At ProfessorT&C we have made it our business to take apart the terms and conditions of casinos, sportsbooks and poker sites. Because, to be honest: nobody wants to read them. Everyone clicks on “I accept” and then experiences nasty surprises. The casino can then say at any time “it says so in the terms you have accepted, there is nothing we can do”. I think everyone knows this situation and it happens even at the largest and most famous casinos and providers.
The possibilities how a provider can change everything in his favor are great. And even small changes have great influence. In the past, it was so that casinos suddenly limited the conditions of blackjack or roulette. At the very beginning it was possible to implement 100% of the bonus with these games. Those were fantastic times! Then they reduced the percentage bit by bit so that today it is 5 or 10%. If you don’t know that and expect to be able to play a bonus in Blackjack, you will have a rude awakening.
Excluded slot machines
Online casinos are not necessarily unfair. But they try of course to adjust the conditions in their favor. The fact that you can no longer clear a bonus in blackjack has gotten around. But e.g. not that there are also slot machines that are partly completely excluded from the turnover. These are mostly slot machines with high RTP (Return to Player) and here there are big differences from casino to casino. Some casinos exclude a few dozen of them, others again only a few. These games you must know absolutely before you start to unlock a bonus. There is nothing worse than playing for weeks only to find out in the end that you have not gotten any further with the bonus.
Difference between live and online
There are people who now only play in live casinos. And with good reason, because live roulette, blackjack, baccarat, craps, etc. can be much more fun because you simply have a social aspect. This does not really come up in classic online games against a random number generator.
When it comes to releasing a bonus, there can be big differences between live and online games. The reason is obvious: The costs for a casino are much higher because you have to rent a room, hire dealers, etc. Even if casinos share this through so-called live dealer networks such as Netent or Evolution Gaming, the share is not too small. Therefore live dealer games usually contribute less to the bonus than normal online games. Often it is 5% instead of 10%.
Turnover requirements
In the past, casinos were so generous and offered very low wagering requirements of 20 or 25, meaning that you only have to wager 20 or 25 times the bonus amount to convert it into real money. Today, the wagering requirements are more like 30 to 35, and few casinos are above or below that. On ProfessorT&C you can see these conditions and assume that this data is also current. Because a casino changes its conditions from time to time.
Basically, of course, the lower the better because then the bonus can be converted more quickly into real money. But it also depends on the details. What good is it, for example, if a casino excludes all slot machines with high RTP from the turnover? Or you can only free up 5% on roulette if you enjoy playing roulette from time to time?
Freespins
Many people consider freespins as a gift of money but they are not. Normally it works out that you get for example 10 freespins. You can use these and win e.g. 10 Euro. It’s not like you can just pay out the 10 Euros. You usually have to bet them as well. Some casinos require the same wagering requirements as for deposit bonuses. But in our opinion this is not very fair. Normally, the wagering requirements are usually lower, for example, 10x. This means that you still have to wager 100 euros to get the 10 euros as real money. That is also not little but easily doable. Unless the casino does not require that the amount must be wagered only with bonus money. This brings us to the next topic…
Turnover with own money or bonus money
There are casinos that require that a bonus must necessarily be wagered with bonus money. This means that if you have to free 100 euros bonus, you must do so with these 100 euros. You can then not use your own money to meet the turnover. And if the turnover conditions are at 30 that is 3000 euros that you must first create with 100 euros. Even if you concentrate on a slot machine with a good RTP you will lose 75 Euros on average with a 3000 Euro turnover – and this with a RTP of 97,5% which is very high. The bottom line is that there is not much left of the bonus unless you have a very good run.
Such casinos require a deposit to activate the bonus and only allow the bonus to be released when your deposit is used up and only the bonus is available.