're an online poker player, you should already be playing through a rakeback program. rakeback programs are an easy way to get money into your poker account without any effort on your part. You're not required to be a skilled player, you just have to play. In fact, if you have been a losing player, a rakeback program may make you a winning one, and if you're already winning regularly, you'll be winning more.
Rakeback returns part (about 30 percent, depending on the rakeback site and the online poker room) of your rake back to your account. The rake is the amount the online poker room automatically removes from each pot in order to cover their costs. Live poker rooms have a rake as well, taken out by the live dealer as the hand goes along.
Although the rake in a regular online online Texas Hold'em game is never more than five percent of the pot up to three to five dollars, that money adds up. Even though the money is taken out of the pot, making it seem like only the winner is penalized, the fact is that every player contributes to rake in the money that they pot into the various pots. Whether they win a pot is immaterial. In fact, your goal is to win large enough pots to make up for those pots that you contribute to and don't win, and rake is an obstacle to that goal.
Rakeback programs help you clear that obstacle. You just sign-up with a new poker site through a rakeback program, and you'll start getting your percentage of that rake returned right to your online poker account. All that's required is that you sign-up with a new site, and you do it through the rakeback site. Rake is usually calculated through one of two methods. The dealt or shared method, where each player dealt in is considered to have contributed an equal portion of the rake. Then there is the contributed method, where you are credited with a percentage of the total rake according to how much you have contributed to the pot.
However, what if you're not a cash game player? In tournaments, all the chips must remain in play, so the online poker room cannot drag any chips out of the pots. How then, can an online poker tournament player receive rakeback?
The fact is, online poker rooms take a rake from the tournament players too. They do this in the form of tournament entry fees, which are usually about ten percent of the tournament buy- in. That goes for all kinds of tournaments, be they single table sit-and-gos or major events. In this case, you can get a percentage of that tournament fee returned to you.
It is important to be aware that not all rakeback programs and online poker rooms necessarily handle tournament rake the same way they handle cash game rake, and some may not credit you with rakeback for tournament play at all, although many do. If you are primarily a tournament player, be sure you understand how your rakeback site and online poker room handles tournament rakeback before you sign-up.
More great Rakeback Resources from Treasure Hunter Poker:
