Bonus Complaint William Hill Casino Club - Ts and Cs all over the shop

[interlog]

Hi,

New member here, so please be gentle!

Background
I signed up for a new account with William Hill Casino Club using a UK cashback site. I deposited £100 and received a £25 bonus. I started to play video poker at £2.50 hands and after some 300 hands, I got lucky and hit a Royal Flush for a £2,000 win. I checked to see how much more I had to wager before I could cash out and was surprised to learn that it was £4,375. Hmm... I can't recall reading anything about a 35xwager requirement.

So I first off looked at the welcome email that I received on opening the account and before depositing the first set of money. It welcomed me to the club and advised me "Make your first deposit and receive your 25% welcome bonus up to £250!". The bottom of the email reads as follows:

Forgot your password? Click here

*Terms and Conditions apply

General T&Cs apply.
William Hill Casino Club supports responsible gambling. For more information please visit the Gamcare, GambleAware or GamblingTherapy websites.

William Hill Casino Club is operated by WHG (International) Limited, a company registered in Gibraltar. WHG (International) Limited is licenced and regulated by the Gambling Commission (licence number 000-039225 R-319373-001) for customers in Great Britain, and licenced by the Gibraltar Government and regulated by the Gibraltar Gambling Commissioner (licence nos. 034 & 042) for all other customers.
The registered office of WHG (International) Limited is at 6/1 Waterport Place, Gibraltar, with registered company number 99191.

See FAQ's for more information.

Click on the following links to access William Hill Casino Club's Privacy Policy, General Terms & Conditions. Over 18's only. Underage gambling is an offence.

Contact us at: Support@WilliamHillCasino.com or call us at

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

If you wish to unsubscribe from future promotional emails please click here. We reserve the right to contact you with important account or service information or changes to our terms and conditions.

The 1st link to "*Terms and Conditions apply" links to

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

- nothing about a 35xwager requirement

The 2nd link to "General T&Cs apply." links to

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

- again nothing about a 35xwager requirement

The 3rd link to "See FAQ's for more information" links to

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

with the bottom of the screen clearly showing a wagering requirement of 20x. Both the links at the bottom of that page link to pages also clearly stating a wagering requirement of 20x.

So thinking that William Hill Casino Club made a mistake, I emailed them to let them know that the wagering requirement should be 20x£125 = £2500.

They responded, basically saying:

Bonuses issued are based on the affiliate site you've signed up with. As I can see here, the wagering requirement is x 35 of the bonus and deposit amount (£100 deposit + £25 bonus x 35 = £4,375). This means you need to accumulate a total of £4,375 amount of stakes in the Casino before you could withdraw.

So I went to the cashback website and clicked on the link to William Hill Casino Club that gets you to the following page:

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

with again, at the bottom it clearly stating a 20xwagering requirement. It is only when you click on the Ts and Cs link that it suddenly has a conflict because the wagering requirement has gone up to 35x (this will not show for you readers as it does for me, so I have posted a screen shot):

So here we have it:

On registering the web front page states 20xwagering requirement, when you drill down there is a conflict and it shows 35xwagering requirement.

On receiving the welcome email and letting me know I am legible for a bonus there is no reference to the 35xwagering requirement, in fact it only refers to 20xwagering requirement.

One can say I am to blame because I should have read the Ts and Cs better and/or queried it before committing my money. However, I find it that the Ts and Cs are not clear at all, it makes more reference to a 20xwagering requirement than a 35xwagering requirement.

I put this to William Hill Casino Club via another email which I am awaiting a reply. I asked them to commit to the 20x£125 wagering requirement.

I have, as yet, not wagered the £2000 sitting in my account until this has been resolved, being mindful - of course - of the 30 day deadline.

Your advice is welcome please.

Thanks

 

[vinylweatherman]

They should not be responding in "industry jargon" to a player. The average player does not know much, if anything, about "affiliate sites". All they know is that they saw the site advertised somewhere, and clicked through to it. The terms on the actual site normally trump any guidance shown on any "affiliate sites". This is something that casino reps have gone to great lengths to make clear to players who have the opposite problem of the affiliate site showing a BETTER deal than is actually available.

No matter what WH say, it's UK law that governs this. Where there is ambiguity in a consumer contract, it is settled by considering the more favourable outcome for the consumer, not the business. On this basis, this conflict of terms would be resolved by considering the 20x to stand, it being more favourable to the consumer.

There is also the issue of advertising standards, under which this whole thing might be considered "misleading" to the average consumer.

Lastly, cashback sites state that users who click through should NOT suffer a worse deal than would be offered to direct customers, and depending on which one you used, they may be interested to learn that this merchant has broken the rules over this.

A few online stores got caught at TopCashbackUK doing this kind of trickery. They had websites that showed higher prices for TopCashbackUK users than those who went direct, and they got caught out by savvy shoppers who noticed something odd about the pricing, and who then went on to demonstrate that it was a deliberate "con" based on the merchant site itself that was seeing the tracking cookie, and responding to it's presence by posting higher prices.

 

[interlog]

Thank you for your reply.

I agree with what you're saying.

The casino replied rather tersely back as follows:

The wagering requirement of the bonus is as explained in the previous email. Also, please note that if you don't want the bonus, you can contact us to remove it provided that haven't used it yet.

As for the wagering requirement, it shows here that you have already wagered £850.00 so you have to wager £3,525.00 more.

