Not all online casino bonus offers are as good as they seem

Once again the business news is full gloom and doom for the high street as it struggles to compete with our move towards internet shopping. Many of the big high street retailers do of course have their own online presence, which in turn enables them to compete with the internet giants such as Amazon, but others have been slow to react to the change in consumers’ behaviour. Many of the big online sports gambling sites and online casinos are also operated by the leading bookmakers who own the betting shops on our high streets, so again they have been able to survive the competition and have not yet had to seriously reduce their high street presence. There is however one common factor which applies to all businesses dealing with the public whether online or on the high street, and that is the need to attract new customers. It is the reason why all our online casinos offer some sort of online casino bonus for new casino games players, and of course why there are now far more sales events on our high streets than ever before. There is no doubt that we are all attracted by what we think is a bargain, but many of us are also increasingly aware that not every seemingly generous offer is as good as it may appear. If we go back to the online gambling scene for example, the free bets and cash back deals offered by the bookmakers through their sports gambling sites are fairly straightforward and easy to understand, whereas most of the online casino bonus offers are generally somewhat more complicated. The reason is that all the online casino bonus deals come with a list of terms and conditions which can make them far less attractive than they may appear for many potential casino games players. Most of the online casino bonus offers we see are welcome bonuses for new customers, and nearly all of them take the form of a promise to match a customer’s first deposit with a 100% bonus. Many of these welcome bonus deals also offer a reduced bonus on the second and even third deposits, but they are all conditional on the customer accepting the terms and conditions some of which can be problematic if they are not fully understood. The most important of these terms and conditions is what is generally referred to as the play through requirement. This defines how much money the new player needs to stake on playing online casino games before being entitled to withdraw any potential winnings resulting from the bonus payment. It is usually described as a multiple of the sum of the deposit plus the bonus, and is commonly a multiple of at least twenty times that sum. That means that a relatively modest first deposit of say 20 euros, attracting a 100% bonus of a further 20 euros adds up to an available pot of 40 euros. If we then multiply that sum by a factor of twenty the player would be expect to stake at least 800 euros on playing casino games before being allowed to withdraw any potential winnings.

On the face of it an offer to double the stake money available to play online casino games is very appealing, but needing to gamble twenty times that amount to qualify for the bonus may far exceed the amount that many people anticipated spending when they decided to try playing casino games at an online casino. This form of online casino bonus can therefore encourage some people to significantly exceed their budget and perhaps even get into financial difficulties as a result. There is nothing inherently wrong with this type of online casino bonus, but it is very important that any new players deciding to accept the bonus understand how much they are required to stake on playing the casino games I order to qualify for that bonus. There may also be a time limit applied to the play through conditions as well as restrictions on which casino games qualify in full towards those play through requirements. We are all liable to be a little lazy when it comes to reading the small print of any agreement particularly if we really want it, but understanding the terms and conditions of this form of online casino welcome bonus is vital if it is to be of any benefit to the player.

It may sound as if we are being very critical of the online casino operators for offering this type of welcome bonus, but that is not what we are saying. We understand that the online casino sector is a very competitive market and all the different online casinos need to attract new customers. We also understand that any online casino offering players the chance to play casino games with their money needs to ensure that those players stay on the site for as long as possible so that they have a chance of benefitting from the bonus offer. All we are saying is that anyone tempted to accept one of these bonus offers must be fully aware of the terms and conditions which apply to that bonus deal.

Not every online casino uses that type of welcome bonus to attract new customers however, there are a few online casinos which take a different approach. The obvious example of that is the No Bonus casino, which as the name suggest does not offer any form of bonus for new or existing customers. They have chosen instead to reward new players and their loyal regular customers with an interesting cash back deal. Any player making a deposit today and suffering an unfortunate run of bad luck that results in their losing all of that deposit on the same day, will receive a 10% cash back payment into their account the following morning with no strings attached. It is an interesting approach and clearly does not encourage irresponsible gambling which is also very welcome. At this stage we should also mention the Free Spins casino which is another online casino with no bonuses.