DTD could close soon?????

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Taken from http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/news/Poker-club-close-doors-weeks/article-1040893-detail/article.html NOTTINGHAM poker club Dusk Till Dawn is "highly likely" to be shutting its doors in two weeks' time. Rob Yong, owner of DTD, said: "It's very saddening after all the hard work that myself and my staff have put into the club but it's highly likely we'll be closing." If the club shuts it will result in over 100 people being made redundant. The controversial club opened its doors less than two years ago in late 2007, becoming the first legal poker-only club by obtaining a casino licence. This was contested by the Big Three casino chains – Stanley's, Gala and Grosvenor – who feared that it would spark the growth of more poker-only clubs. The casino licence has become a burden for the club as it is recognised as a full casino despite not hosting table games such as blackjack or roulette. This means that the company is unable to claim back VAT on its £3.4 million refurbishment and is subject to new gaming duty laws.

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Re: DTD could close soon????? A post from Rob Yong on another forum Hi guys, i don't want to get into a Q & A / debate about this, but i'll post once to put everyone in the picture. Nick is away for a week and we both agreed that we would get last week's "festival of doom" out of the way and we would look at things objectively when he get's back, with all the facts and figures on the table. Things are up and down in business and noone forces anyone to invest in a project, the government cannot make laws for Dusk Till Dawn, we are the only one of its kind but we made the decision to do this and with that we must take the conseqences "on the chin". I does look like the Nottingham Evening Post have jumped the gun a bit, there is no chance we will be closing in the next few weeks but it is true that the medium and long term future of Dusk Till Dawn is in question, and one of these options is shutting the doors, as it would be cheaper to do this and pay the lease costs on an empty building, than keep it open. When we budgeted this project, we knew we would have to carry the addional running costs such as licencing fees and complaince procedures., but we seem to have caught in the middle of other stuff asscoaited with being a full licenced casino, there are 3 main problems; 1. The VAT hit us with additional costs catergoring our 50 poker tables and the space they take, as effectively 50 roulette tables, therefore we cannot claim VAT back on almost all of our start up, re-fit and running costs, becuase effectively we have a hige space dedicated to gaming. 2. Our business rates have recently been tripled by the Counil, we are now paying the same rates as a full casino with 50 tables 3 The recent "poker tax" legislation on MTT/STT juice and cash game rake DTD has been more successful that we budgeted in terms of revenues, we never expected 1300 footfall on a regular week and the monthly/third party events have exceeded all our forecasts, this has been due to a lot of hard work put in by the DTD staff, however, I think many of us feel like we are just "flogging a dead horse" due to the additional taxation costs ie. as soon as we get some success - something else goes wrong. We all like challenges, but the fight to even open the place took a lot out of everyone, including me, and getting hit with more bad news continually - which is out of our control, is very frustrating. As the moment, some of us feel a little "punchdrunk" - especially me, so we need some time to do some logical thinking, there will be no knee jerks reactions over the coming weeks and there is no chance that we will consider anything that is not 100% legal, it's time to take stock after a whirlwind few years and whatever happens, I am especially proud of everyone that helped us to open the doors in the place. Thanks for your comments, Rob