Choosing an Online Casino

In this article I tried to collect all useful tips and advises about how to chose the "right" online casino. Post comments with correction and suggestions - and we could discuss it :)


The online gaming industry is very active on the Internet. There are dozens of casinos online to choose from. It can be difficult to tell which casinos are trustworthy and which are not, and you can be certain that there are online casinos out there that are not trustworthy or safe to play in with your hard-earned cash. Casinos that are not trustworthy are known as rogue casinos, and players might find themselves in a number of different bad situations when playing at a rogue casino.

For example, they might be unable to withdraw their winnings, unable to get a response out of customer service, or they might find that the games within the casino are not paying at a rate that the casino advertised. There are things to look for though when you are shopping for an online casino that will help you to avoid rogues and pick only the best online casinos in which to play.

Trustworthy and responsible casinos have their software certified by trusted third party testing facilities. This testing is to ensure randomness and fairness on all of the games within the casino, for example the online slots available at a casino. This testing should be ongoing on a regular basis (every few months for instance) and the certification should be posted prominently on the casino’s web site. The company that performs the testing should be a trusted company as well (easily found out by doing an Internet search).

Rogue casinos will often post on their site that they are certified as having fair and random software but will not be forthcoming about the third party that performs the testing or the third party will be an unknown entity that one would not be able to find any information about.

Customer Service is an important function of any online casino and should be investigated for timeliness of service and general helpfulness. If you cannot reach an online casino’s customer service department, this is a bad sign. The best online casinos will include a live chat feature on their web site where you can reach a live person 24 hours a day. Rogue casinos will often have no live chat, and very slow response times, or no response at all, when contacting their customer service department.

Hold percentage and payout percentage refers to the overall percentage amount that the casino pays out on the money they take in during wagering. For example, in online casino slots the payout percentage might be recorded on a casino’s web site as 97.4%. This means that 97.4% of all money wagered is paid back out to the customers. All online casinos generally publish this payout and hold information, but the most trustworthy casinos also post certification of these percentages by a third party. Rogue casinos sometimes do not post the information at all, or their information is inaccurate and not tested.

When a customer wins at an online casino, they will of course want to cash out eventually and retrieve those winnings. At a trustworthy online casino, this would be no problem, but at a rogue casino it might not ever happen. Often at a rogue casino, the player will be met with information stating that they have not met wagering requirements even though they have, and when they attempt to file a complaint or investigate, they receive no response from the casino with the net result being that they are never able to retrieve those winnings.

Be an educated player and read the fine print before you play. Make sure you are 100% familiar with all wagering requirements prior to accepting deposit bonuses and prior to making any wagers at all, so that you will know when and how you will be able to withdraw your money.

By educating yourself as a player and doing your research on the online casino of your choice, you will help yourself to avoid those rogue casinos and choose only the best. This will help to ensure that you have a great time, every time. Good luck!