If you are a beginner here, use your credit wisely. Lending and borrowing are great ways to keep your poker accounts active, but try be smart about it lest you ruin your reputation. Here are some tips.

  • Don't try to borrow money if you are new here. This should be obvious, but you don't know how many people I have seen asking for several thousand points, and when I click on their name I see the account was created today. This looks like a scammer, so unless you are trying to scam, don't do this. Instead try to get to know people in chat, post in the forum and play in the freerolls and client games. People will lend to you once they get to know you.
  • Borrow small amounts at first. Try to make a name for yourself to build your creditworthiness. Like the 18-year old that gets the electric and phone bill put into his name so that he can one day get a credit card, you should ask for a few hundred points and pay it back on time. Rinse and repeat a few times and you will have a reputation that enables you to borrow even more in the future.
  • Don't pay back late! If you pay loans back late it will be noted in your feedback. This will translate into higher borrowing charges from the lenders, and eventually lead to your being cut off from credit altogether if it happens a lot.
  • Don't get in over your head. This is the most important one. Desperation is easy to detect and nobody, I mean nobody wants to lend to that guy that already has a late loan out in the "loan shark" section, and is messaging in chat and the poker client every night for loans through the market. Make sure you have a plan to pay back the loans you take out ON TIME, even if you manage to lose all the points. If you have no way to buy points and you are borrowing for 7 days, then don't ask for a 3,000-point loan, because there is no way you can pay that back if you lose it. 300 points is something you can more reasonably expect to pay back if you lose it all, by posting, playing the lottery and doing a couple surveys or videos here and there.


I'm sure there are more tips, so please post them old-timers!