Casinogrounds advertising False advertising of bonuses for UK Players

[christaney]

Hello,

I want to complain about the 'Bonuses' CG are advertising for UK players. SPECIFICALLY the PartyCasino 'bonus' and the Leovegas 'bonus'

CG are adertising the attached Party bonus on their homepage for UK players. Nowhere in their advert does it have any small print and nowhere does it state any special conditions.

I deposited £200 and when the bonus did not add I went on chat. I was then told I had to wager my deposit 35x before getting the 'bonus cash'. This is not a bonus. This is cashback and this is Casinos attempting to circumvent tax in the UK on deposit matches. Nowhere does CG advertise this requirement (they do for Leovegas however, again not a bonus and should not be advertises as such). If you look at one line way way down Partys Welcome page you will see in small print it says you need to wager the cash 35x. This is CLEARLY in breach of the new consumer rights Act which came into effect in 2015 to prevent companies from doing this. 

How many people from the UK will deposit into Party Casino thinking they will get a £200 bonus only to be told this and through frustration spaff their money away? This is irresponsible from CG and blatant false advertising.

CG are also offering UK players £100 get £100 on Rizk. However when you sign up again this is false. See attached image. They only offer a £50 get £50 for UK players as confirmed by chat?

I am very dissapointed as a long time viewer of kim and Nickslots to find these shady practises going on at CG.

I hope someone messages me or rectifies this or I will be including CG in my complaints to the ASA. 

Chris

[christaney]

This was Rizks response....S

[christaney]

Now NYSpins. Signed up and deposits £250. Attached is CG's add for UK players... Clearly states £5 max bonus bet. 

Max bet however in cash when a bonus is attached and when in bonus is £1!!!!!! More false advertising.

 

Thats three casinos on your site for UK players I have attempted to sign up to and all are completely wrong!

[Spinningforfun]

But at the same time tho lol terms and conditions Should had been checked bye you your self, you as a player should had checked all terms and conditions before depositing 

[Andreas]

Hi Christaney,

We will review the terms for our UK casinos and see to that they are up to date. We have no intention or benefit what so ever to mislead, and we sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused.

Especially with UK, the casinos make very frequent changes to the offers (due to many offers being abused/economically not working) but this is no excuse and we will establish procedures to ensure outdated info is there at a minimum.

With regards to a post-wager bonus not being a bonus, I think we disagree here. It should however be made clear and we shall see to this.

All the best,

Andreas

[christaney]

4 minutes ago, Spinningforfun said:

But at the same time tho lol terms and conditions Should had been checked bye you your self, you as a player should had checked all terms and conditions before depositing 

That's completely false. The new consumer act which came into effect in Oct of 2015 protects consumers in this case. It specifically states vendors must adhere to consumer regulations and advertise all meaningful terms clearly....All the above casinos and CG have not done this. The casinos have obscure terms thousands of words buried in their Ts and C's and CG are advertsiing completely different terms all together.

[christaney]

1 minute ago, Andreas said:

Hi Christaney,

We will review the terms for our UK casinos and see to that they are up to date. We have no intention or benefit what so ever to mislead, and we sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused.

Especially with UK, the casinos make very frequent changes to the offers (due to many offers being abused/economically not working) but this is no excuse and we will establish procedures to ensure outdated info is there at a minimum.

With regards to a post-wager bonus not being a bonus, I think we disagree here. It should however be made clear and we shall see to this.

All the best,

Andreas

This doesnt help me with money I have deposited into casinos and not received the offers advertised to me. I also have money trapped currently in NY spins and Party as I am certainly not playing at this casinos now. I assume CG will take no responsibility or help here? Simply blaming me/casinos for not reading the terms? FYI the casino agents are blaming you for not having updated terms and ignoring the UK 2015 Consumer Act.

A post wager 'bonus' is by definition not a bonus. It is casinos in the UK circumventing tax laws in a way to try and get around paying tax on the bonuses. They are packaging Cashback in a misleading way in an attempt to trick new customers. The very fact you dispute this shows either an ignorance or disingenuousness on CG's part.

I am very concerned about how many people will have deposited and lost money because they did not receive the offers you advertised and spaffed their money away in frustration. 

[Andreas]

I don't see how it's cashback when you get it based on completing turnover, not losses? You could very well be up several grand when it converts, and should you lose it all when it does, it is no different from a tax perspective.

