Here is the situation: I won a seat through a WSOP Express satellite (Must Play format), starting from a free Step 0. Unfortunately, I ran into visa issues, so I contacted the Events support team before the tournament to inform them that I wouldn't be able to make it. I have no complaints against GGPoker; they followed all the rules (they even credited $3,500 for travel expenses, so at least I made $3,500 starting from zero. Thank you).
Only WSOP could resolve my issue, as the ticket had already been transferred to them by GGPoker. The tournament has already ended. I was never registered for it, my chips were never put on the table, and now the ticket has simply been deleted from my account.
On April 8th, I wrote to WSOP support regarding the possibility of a refund in the form of a ticket equivalent or T-money, but received no response. I have written to them several times and even contacted the WSOP compliance department on April 20th, but still haven't heard back.
To reiterate, I am not blaming anyone. I activated the ticket myself without fully researching the visa situation. I played through all the satellites starting from a freeroll and won a $10,000 package. (Honestly, I never expected to succeed and didn't have much of a plan in case of a win, as it sounded impossible from the start). I was overwhelmed with joy; the odds of such a run in poker are about 1 in 100,000, so I believed in myself and activated the ticket. But it turned out that getting a Czech visa as a player from Russia is incredibly difficult.
Yes, I want to move on, but it’s frustrating that after such an incredible run through the satellites, 5,300 EUR was simply 'DELETED.' As I understand it, the buy-in stayed with WSOP since I wasn't registered in the tournament, so theoretically, they could return it. I'm curious to hear the community's opinion: what would you do in my situation?"