Casino Operators Beware: AKA23

[XXLClubCasino]

Originally Posted by BBKPoker

That's fine for you to make that decision obviously, but it's probably not that good of a business decision. If you don't want to spread limits of 1-300 per hand, players can choose to play on virtually any other Microgaming (max bet limits of $200) Playtech (adjustable, but generally max bet limits of $300) or RTG site (adjustable, but generally max bet limits of $250).

I'd guess something like 98% of the industry offers at least $100 bets or larger. And, you'll probably never find out what it's like to have a whale slamming maximum bets for 3 hours with poor strategy, because there is zero chance you are going to keep one with those starting limits. I for one would just immediately withdraw and go elsewhere.

We have a couple of highrollers in our casinos mostly Russians where we were more than happy to adjust their VIP levels and the associated game limits which is way over the 300$ max bet that you see at other casinos.

For us the definition of a highrollers do not start with the standard 200$ max deposit to get the max available bonus. Any "real" highroller will contact our VIP manager previous to make any deposit. During the first contact table limits, welcome bonuses etc. are adjusted to best fit the player requirements and taste. The regular WR as well as restricted games will be partially lifted or define with the player to best match his gambling habits.

For us this one to one player relationship is working perfectly well and players as well as we are better of than before adjustments were made. By reducing the bet limits for "standard" players and bonus lovers we have manage to turn our casino from a non profitable business to a profitable one which is what we were looking fore.

Bonus lovers can hit a casino in a unbelievable way within a very short time, this due to the fact than when a player find a mathematical way to risk none of his own cash and turn a negative hedge to a positive by playing smart, he will spread the word through the various internet information gateways. The casino see then 1000 of players playing the exact same way and see itself hit badly. I'm pretty sure most of the time it's not a player syndicate but only a simple response to a forum entry or a mass mailing.

For our part we took this decision after reviewing 1000s of players accounts and game logs with professionals mathematicians like the "wizard of odds" and the current setup produced the awaited effect.

I'm sure other casinos will follow in the same direction. From this original posting you can see that a casino can't survive to be hit this way over a long periode of time and casinos managers are overwhelmed with it and react all differently. The same is valid in landbase casinos BJ tables have tables limits for all type of players but you will barely never see 1-300, at least I never see it.

If anyone has good revolutionary ideas on the best way to handle welcome bonuses for a wast majority of players from a .05 to a 300$ per spin I would love to hear it and try to implement it.

[vinylweatherman]

If anyone has good revolutionary ideas on the best way to handle welcome bonuses for a wast majority of players from a .05 to a 300$ per spin I would love to hear it and try to implement it.

Any bonus with a +EV is going to get hit by hunters. Lowering initial table limits prevents this, but might mean you lose players who think the limits are permanent.
High Rollers are less interested in the bonus than in good service, such as having your questions answered instead of a standard "cut & paste" reply.

Problems have been caused at XXLClub by players not knowing the initial limits are set lower than other places. This could be remedied by stipulating these limits are set because of the welcome bonus, and inviting players who want higher limits to make contact to discuss a deal. Since you get to communicate in advance, you have a chance to determine if the player is likely to be serious, or a bonus hunter pretending to be a high roller having just read the last post!

[aka23]

Originally Posted by BBKPoker

That would be because you have miniscule bet-sizes.

It has more to do with the terms of the bonus. The sign-up bonus is non-cashable; and Blackjack, Video Poker, and 3-card Poker are all not allowed. The remaining available games all have a house edge of >2.6%, so the player is expected to lose most of the sticky bonus during the wagering.

Many casinos have a similar offer to the above. In the past month, two groups with similar offers thanked me for the quality of traffic referred (links appear on all bonus and sw lists, not best bonus list). One went so far as to offer a large CPA, if I moved their casino to 1st on the best bonus list. I doubt that bonus hunters will make a large dent in profits with an offer like this, regardless of table limits.

[cyprean]

Any "real" highroller will contact our VIP manager previous to make any deposit.

I laughed when I read this.

[XXLClubCasino]

Originally Posted by vinylweatherman

Problems have been caused at XXLClub by players not knowing the initial limits are set lower than other places. This could be remedied by stipulating these limits are set because of the welcome bonus, and inviting players who want higher limits to make contact to discuss a deal. Since you get to communicate in advance, you have a chance to determine if the player is likely to be serious, or a bonus hunter pretending to be a high roller having just read the last post!

I totally agree with you that we should better describe the steps needed to increase the table limits, I'll work on this. Proactive communication is always the best.

Regarding problems with caused to players, I'm not aware of this. We had a couple of max deposits (200) where players asked to be refunded before playing meaning they were surely unhappy either by the games restrictions or the table limits but we of course refunded the players his deposit at no charge and in full.

To be honest and you are all surely aware of this is that one of the criteria to detect bonus seekers is:

1. Maximum deposit of the first deposit bonus (i.e 200 deposit + 200 bonus)
2. Maximum bets at low house hedge

This rule apply to almost 100% of the bonus lovers. This means for us that no highroller or recreational player do play this way. Highrollers will deposit more than the 200 and recreational players will not bet the maximum per hands.

Given these pretty straight forwards assumptions I strongly believe that we did the right thing and that we are not really missing a lot of highroller business.

[vinylweatherman]

Originally Posted by XXLClubCasino

I totally agree with you that we should better describe the steps needed to increase the table limits, I'll work on this. Proactive communication is always the best.

