Make sure you understand any online casino bonus deal

There are very few business sectors in the modern world that are not extremely competitive, and in most areas there will probably be a huge number of different organisations attempting to attract customers from their rivals. That is clearly one reason why some of the big marketing consultancies have become so important in many sectors and consequently very successful businesses. The online gambling sector and the online casino sector in particular are no different in that respect, and if anything the competition is getting even more intense as more online casinos come on stream. In the early days of online casinos most of the available sites were operated by the big bookmakers who had simply added a few casino games to their online sports gambling sites. Over the last few years however we have seen several specialist online casino operators join the sector so that casino games enthusiasts now have far more choice than ever before, both in terms of the range of casino games on offer and also the number of accessible online casino sites. Ideally of course the choice of which online casino we use should be based solely on the quality of the casino games they offer, but as with most other businesses they believe they need to do something to attract us to their site in the first place, which is why we see so many online casino bonus offers. The problem is that whereas the bonus deals offered on the sports gambling sites operated by the bookmakers are relatively straightforward and easy to understand, almost all the online casino bonus deals come with a list of terms and conditions some of which can lead to misunderstandings on the part of their prospective customers. When a company such as Paddy Power offers a cash back deal or a free bet for their sports gambling customers, it is generally as simple as that with no strings attached. Unfortunately that does not apply to the majority of the online casino bonus deals offered by most of the site operators, including the big bookmakers such as Paddy Power. Not only do the terms and conditions associated with most of these bonus deals make them far less attractive than they may appear at first glance, it is also debatable whether they actually achieve the desired result of attracting customers from their rivals because most of them are almost identical.

The most common type of online casino bonus offer takes the form of a promise to match a new customer’s first deposit with a 100% bonus thereby effectively doubling the stake money they have to gamble on playing casino games. Most of the online casino operators who employ this type on online casino bonus deal to attract new customers also offer reduced bonuses on the second and even third deposits made by a new player, but they all come with similar terms and conditions which must be fully understood before a new player agrees to accept the bonus. The most important and almost certainly the most misunderstood of these terms and conditions is what we refer to as the play through requirement. This specifies how much money a player must stake on playing casino games in order to qualify for the bonus and before they are allowed to withdraw any potential winnings which may result from that bonus. The play through condition is usually defined as a multiple of the total sum of the deposit plus the bonus, and is commonly at least a factor of twenty. That means that a new player making a relatively modest deposit of say 20 euros, and agreeing to accept a bonus of a further 20 euros would need to wager at least 800 euros on playing casino games to satisfy the play through conditions. Some online casinos also put a time limit on the play through conditions and specify that some casino games do not qualify in full for the play through requirement. Clearly there are some potential online casino games players for whom that sort of play through commitment would be perfectly acceptable and within their budget, but there are at least as many other potential players for whom that level of expenditure is well outside their budget making this type of online casino bonus deal totally unsuitable for them.

Here at onlinecasino.ie we totally understand why many of these terms and conditions are deemed necessary by the online casino site operators. They are after all offering new customers the chance to play casino games with the operator’s money rather than their own, so it is fair that they want those customer’s to play on the site for as long as possible in order to have a chance of getting their money back. It is also true that some casino games such as roulette have a smaller house edge than others so the odds are more in favour of the player than other games, which is why the game of roulette can be downgraded in terms of qualifying for the play through requirement. Both of these factors are perfectly logical reasons why there need to be terms and conditions associated with this type of online casino bonus, all we ask is that potential new customers tempted to accept one of these deals are fully aware of the commitment they are signing up to. As we have already said however it is also easy to make the case that a welcome bonus offer of this type does not actually make one online casino site stand out from the crowd because almost every online casino offers a similar deal. Of the online casinos on our recommended list only the NoBonus casino offers a different approach to attracting new players. In this case they offer an innovative cash back deal which applies to all their casino games players, new and existing. The idea is that if anyone has a run of bad luck which results in them losing the whole of their deposit on the same day, they receive a 10% cash back the following morning as consolation.