Thank you and have a nice day.

Didn't address the issue I raised at all.

Besides, they're failing their own Ts and Cs because I only played 340 hands at £2.50 per hand and according to their Ts and Cs, video poker is at 20%, not 100%. How come I already wagered £850. Is this going to be another trap later on????

Looks like I will have to play some slots to the tune of £2000, reinvest the winnings to the tune of £1,525 (hopefully!!) with some money left after. Who knows what is going to happen if I manage that and then attempt to get to the money.

Anybody else has any advice?

 

[Casino2014man]

Make sure if there are any slot rules regarding maximum bet size you adhere to them!!!

 

[vinylweatherman]

The odd thing is, the standard bonus on the site is 100% up to £150, yet this FAR BETTER bonus is the one with a 20x WR. They are behaving as though this 25% bonus is so much BETTER than the standard one that it warrants a 35x WR.

You could have gotten £100 bonus for your £100, and with only a 20x WR, a total of £4000.

This is completely crazy, no wonder you are so confused.

 

[ugaboga]

Thank you for your reply.

I agree with what you're saying.

The casino replied rather tersely back as follows:



Didn't address the issue I raised at all.

Besides, they're failing their own Ts and Cs because I only played 340 hands at £2.50 per hand and according to their Ts and Cs, video poker is at 20%, not 100%. How come I already wagered £850. Is this going to be another trap later on????

Looks like I will have to play some slots to the tune of £2000, reinvest the winnings to the tune of £1,525 (hopefully!!) with some money left after. Who knows what is going to happen if I manage that and then attempt to get to the money.

Anybody else has any advice?

Don't you hate it when you get two liners in response to a genuine concern that you have documented thoroughly? That is a rather pathetic reply from an established industry leader. Very disappointing from WH.

 

[Googobucs]

Looks like I will have to play some slots to the tune of £2000, reinvest the winnings to the tune of £1,525 (hopefully!!) with some money left after. Who knows what is going to happen if I manage that and then attempt to get to the money.

Anybody else has any advice?

Make sure you don't break any rules by switching to slots or making wagers that are too high..........Go back and read the T & C again to be sure you don't make any mistakes on how you wager.

 

[Finn]

Thank you for your reply.

I agree with what you're saying.

The casino replied rather tersely back as follows:



Didn't address the issue I raised at all.

Besides, they're failing their own Ts and Cs because I only played 340 hands at £2.50 per hand and according to their Ts and Cs, video poker is at 20%, not 100%. How come I already wagered £850. Is this going to be another trap later on????

Looks like I will have to play some slots to the tune of £2000, reinvest the winnings to the tune of £1,525 (hopefully!!) with some money left after. Who knows what is going to happen if I manage that and then attempt to get to the money.

Anybody else has any advice?

If the video poker contributing 100% under this x35 wagering is intentional, and the wagering requirements were higher under those bonus terms to balance that, and it contributes only 20% under x20 wagering, then this x35 bonus could actually be better for you, since video poker usually has very high RTP.

 

[vinylweatherman]

If the video poker contributing 100% under this x35 wagering is intentional, and the wagering requirements were higher under those bonus terms to balance that, and it contributes only 20% under x20 wagering, then this x35 bonus could actually be better for you, since video poker usually has very high RTP.

Possible, but more likely a CS screwup.

However, it might be worth asking a couple more times after further play on VP to see how consistently CS claim that it counts 100%, and WH will be painted into a corner when it comes to them trying to claim (after support confirmed that WR was completed and VP counted 100% for the umpteenth time) after a withdrawal.

 

[interlog]

Once again, many thanks for your replies - very useful information there

In their first email where they informed me that the wagering was x35, they also said:

Stakes from all games will count towards the wagering requirement but some games have lower weighting than the others. Slots and scratch cards contribute 100% of your stakes while roulette only contributes 25%. Video Poker on the other hand only counts 20% of the stakes.

I checked again to be sure that I am not missing anything or that I have miscounted, but I dealt 340 hands at £2.50 each on video poker = £850.

From my account that indeed does confirm that:

So much for video poker only counting for 20%.

Well, I am off now to play some slots. Wish me luck.

 

[SpinUk]

Once again, many thanks for your replies - very useful information there

In their first email where they informed me that the wagering was x35, they also said:



I checked again to be sure that I am not missing anything or that I have miscounted, but I dealt 340 hands at £2.50 each on video poker = £850.

From my account that indeed does confirm that:

So much for video poker only counting for 20%.

Well, I am off now to play some slots. Wish me luck.

I can't comment on the original wagering mix up but I CAN confirm why the videopoker is contributing 100%.

If it is anything like jackpot247 (playtech) then the bonus funds and cashfunds are held speperately - 100 and 25 in bonus. The balance appears as a total but you always use your cash first.

Now, although your funds are tied into the bonus and cannot be withdrawn, oddly (and I had to check this after a big win where I couldnt understand how I had reached wagering so quick playing big bets on A Night Out) as you are using cash first you can play ALL games, AND they contribute 100% to your wagering. However, once you get 100% of your cash spent and dig into bonus funds, THEN the 20% contribution kicks in.

 

[interlog]

Played through the wagering requirements with some slots (a good one hour plus session) and "cashed" out on £1250. This is now in the pending withdrawal section with an email confirmation that it may take 4 days or so.

Lets see what happens before I celebrate.