We are absolutely open to try and help. I will ask my colleague to reach out to you. 

[Brian porter]

To be honest CG should check with the relevant casinos on what bonuses are available an stuff. 
 

I have had this before myself where the bonus is totally different than advertised. 
 

But you don’t have to take a bonus or offer either. 
 

there are plenty of casinos out there that offer bonuses and offers which are decent.  
 

 

[Skylined87]

38 minutes ago, christaney said:

This doesnt help me with money I have deposited into casinos and not received the offers advertised to me. I also have money trapped currently in NY spins and Party as I am certainly not playing at this casinos now. I assume CG will take no responsibility or help here? Simply blaming me/casinos for not reading the terms? FYI the casino agents are blaming you for not having updated terms and ignoring the UK 2015 Consumer Act.

A post wager 'bonus' is by definition not a bonus. It is casinos in the UK circumventing tax laws in a way to try and get around paying tax on the bonuses. They are packaging Cashback in a misleading way in an attempt to trick new customers. The very fact you dispute this shows either an ignorance or disingenuousness on CG's part.

I am very concerned about how many people will have deposited and lost money because they did not receive the offers you advertised and spaffed their money away in frustration. 

@christaney I've reached out to you in PM. 

[christaney]

34 minutes ago, Andreas said:

I don't see how it's cashback when you get it based on completing turnover, not losses? You could very well be up several grand when it converts, and should you lose it all when it does, it is no different from a tax perspective.

We are absolutely open to try and help. I will ask my colleague to reach out to you. 

It is simple maths. Having to wager your deposit 35x before reveiving a 'bonus' as cash completely circumvents the idea of non sticky bonuses which the UKGC bought in to help players benefit a little bit more from welcome bonuses.

A casino does not pay tax on the deposit 'bonus' paid as cash, this is a loophole some are exploiting.

The notion you will be several thousand up is very unlikely given you are playing games with  RTPs of 95 to 97% at best. You are going to be down long before you get the cashback bonus. Also most players will never receive it if they keep losing. This is again where casinos are falsely advertising it as a welcome bonus match. A real deposit bonus match e.g £100 get £100 at Genesis is much better value to the player. Which is what the UKGC intended when they changed the regs to non sticky. You chould lose your cash but hit thousands in bonus and wager it out. Much better EV then these false deposit matches you advertise at Party Casino and Leovegas, they are predatory in intent and completely against what the UKGC where attempting to do with non sticky bonuses.

I find it appalling CG advertise this false welcome bonus matches. Also that in Party, Rizk and NY spins the offer you advertise differs considerably from the offers we are actually signing up to. This is false advertising and massively against ASA regulations.

[MarcT22186]

58 minutes ago, christaney said:

This doesnt help me with money I have deposited into casinos and not received the offers advertised to me. I also have money trapped currently in NY spins and Party as I am certainly not playing at this casinos now. I assume CG will take no responsibility or help here? Simply blaming me/casinos for not reading the terms? FYI the casino agents are blaming you for not having updated terms and ignoring the UK 2015 Consumer Act.

A post wager 'bonus' is by definition not a bonus. It is casinos in the UK circumventing tax laws in a way to try and get around paying tax on the bonuses. They are packaging Cashback in a misleading way in an attempt to trick new customers. The very fact you dispute this shows either an ignorance or disingenuousness on CG's part.

I am very concerned about how many people will have deposited and lost money because they did not receive the offers you advertised and spaffed their money away in frustration. 

Just as an information: Party/bwin offers mostly post wager bonuses and not only for UK. You must be pretty lucky to get a real bonus offer there. 

Those post wager bonus are their interpretation of a bonus (while orig. Poker-room) and that's the case since partypoker offered their first bonus promotions. Has nothing to do with taxes just to protect themselves from abusing those promotions back in their Poker only days.

That's btw. the reason Party/bwin isn't an Affiliates favorite... 

[Andreas]

31 minutes ago, christaney said:

It is simple maths. Having to wager your deposit 35x before reveiving a 'bonus' as cash completely circumvents the idea of non sticky bonuses which the UKGC bought in to help players benefit a little bit more from welcome bonuses.

A casino does not pay tax on the deposit 'bonus' paid as cash, this is a loophole some are exploiting.

