Given the title of this article, it does seem as if we are about to unveil some great casino secrets that have been tricking players out of their money for years.
Of course, that is not the case at all. All the information in this article is freely available from reputable casinos. The information is most often found in the Terms and Conditions section of the site, stated in black and white for everybody to see.
It is just that most players are often unaware of it!
So the question is why do online casinos refrain from making some of the key tenets to its use by players, somewhat hidden away on the Terms and Conditions page of the site? Doesn't that make it sound a little unfair?
Not really. Online casinos are like any other business. Their aim is to provide a service to customers and in doing so, generate a profit once all its overheads are met.
In no other business would you expect an advertising campaign where the negative sides of a product or service are pointed out. You won't ever read "The new Ferrari Enzo - Not quite as good as an Aston Martin DB9 and a fair bit more expensive than a top of the range Maserati with no real discernible difference in performance. Oh and they cost a small fortune to service ever few weeks too."
When a casino is thinking about its marketing, it has to promote the aspects of the casino that will appear positive to customers. However, in order for it to be viable as a business, it has to ensure that it will generate a profit and that comes by having certain rules and regulations in place that will ensure that.
What does this mean? Well it means that in order for the casinos to generate a profit, punters have to, in the main, lose. A few lucky ones may find their time at a casino ends up in profit, but the majority will lose money.
If you are a casino player of any sense, then this will not come as a surprise to you. All casino games have an built-in house edge that means that across thousands or millions of plays, the casino will turn a profit over time. That has been the case ever since the first casino game was played in the history of humankind.
So to help preserve profitability and to allow casinos to continue to offer players a myriad of bonus, promotions and other incentives to keep them playing at the site, there have to be some rules in place to help the casino ensure they can run all these offers and still maintain a profit.
These are the rules that are often hidden away in the Terms and Conditions and which novice punters especially, can be unaware of, often until they fall foul of them and complain that it is 'unfair', when in actual fact, it is nothing of the sort.
So here's three key snippets of information that your casino won't be broadcasting in its advertising or across its front page, but which it is important for punters to know and understand:
1. Wagering or play through requirement for your new player and other bonuses
Arguably the most important thing a casino doesn't make obvious knowledge is its play-through requirement for your new player (or any other) bonus you receive from them. Many players wrongly assume that when you are credited this money, it is yours to withdraw as you wish. Well no, it is not 'money' in the real sense of the word, what it is, is a chance to spend real money rather than play money when trying out an online or mobile casino.
Once you have understood that subtle distinction, then the rest of the play-through requirement makes sense. If a casino has a 40x play-through requirement for your bonus, that means if you receive a 100 bonus, then you will have to make 4,000 worth of wagers before you can withdraw any cash generated from that initial bonus amount.
But what does that actually mean? Well, let's use a simple example. Say you receive a 100 bonus and you play all of that bonus on a slot and on your final spin, you land a win of 5,000 credits. Does this mean you have now met withdrawal requirements?
No, it does not. You have still only wagered 100 of the 4,000 you need to play with in order to release any funds. Therefore, you still have to wager 3,900 credits more in order to realise any funds left in the account.
Let's now say that you wager 3,900 and don't win any extra cash. You have now met the 4,000 you needed to spend to lift the withdrawal requirements so the remaining 1,000 in your account can now be withdrawn.
Although a very simplistic (and perhaps unrealistic) example, it clearly shows how you will need to wager much more than your initial bonus in order to get your hands on any of this cash.
As such, it is best not to view your bonus as a cash reward. See it as a chance to try out some games at the casino for free and suddenly, this bonus looks more appealing.
2. Withdrawing your money is more difficult than depositing
Another thing casinos won't tell you is that while depositing into your account can take a matter of seconds from any reputable funding source; withdrawing cash from your account back into your bank or back onto your credit card, can be a much more involved and lengthy process.
The important thing to note here is that it is not because the casino doesn't want to stop you withdrawing your money. Ideally, any online casino wants you to keep funds in your account and add to them, but there are some very important reasons why withdrawing funds takes a lot longer.
The first of these is of course, security. How would you feel if you won 5,000 at the casino, logged out and then a day or so later logged back in to discover that an opportunist hacker had accessed your account, withdrawn your winnings and left you with nothing?
As such, security is vital when withdrawals are initiated. This often means that the customer will be subject to ID checks. Casinos ask for official documents (passport, drivers license, and a utility bill showing your name and address) to be scanned and sent to them.
Then to give the casino time to process this data and ensure you are who you say you are, they need time to check the veracity of the withdrawal, hence why some withdrawals can take anywhere from 24/48 hours to a week or more to process.
So yes, withdrawing your money is not as easy as depositing and while this may be inconvenient at times, it is absolutely necessary that this is the case to ensure the best standards of security for the casino and your account.
3. Why casino's love slots players
Casinos love slots players and while it is easy to ascertain this from the number of free spins and other pokies-based offers you can find online nowadays, the real reason why casinos love slot players won't be immediately apparent.
To understand why casinos love slot players, you need to understand two things. How popular slots are and their importance to casinos finances, and lastly, the house edge on a typical slot.
The first thing to note is that it is estimated that between 70 to 80 per cent of a typical online casinos turnover is generated from slots play alone. That is a huge amount of money for any casino. Industry-wide, that is billions.
Therefore, "slot money" is vital for the online casino industry and the reason why is more than simply more people play slots, but also that slots are more profitable for casinos than many other forms of games they offer.
Some card games (such as blackjack) or bets in games like roulette, baccarat or craps offer the player a higher chance of success. These games and bets therefore don't generate the casino the big profits.
Slots on the other hand only pay out comparatively infrequently and the fact that they are truly random and no external factor (such as strategy in blackjack) can affect the odds of a spin, they are reliable sources of income.
Sure some players will hit the big progressive jackpot slot and win millions. That is the dream of all slot players in much the same way that a lottery ticket holder wins of winning the big one each week. They hope they will win, rather than expect to.
Casinos may not make this information initially obvious and it may seem 'unfair' to some newer players, but a quick investigation into why casinos keep some things quiet quickly reveals that far from deceiving players, these issues are actually aimed at ensuring the casino remains profitable so that it can continue to offer great games, freebies and bonuses to players for many years to come.
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