Gambling Online: How to Avoid Scams and Keep Your Money Safe
With online casinos being around since 1995, more companies have been jumping on the online casino bandwagon. Thanks to technology there are more options than ever before on where to gamble online. Although this is convenient you really want to make sure you avoid getting scammed and losing out on your hard-earned money.
Read on to learn how to stay safe and not deal with any scamming companies.
Secure Connection
A pro tip on staying safe from scammers is to make sure that you have a secure connection while you are online. A perfect way to protect your information is using a VPN. The key to choosing a VPN is to make sure the company is reputable.
VPNs keep you safe while you are using the internet in a public place because the entire connection is encrypted.
Something else that will help you stay safe from scammers is to pay attention to how secure the company seems. Check if they perform a KYC process, which is where they are ensuring that those gambling are who they say they are.
Check Online Reviews
When you are considering an online casino, do your homework by reading the reviews online. The best online casino in Canada is full of positive reviews where players were happy with their experience and the platform. Reviews are a great insight into how trustworthy the company is and how reliable they are.
Before you commit to using a company you can read through all the feedback from others that already used the website to gamble. The reviews can set up your expectations ahead of time.
Make sure that the reviews are from actual customers vs from employees for the company. Also, if there are negative reviews evaluate if there is a trend with the same negative review and check to see if the company answered the negative review or not. If they take the time to answer it this might be a sign that they care and have customer service on their mind.
Choose the Games Carefully
Before you jump on the first game you see to start playing you need to take your time to ensure that you are choosing a safe game. The games that tend to be safest are traditional casino games such as blackjack, poker, and baccarat.
When you start playing a game we highly recommend to never chase your losses. Instead of chasing losses, call it a day and try again another day. This will help you stay safe and keep you from losing more money than you can afford to lose.
Be Aware of Slow Payments
Some casinos online scam their customers by taking long with processing payments. There should be zero hassle when you want to take out your winnings. Although every online casino will take a certain amount of time to process the withdrawal it shouldn’t take months.
When a casino takes too long to process payments this might be a sign that they don’t have enough funds to cover your payment. This sometimes happens when they owe money to their affiliate partners, or they owe money to software companies that helped build their site.
No matter the reason, no company should be using money that belongs to players to pay for expenses that should be taken care of by the company. Anytime an online casino is refusing to process your withdrawal this is a sign that it’s a scam.
Unfair Games
A casino is never allowed to change games in order to make them unfair. This means that legally they don’t have the right to make it impossible for their customers to win.
An online casino has a random generator that determines the cards that get dealt and what numbers the dice land on. This random number generator has to be random in order to make the game fair and equal for either the house to win or one of the players.
If you ever notice that a game seems to have rules or patterns that determine the end results of the game, this is a red flag that they might be running their games unfairly. A shady casino will offer games that have strange rules that are out of the norm that you won’t find in any physical casino.
Keep in mind that with table games, casinos have the right to slightly modify the rules. An example of this is that they can decide if the dealer stands or hits on a soft seventeen while playing blackjack.
Predatory Terms
When you first create your online account, there is always a button where you have to agree with the terms and conditions. The average person clicks that box without ever looking over the terms and reading them.
Because shady online casinos know that many people don’t read these terms and conditions they include terms that are predatory on purpose. These terms cover them legally to take advantage of customers.
One term they might include is a limit on how much money they can win with bonus funds. Sometimes they add in their terms that they have the right to exclude certain games from promotions without telling you. The problem is that once you click and agree with those terms and conditions you can’t do anything about it.
Some online scam casinos will even change their entire terms without ever notifying their customers. This leads to them changing the terms whenever they want to in order to avoid paying you.
Feeling Like an Online Gambling Pro?
We hope you can now gamble safely online and stay away from any scams or questionable online casinos. When you are gambling online make sure you are aware of the gambling laws in the state you live in.
Also, please don’t ever gamble more money than you can afford to lose. This can leave you in a terrible financial situation and it might be a sign that you need to seek help for a gambling addiction.
If you found our article helpful make sure you keep browsing this section for more tips and tricks.