The notion you will be several thousand up is very unlikely given you are playing games with  RTPs of 95 to 97% at best. You are going to be down long before you get the cashback bonus. Also most players will never receive it if they keep losing. This is again where casinos are falsely advertising it as a welcome bonus match. A real deposit bonus match e.g £100 get £100 at Genesis is much better value to the player. Which is what the UKGC intended when they changed the regs to non sticky. You chould lose your cash but hit thousands in bonus and wager it out. Much better EV then these false deposit matches you advertise at Party Casino and Leovegas, they are predatory in intent and completely against what the UKGC where attempting to do with non sticky bonuses.

I find it appalling CG advertise this false welcome bonus matches. Also that in Party, Rizk and NY spins the offer you advertise differs considerably from the offers we are actually signing up to. This is false advertising and massively against ASA regulations.

If you feel that term 'bonus' on these types of offers is misleading then it is probably best to turn to the UKGC about it. From my perspective it is a bonus as you get it as a perk for depositing and playing - they are very similar to how poker bonuses work, in that that it's "cheaper" to play while having them. 

A casino pays tax in the UK on their gross revenue across all their players. If a deposit bonus has "much better value to the player", that would mean their expected gross revenue on that offer is lower, which means less tax. 

Again, we are currently reviewing all offers to ensure they are up to date. If any / for any offers that may have changed since they were last updated, this will be corrected. We are also establishing an improved procedure for this going forward.

We also cannot underline enough the importance to always read the FULL terms on the casinos' websites, no matter what.

[Original Jase]

Actually that's not true about saying the UKGC brought in non sticky bonuses. It was only a recommendation from the competition markets authority (told by the UKGC themselves). There are a few sites in the UK that still use a different bonus structure to non sticky bonuses. So basically what you're writing is also misleading. Phone the UKGC next time for confirmation and they should tell you what I just wrote @christaney

[christaney]

4 hours ago, MarcT22186 said:

Just as an information: Party/bwin offers mostly post wager bonuses and not only for UK. You must be pretty lucky to get a real bonus offer there. 

Those post wager bonus are their interpretation of a bonus (while orig. Poker-room) and that's the case since partypoker offered their first bonus promotions. Has nothing to do with taxes just to protect themselves from abusing those promotions back in their Poker only days.

That's btw. the reason Party/bwin isn't an Affiliates favorite... 

Thats not true. My cousin in Canada signed up with Party only two weeks ago and they offer a £500 match.

3 hours ago, Homer Spinson said:

Actually that's not true about saying the UKGC brought in non sticky bonuses. It was only a recommendation from the competition markets authority (told by the UKGC themselves). There are a few sites in the UK that still use a different bonus structure to non sticky bonuses. So basically what you're writing is also misleading. Phone the UKGC next time for confirmation and they should tell you what I just wrote @christaney

Complete tripe. I have emails from the UKGC in reference to Everymatrix stating their bonuses were completely against UKGC regs when they were still trying to lock in cash with bonus amounts.

Perhaps you need to review the regs and LCCP?

4 hours ago, Andreas said:

If you feel that term 'bonus' on these types of offers is misleading then it is probably best to turn to the UKGC about it. From my perspective it is a bonus as you get it as a perk for depositing and playing - they are very similar to how poker bonuses work, in that that it's "cheaper" to play while having them. 

A casino pays tax in the UK on their gross revenue across all their players. If a deposit bonus has "much better value to the player", that would mean their expected gross revenue on that offer is lower, which means less tax. 

Again, we are currently reviewing all offers to ensure they are up to date. If any / for any offers that may have changed since they were last updated, this will be corrected. We are also establishing an improved procedure for this going forward.

We also cannot underline enough the importance to always read the FULL terms on the casinos' websites, no matter what.

The UKGC are not fit for purpose. I have submitted a complaint with ASA, I have also listed CG in my complaint as you should not be advertising Party non Leo bonuses as deposit matches. This is completely misleading.

At least your reviewing your offers. However having worked with gamblers and people with a gambling addiction I can well imagine people depositing on some of these casinos, not getting what was advertised and then losing their money. I class this as predatory and this is why I am working on getting affiliation regulated in the UK.

[dirtystack]

22 minutes ago, christaney said:

4 hours ago, MarcT22186 said:

 

Thats not true. My cousin in Canada signed up with Party only two weeks ago and they offer a £500 match.

Does the UKGC dictate what can and can’t be done in territories other then England Scotland and Wales?

Do they care what’s happening in Canada if everything on the UK side is compliant?

