How does Deposit Match Work On Online Casinos

Have you heard of those deposit bonuses at online casinos and are wondering what is the deposit match bonus, how does it work, and do you really get the bonus money? This article will shed some light on the subject so you’ll be able to confidently claim the casino bonuses. For a quick fix and a brilliant deposit match bonus visit the best online casino experience in NZ.

First of all, let’s first cover the technical terms and say what a deposit match bonus is.

Deposit match bonus – what is it?

The most common – but not the only – type of a bonus that you get for signing up with an online casino is a bonus for newly registered customers that you get when you qualify for it by making a real money deposit. For example, you may register a new account at Lucky Koala and you make a real money deposit of 100 NZD.

The casino will then reward you with some bonus cash, and most commonly it will be 100% of the money you deposited into the casino, which means you just doubled your money in one quick click. In a sense, your deposit was matched with the same amount in bonus cash. This is what constitutes a deposit match bonus.

If the bonus was more than 100% or less than 100%, then technically your deposit was not matched with the same amount in bonus cash. Deposit match is only when you get 100% on top of your deposit.

The usual terms and conditions

All casinos apply a set of terms and conditions to the bonus offer, in order to protect themselves from bonus abuse. They don’t just simply give the money away, the word would get out and the casino would be bankrupt in a week.

Instead, the casino applies an achievable set of hoops you must jump through in order to withdraw the money. The industry has settled on some terms that achieve the double effect of serving to protect the casino while at the same time being tempting and achievable from the player’s perspective.

Let’s go over some of the main ones and say what terms are acceptable and what are not.

Wagering requirement: 35x is the best you’re going to get

When you get a cash bonus, say 100 NZD in bonus money because your 100 NZD deposit was matched, the casino will ask you to, in return, wager a certain amount of money in the casino before you’re allowed to withdraw whatever money you have in your account.

35x the bonus is the best you’re going to get in almost all cases, except in some special circumstances. This would mean that you have to wager 3,500 NZD in the casino to claim the 100 NZD bonus.

Some casinos do a trick and say it’s 35x but bonus plus deposit, which is then 35 x (100 + 100) = 7,000 NZD, so the rollover is actually 70x. This is awful, you’ll never manage to pull it through.

Sometimes the rollover will be 45x, and most commonly you’ll see this inflated amount in case of no deposit bonuses, so bonuses that you got without making a real money deposit. If you see 45x at a deposit bonus, that’s not a really good thing.

Maximum bet: 5 EUR is the standard

When you get a casino bonus and are meeting the wagering requirements, it is understood that it is beneficial for you to make a large low-risk bet, as you’ll move towards completion of the wagering requirements much faster. This is why casinos limit the maximum allowed bet. If you breach this, the casino reserves the right to confiscate your winnings or even your deposit.

Most casinos will set this to 5 EUR or currency equivalent, so just under 10 NZD. If you see a larger maximum bet, know that it’s something you can potentially exploit in the right situation.

Maximum win should be unlimited

Casinos will usually protect themselves by setting the maximum win amount only in case of no deposit bonuses, to limit how much a non-depositing customer gets from the casino for free. The maximum win with a deposit match bonus should really be unlimited, as you don’t want to have your jackpot win capped because of some stupid T&C.

Allowed games make all the difference

Casinos will typically make a list of games that are unavailable for play when meeting the bonus wagering requirements, and they’ll either block those games outright so you can’t even load them, have the bets on these games not count for the bonus rollover, or say that your bonus will be forfeited if you launch those games. The latter is a sleazy move.

Commonly, table games and live dealer games will be excluded completely, with a 0% contribution, or they’ll have a wagering contribution of 10%. This would mean that your 1 NZD bet will contribute 0.1 NZD to the wagering requirements. The maths doesn’t check out in this case, and it doesn’t make sense for you to play the table games.

It has become something of a standard lately for the casino to exclude certain pokies. When you check the Terms & Conditions of the bonus you’ll probably find a list of excluded ones. It can be a list of 20 pokies or so, or it can be a long list of up to 200.

Casinos will exclude pokies that have a high theoretical payout as they want you to play those that have a high house edge instead, and will probably want to exclude pokies that are known to pay big wins when a player gets lucky.

Choice of a pokie to play matters the most

If we know that casinos limit pokies you can play, then obviously it is beneficial for the player to play a pokie of that type, no?

The best thing you can do is to find a pokie that fits the general description of a pokie that casino would want to exclude, but hasn’t. It would have to be a pokie with a high theoretical return to player (RTP) that’s close to 97.00% or even higher than that, and that is a high volatility game that has a rewarding bonus round and a potentially rewarding base game where you can win big.

This would be the pro tip and the secret ingredient of successful bonus claim.

Last updated: 23/08/2024