Regarding problems with caused to players, I'm not aware of this. We had a couple of max deposits (200) where players asked to be refunded before playing meaning they were surely unhappy either by the games restrictions or the table limits but we of course refunded the players his deposit at no charge and in full.

To be honest and you are all surely aware of this is that one of the criteria to detect bonus seekers is:

1. Maximum deposit of the first deposit bonus (i.e 200 deposit + 200 bonus)
2. Maximum bets at low house hedge

This rule apply to almost 100% of the bonus lovers. This means for us that no highroller or recreational player do play this way. Highrollers will deposit more than the 200 and recreational players will not bet the maximum per hands.

Given these pretty straight forwards assumptions I strongly believe that we did the right thing and that we are not really missing a lot of highroller business.

I have seen some casinos offer a "high roller" deal directly on the website. It normally comes with a MINIMUM deposit in the $1000+ range, and may have set terms, or an invitation to discuss.

Your criteria 1 & 2 are a very good sign of detecting a bonus hunter, as this is the best way to handle the non-cashable bonus. A "recreational" player could well deposit the $200 max, but would want the bankroll to last longer than 2 seconds. The non-cashable element may be putting off some players due to the fact that they have to play games with 2%+ house edge, and thus may feel they can never win from the first deposit.
The best thing to consider is removing ALL game exclusions, and using table limits alone to control advantage strategy, making sure players know before depositing that by accepting the bonus they agree to these limits.

In the long term, marketing need to look for ways to attract players without the standard SUB. These have to be inviting enough to compete with SUB offers, yet not so loose that advantage players can harvest them with little effort. These incentives might be based on how much a player wagers, not how big their deposit was, and could run for a set period of time from account opening.
For example, having 1% of their total WAGER on slots refunded to them. This will look great when it turns up in the account, but with a house edge greater than this, the casino, over all participating players, will only lose 1% of the 5% or so house edge on slots.

[JohnGalt]

Originally Posted by XXLClubCasino

I'm sure other casinos will follow in the same direction. From this original posting you can see that a casino can't survive to be hit this way over a long periode of time and casinos managers are overwhelmed with it and react all differently. The same is valid in landbase casinos BJ tables have tables limits for all type of players but you will barely never see 1-300, at least I never see it.

Not many places offer $1 bets but plenty of casinos have bigger spreads than that. Bellagio, for example, always has a couple $5-$5000 blackjack tables.

[XXLClubCasino]

Originally Posted by JohnGalt

Not many places offer $1 bets but plenty of casinos have bigger spreads than that. Bellagio, for example, always has a couple $5-$5000 blackjack tables.

But they won't give you 200$ in free bonus to sit down at the table but thank you for the info.

[XXLClubCasino]

Originally Posted by vinylweatherman

I have seen some casinos offer a "high roller" deal directly on the website. It normally comes with a MINIMUM deposit in the $1000+ range, and may have set terms, or an invitation to discuss.

Your criteria 1 & 2 are a very good sign of detecting a bonus hunter, as this is the best way to handle the non-cashable bonus. A "recreational" player could well deposit the $200 max, but would want the bankroll to last longer than 2 seconds. The non-cashable element may be putting off some players due to the fact that they have to play games with 2%+ house edge, and thus may feel they can never win from the first deposit.
The best thing to consider is removing ALL game exclusions, and using table limits alone to control advantage strategy, making sure players know before depositing that by accepting the bonus they agree to these limits.

In the long term, marketing need to look for ways to attract players without the standard SUB. These have to be inviting enough to compete with SUB offers, yet not so loose that advantage players can harvest them with little effort. These incentives might be based on how much a player wagers, not how big their deposit was, and could run for a set period of time from account opening.
For example, having 1% of their total WAGER on slots refunded to them. This will look great when it turns up in the account, but with a house edge greater than this, the casino, over all participating players, will only lose 1% of the 5% or so house edge on slots.

I think cashback is the way to go. We offer a cashback of 5-10% on any lost but with a max WD of 100 at the moment to all players that deposit.

We are doing the math to extend this cashback without any game restrictions and max cashout but it's quite a challenging task, a 1% cashback will look quite unspectacular to players and with an average of 96.5-102% monthly payout percentage we can't give much more so we better be over careful and miss some business.

We are also working on a new type of exclusive free side bets that will act as a new bonus system.

[vinylweatherman]

Originally Posted by XXLClubCasino

I think cashback is the way to go. We offer a cashback of 5-10% on any lost but with a max WD of 100 at the moment to all players that deposit.

We are doing the math to extend this cashback without any game restrictions and max cashout but it's quite a challenging task, a 1% cashback will look quite unspectacular to players and with an average of 96.5-102% monthly payout percentage we can't give much more so we better be over careful and miss some business.

We are also working on a new type of exclusive free side bets that will act as a new bonus system.

I did have a look at the current offers, and they are indeed "crap", especially for me as a Brit. The 25x slots playthrough & non-cashable nature make it better to play without the SUB, although it might be worth using the SUB to chase down a progressive.

It seems an increasing number of "Brit hating" casinos are springing up, and this will only put off players from the only European "first world" country to formally recognise remote gaming as legal, and offer a regulatory regime to operators (albeit spoiled by Gordon Browns greed, and lack of understanding of internet market forces).

Not as bad as the 50x WR I saw earlier, but I would stick with cashable bonuses with WR being so high, and this means Microgaming at the standard 30x Bonus only for slots, and game weightings for the rest.