[Original Jase]

@christaney@christaney You wrote "Non sticky bonuses which the UKGC brought in to help players" and that is not true. It was a recommendation by the competition markets authority and that was made clear by the UKGC last year when people complained about sites like royal panda , admiral casino etc who don't use this bonus structure. So what I wrote was just repeating what UKGC said themselves actually. I'm commenting on that quote you said and nothing else. I would like to add if you come back and still say this is tripe , I don't really care because I'm happy I was told this by the UKGC themselves so take it up with them. Also why would a UK site like admiral casino be allowed to have a bonus structure that requires you to wager 35x £10 before you unlock a £10 cash reward but have it advertised as a deposit match and still get away with it after people complained? Because they're allowed to for the reason I stated above

[Andreas]

10 hours ago, christaney said:

Thats not true. My cousin in Canada signed up with Party only two weeks ago and they offer a £500 match.

Complete tripe. I have emails from the UKGC in reference to Everymatrix stating their bonuses were completely against UKGC regs when they were still trying to lock in cash with bonus amounts.

Perhaps you need to review the regs and LCCP?

The UKGC are not fit for purpose. I have submitted a complaint with ASA, I have also listed CG in my complaint as you should not be advertising Party non Leo bonuses as deposit matches. This is completely misleading.

At least your reviewing your offers. However having worked with gamblers and people with a gambling addiction I can well imagine people depositing on some of these casinos, not getting what was advertised and then losing their money. I class this as predatory and this is why I am working on getting affiliation regulated in the UK.

Great - we'll of course stop calling it a bonus if it's deemed not to be one. I personally think it is.

May I ask - lets say this 'offer' converts to cash after say 1x wager of deposit, would you still not consider it a bonus? Is it only a bonus if you get it to your balance immediately after deposit, regardless of WR or max cashout restrictions (as long as it's non-sticky)? Mathematically the 'offers' you object to are a LOT better to the player than many of the "non-sticky" bonuses available in the UK.

Personally I think it's completely fine to favour or disfavour certain bonus types, but to not call them bonuses because it doesn't fit one's one perception of a casino bonus is a bit off to me. There are numerous different types, some real bad some good, but they all fit into the official definition 'bonus'; "something in addition to what is expected"

[MarcT22186]

10 hours ago, dirtystack said:

Does the UKGC dictate what can and can’t be done in territories other then England Scotland and Wales?

Do they care what’s happening in Canada if everything on the UK side is compliant?

He was referring to my post as Party offers those post wagers in a lot of Promotions over here (Germany) as well. I'll jump onto your questions - I would love to have a regulation body like UKGC here (and luckily we get sth. close to it soon). 

I'm completely @Andreas this Party Bonus is much better than every other Non-Sticky/Parachute (normally it stays alive even if you Cash-out) I saw before. They're non-stick and you can continue wagering even if your 1st deposit is lost. Not sure how long you actually have to unlock it, but as far as I remember it's more than enough time to get it done. 

[kahpaydium]

I see this site has now suddenly been promoted by one of the more popular streamers but they've chosen not to explain how this 'bonus' differs so much from other welcome bonuses, I'm sure a lot of people will come unstuck thinking it's the same.  I guess as long as they put their money on the site, that's all that matters really.

[NudgeShuffle]

@Andreas I suspect lawyers could spend a lot of time arguing over the legal definition of the word 'bonus' and it end up as a draw.

@christaney Very interesting point re: tax avoidance on the HMRC duties for bonuses. Hadn't considered that. Quite cunning really.

 

 

[tehf00n]

My two cents after being stung by the Party Casino bonus.

• I made a deposit and was given 120 free spins on Starburst (ugh) instead.
• I complained on CG and it was attented to.
• I decided not to go through the pain of questioning it on support and went to play them.
• The starburst spins did not load.
• It was then I got onto support, who gave me 120 spins on some off-brand slots I had never even heard of before (Loot'EnKhamun ,Melon Madness Deluxe or Mega Bars)
• Megabars looked familiar so I dumped them into there.
• Overall I ended up increasing my deposit, could have withdrawn, but had some free time and couldn't be bothered with all the documentation and messing around when I had already been through that. So I span it all away. Que cera.

 

I have to say casinos tend to help in these cases but it doesn't help the consumer at the point of entry (deposit stage). This is the important factor.

