Once upon a time, about the only place you could gamble in New Zealand was at one of the country’s 6 physical casinos, SkyCity Auckland, Christchurch Casino, Dunedin Casino, SkyCity Hamilton, SkyCity Queenstown, and Wharf Casino. While the 6 physical casinos in New Zealand are great for an hour or two to be perfectly honest, they are not all that they could be and certainly don’t replicate the Las Vegas or the Macau experience. And except the SkyCity Auckland casino which offers a huge selection of games, most online casinos beat the pants off of your typical physical casino experience in New Zealand on top of which, several casinos have rather conservative dress codes. It’s not surprising then that many, indeed the vast majority of gamblers in New Zealand choose to do their online gambling online. And New Zealanders love to gamble. It is estimated that over 40 per cent of the adult population participate in some form of gambling weekly. With that in mind, here are a few tips for getting the most from online casinos.
1. Choose the right casino
With there being hundreds of online casinos how do you go about choosing which casino to play at? One of the better ways is to understand how casinos are government rated and how that affects your chance of selecting a totally honest casino. In the world of online gambling, there are a few governments that regulate online casinos. While there is no world gambling body and so theoretically even Kim Jong Un could open up a casino and self regulate it, there are in actuality only a few places where online gambling is authorized and even fewer that are quite safe and legitimate. These include those casinos licensed by the UK Gambling Commission including Alderney and the Isle of Man, the Malta Gaming Authority in Malta, Antigua and Barbuda, Costa Rica, and Panama. There are also individual gaming authorities dotted across Europe, as well as online gaming authorized by an Indian tribe in Canada, So how do the various regulatory bodies fit in for getting the most from online casinos by planers in New Zealand? Well, as you can imagine, the UK sites and the Island of Man and Alderney sites are the most heavily regulated and are therefore totally legit. Unfortunately, the UK sites are heavily regulated as to which players they can accept. They don’t accept players from either the United States or New Zealand. Not as closely regulated but not far behind are sites regulated by the Malta Gaming Commission. First, as far as New Zealanders are concerned, there is no player discrimination from sites with a Malta Gaming Authority license. Second, everything is clearly inspected to be sure the casino operates fairly, and probably 90 per cent or more of the legitimate casinos found on the internet are licensed from Malta, or dual licensed for both the UK and Malta. AS far as the rest goes, you are taking a big chance when gambling at a site licensed in Central America, which simply rubber stamps the license, collects the fees, and doesn’t care how the games are actually operated. So stick to a Malta-based casino, and you should be able to find this information out at the very bottom of the Home page. Second, if you want additional assurance, look at the bottom for a casino that has an eCongra seal. The eCongra group is non-governmental, but actually checks the level of fairness in an online casino, such as verifying the random number generators are accurate. In some cases, eCongra will actually step in and help referee complaints that online gamblers may have. If you see an eCongra seal at the bottom of the main page as well as a Malta license, you are good to go.
2. Choose an online casino with the games you wish to play
This one is on you, but to find the right online casino, you need to know which games you will play. If you just love slots for example, then choose the casino with the largest selection of slot machines available, or in a rare case, is one of the few that offer that type of slot machine. Incidentally, playing slots is not that bad at an online casino, as slots on an online typically pay around 95 per cent return to player as compared to around 88 per cent on a physical New Zealand casino. But if your game is poker, look for a great online casino that offers multiple poker games. And if you love to play blackjack, baccarat, or craps, look for an online casino that offers live games in these avenues.
3. Easy deposits and quick deposits
Besides having the games you wish to play, a typical New Zealand online player needs to sort through the Frequently Asked questions to understand all of the avenues for making a deposit, the time period to expect for a withdrawal request to be processed, and in what format the deposit will be forwarded to you. Typically online casinos accept deposits by credit card which is the most secure, debit cards, E-Wallets, Poli, and Wire Transfer. Look for most payout requests to be made within 2 to 3 business days, and note that most payments are made concerning the avenue they were deposited. Payouts of 2 to 3 days are expected. Be might cautious of casinos that payout in a week or 10 days. Before depositing money into an online casino, we can’t emphasize enough how important it is to read those FAQs because this is where all the to legalize is hidden. If there is something you don’t like, we recommend that you pass and go to another online casino.
4. Customer Service
One of the important things to read in the FAQs is information about customer service. Some casinos offer great customer service, some only pay lip service to it. Find out first of all, how you contact customer service. Is there a phone number you can call 24-hours per day? Alternatively, do they have a chat service which is manned at all times? It can be incredibly frustrating to find an online casino you like, deposit some money, and then there is some kind of hold up in their verification process and then it takes you 2 days to straighten it out. The better the customer service, generally the better the online casino.
5. Bonuses
You’ll notice that we put the information on bonuses dead last. That’s because when you find a great online casino, we urge you to stick with it rather than to flit from casino to casino chasing bonuses. We find that most bonuses take a licensed New Zealand barrister to sort out as there are dozens of conditions. If you choose a great online casino and it happens to have decent online bonuses for playing with them, then go for it, but even if the bonus is not so good, if everything else is favourable, then it’s worth looking into.
6. Online reputation
Finally, if you have questions about an online casino, hundreds of websites will give you a good sense of the online reputation of a casino. One word of warning about this approach though. Online gambling sites and reviews are sorted into one of two types, legitimate reviews, and those that are under the table being paid to hype a casino’s website. Just be sure you are paying attention to the former rather than the latter,
