Occasionally we report on the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) when they come out against a bingo ad. This time it’s Spin Palace, a casino site, but the ruling against the site concerns something that almost all bingo players will have seen.
Bayton Ltd, a Maltese company who are behind Spin Palace are on the end of the judgement, have been brought up for the wording of their welcome bonus.
Spin Palace’s page says (or said): “£1000 FREE …1st deposit – 100% Match Bonus” and a player – who had taken up the offer – complained because the banner didn’t make the wagering requirements clear.
We’ve all seen that haven’t we? In fact bingo brands base their advertising on tempting offers of free bingo and match deposit bonuses.
Spin Palace were having none of this, of course. Their defence was based on the fact that there is a ‘click for full terms and conditions’ link with the banner which explains that you have to play through all the funds in your bonus account before you can cash out. Part of their defence, ‘welcome bonuses such as theirs were widely used in the online casino industry and that they were considered a fair and standard practice’, is interesting.
But the ASA didn’t buy that. They noted that the conditions meant that no withdrawals – even of your own cash – could be made until you’d gambled 40 times the welcome bonus.
Their judgement says: “We considered that such a condition was sufficiently significant that it would need to be clearly stated in the ad itself and, because that was not the case, we concluded that the ad was misleading.”
Spin Palace most now change the ad to comply with the ruling. ASA rulings only apply to the ads against which complaints are made, but if this ruling is a precedent then it means an entire strand of the bingo promotions strategy will have to be changed.
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