The type of bonus you get (wager cash to unlock, parachute, cashback) should be extremely visible to the player at all times during the short process from landing page through registration and deposit, with a final dictation before confirmation. It is only fair that with a house edge, that the individual is protected from shady methods as it also helps attain retention long term at the individual level. Every player counts.

As far as CasinoGrounds culpability on this particular issue, I am sure you can understand it's crucial to everyone in the community that you are seen to rectify what is happening. Everyone who takes up CG recommended bonuses has (upto now) 100% trusted them without question.  That needs to stay the same for the love of God. There are enough sharks out there trying to pinch that "first deposit" money so they can stay alive long enough to profit.

[Andreas]

54 minutes ago, tehf00n said:

My two cents after being stung by the Party Casino bonus.

• I made a deposit and was given 120 free spins on Starburst (ugh) instead.
• I complained on CG and it was attented to.
• I decided not to go through the pain of questioning it on support and went to play them.
• The starburst spins did not load.
• It was then I got onto support, who gave me 120 spins on some off-brand slots I had never even heard of before (Loot'EnKhamun ,Melon Madness Deluxe or Mega Bars)
• Megabars looked familiar so I dumped them into there.
• Overall I ended up increasing my deposit, could have withdrawn, but had some free time and couldn't be bothered with all the documentation and messing around when I had already been through that. So I span it all away. Que cera.

 

I have to say casinos tend to help in these cases but it doesn't help the consumer at the point of entry (deposit stage). This is the important factor.

The type of bonus you get (wager cash to unlock, parachute, cashback) should be extremely visible to the player at all times during the short process from landing page through registration and deposit, with a final dictation before confirmation. It is only fair that with a house edge, that the individual is protected from shady methods as it also helps attain retention long term at the individual level. Every player counts.

As far as CasinoGrounds culpability on this particular issue, I am sure you can understand it's crucial to everyone in the community that you are seen to rectify what is happening. Everyone who takes up CG recommended bonuses has (upto now) 100% trusted them without question.  That needs to stay the same for the love of God. There are enough sharks out there trying to pinch that "first deposit" money so they can stay alive long enough to profit.

Hi tehf00n,

Thanks for your feedback.

I have added a bolded note in the review of the review of Partycasino with regards to the bonus being credited post wager. The difficulty here is that to specify exactly how particular bonuses work in the limited amount of space one has in certain places, is very much not straightforward. There are many perceptions of how a casino bonus "should work" and there is no real right or wrong. Essentially what it comes down to is to always read the terms before taking up an offer and decide if it's something you'd like or not.

I'd like to say that you can always trust the casinos we have in our recommended list, but due to the nature of bonuses the terms of particular ones might not be to liking of ALL players - some have too low max bet, cashout restrictions, game restrictions and such, post-wager/parachute and so on. There's really no size fits all so to say - so that leads back to reading bonus terms before making the decision. 

I am fully behind you in that relevant terms should be visible as clearly as it can be made to the player all the way up to the deposit finalisation. It is something we ask from casinos regularly (especially when there are pitfalls), but some times without success.

[kahpaydium]

1 hour ago, Andreas said:

Hi tehf00n,

Thanks for your feedback.

I have added a bolded note in the review of the review of Partycasino with regards to the bonus being credited post wager. The difficulty here is that to specify exactly how particular bonuses work in the limited amount of space one has in certain places, is very much not straightforward. There are many perceptions of how a casino bonus "should work" and there is no real right or wrong. Essentially what it comes down to is to always read the terms before taking up an offer and decide if it's something you'd like or not.

I'd like to say that you can always trust the casinos we have in our recommended list, but due to the nature of bonuses the terms of particular ones might not be to liking of ALL players - some have too low max bet, cashout restrictions, game restrictions and such, post-wager/parachute and so on. There's really no size fits all so to say - so that leads back to reading bonus terms before making the decision. 

I am fully behind you in that relevant terms should be visible as clearly as it can be made to the player all the way up to the deposit finalisation. It is something we ask from casinos regularly (especially when there are pitfalls), but some times without success.

Probably a lot easier when these bonuses are being pushed live on stream though, no space restrictions then but just a choice not to explain them.

[Bingonice]

Felt really bad after seeing the way how these online casinos are trying to scam people. If they have any rules and regulations or some conditions they should mention it in advance rather than just hiding the facts and manipulating people to spend their money into something from where they are not going to get good returns on time.

@christaney I hope your matter to get resolved quickly..All the best!