Predictit charges a 5% withdrawal fee, presumably because they incur Admin fees to "Cut-a-check".

That's an exorbitant fee by any measure...and further...who the hell issues checks anymore.  This is a game stopper!

 Exactly, 5% fees are extremely high, please implement a direct deposit to bank account or something but the withdrawal fee is just too high

As I stated in another post:

I have an extreme desire to trade, hence I opened an account, but overall, online betting is a bad deal. If you lose, you get $0, but if you win, you get 15% in fees, plus federal, plus state taxes. My fees & taxes overall would be over 50% of my earnings. Hence the downside is twice as large as the upside. It only makes sense to invest if you are confident you will be right at a 2:1 ratio. The vast majority of people will not reach that level. Nonetheless I am grateful to PredictIt for providing this service.

See if I have this right?
I deposit $100, then buy 200 shares of a market @ 50¢ per share.
If I win, the share value is $1.00 per share or $200 minus a 90¢ transaction fee= $199.10.
Then, I cash out and pay a 5% admin fee on my $199.10, which equals $9.95.
So, my check from PredictIt is $189.15.
Is that right?

 

Shak, I'm afraid the fees would be more onerous than given in your example. Here's one of their two statements on fees:

Any time you sell a shares [sic] for a higher price than you paid, we charge a fee of 10% of your profit. There is no fee if you sell your shares at the same price that you paid or a lower price. There is also no charge to open an account with us or to deposit funds via credit card. If you wish to withdraw funds from your account, we charge a 5% processing fee. 

In another statement, they confirm that the 10% fee on profits also applies to shares that close at $1 and are held on account. So, in your example (and assuming I understand their bifurcated explanation of fees), you would pay a $10 fee on your $100 profit, then another $9.50 for the privilege to withdrawing your adjusted earnings of $190, for net proceeds to you of $180.50.

i agree - 5% is outrageous - also why is it 5% and not a fixed fee - it costs no more to issue a check for $1000 than it does for $100 but the fee is 10x larger.  makes it pointless to trade in this forum.

 

My thanks to DavePeters for clarifying this obtuse fee structure.

 

I think the 5% fee is mostly about recovering for costs PredictIt incurs when processing credit card deposits.

You're welcome, Shak.

Yeah, i agree that there should be some sort of way around the fee. I think a great idea would be to say that there is an X$ amount charged per check, and then cap that dollar amount. That way you get people only withdrawing when they have larger checks to take out. It would reduce the administrative headache for PI, and would reduce the transaction costs for us getting $ out of the site.

 

In addition to the seemingly high 10% fee on profit, the fee structure is straight out misleading.  I reasonably inferred that if my position was closed out at $1, the profit would automatically be mailed to me.  Instead, they cleverly merely "credit" my account.  That way, in addition to the 10% disclosed fee, they charge an additional 5% fee to redeem the "credit."  The fee should be clearly disclosed as 15% of all profits and not disguised as 10%.  It is never 10%!

True I didn't even know that there was a 5% withdrawal fee plus I didn't know that they would only issue me a check. I want to direct deposit period... I would have never joined the site had i known they didnt have direct deposit...

 

I think they mail checks as an implicit additional means of address verification, but repeatedly having large checks in the mail does get scary, insofar as I simply don't know one way or another what would happen if the post office lost any envelope.  Not speaking of these checks but just mail in general, most people have probably noticed how occasionally a postman drops an envelope in the wrong mailbox, like I've gotten unrelated mail addressed to neighbors and others.

Maybe, after the first withdrawal is done by check, allow direct deposit on subsequent withdrawals?

The fees serve a purpose, insofar as I want them incentivized to continue to maintain this great site, but always using mail alone seems unnecessary.

Alternatively, if continuing to use mail alone, maybe clarify the FAQ by explaining how a lost check would be handled, like if one could pay a moderate fee to have it canceled and then a replacement check mailed out?

Given the choice between withdrawal fees and transaction fees, I would rather have withdrawal fees. Transaction fees I think produce more "friction" in trading and may distort trading odds. I would honestly like all transaction fees eliminated even if withdrawal fees went up to 20%. I think in the long run, the site will do better with lower fees and higher volume, but the issue is getting from here to there.