Your Guide to Bingo Bonuses – Part 2

In the first part of our guide to online bingo bonuses, we’ve looked at the real basics of the types of bonuses you’ll most likely come across as well as explaining some of the terminology. And as promised, in this guide, we’ll be looking at the ways you can get the most out of your bingo bonuses, as well as the best and worst deals for bonuses.

Five Quick Tips for Getting the Most out of your bonus:

1. Read the Terms and Conditions!

Boring as this may be, we cannot stress enough – READ THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS! If there was some way to put this into an all singing and dancing banner, that flashed in front of every single bingo site you stepped on, believe us, we would.

For more info on the types of things you may encounter, keep reading for our guide to bonus terms and conditions.

2. Free doesn’t always mean a free ride

It’s a little misleading on the part of some online bingo sites that offer you £20 free to find out that this £20 is dependent on certain requirements and not entirely “free”.

But keeping yourself tuned into these little language plays is a great way of sniffing out the best bonuses around. Make sure you check out the full terms to avoid disappointment and try and balance your expectations with what you are actually getting.

3. Bigger is not always better

It may seem worthwhile stocking up on your bonus cash and gravitating towards the site that claims to offer you £90 in bonus cash from a £10 deposit, but bear in mind that you will normally have to spend that bonus cash on selected games.

In addition, bonuses generally have a shelf life – and sometimes it can be hard spending £200 in bonus cash on selected games within thirty days. Don’t get too greedy and you’ll be able to enjoy your bonus for what it is.

4. Wager vs. withdrawal

A related point to this is to check how much you can withdraw, based on how much you have to wager. Generally, do not expect to be able to claim your bonus cash out of your account – most online bingo sites will generally swing it that you can only spend your bonus on site and not take it elsewhere.

Most will ask for a wager requirement, which we’ll go through a little later. But what it basically means is that you have to spend a certain proportion of money, equivalent to your bingo bonus, before you can withdraw.

5. Your bonus is for FUN!

Most importantly, you really need to remember that your bonus is there to make your experience a little bit more fun. So if bonus chasing has become something that is more hard work than it should be, there’s clearly something going wrong.

Think of it as a gift voucher or coupon for the site, and you’ll see that it’s nice to use as a treat and to save you a little here and there – but not really up for abuse.

More on Terms and Conditions:

We know that terms and conditions can be super confusing, but it’s really important to read them through.
Generally, you’ll find T&C’s at the bottom of your bingo sites page, as demonstrated here with Wink Bingo. We’ll use this as an example to go through things bit by bit.

Wager Requirement: Your wager requirement is probably the most important thing to get your head round with terms and conditions. It’s set as an amount of your original deposit (normally with any bonus funds increased)

So let’s take a simple look here on Wink Bingo’s 200% welcome bonus.

If you added a £10 first deposit to your Wink account, you’d get:

£10 x 200% = £20 in free bonus cash

giving you

£10 (real cash) + £20 (bonus cash) = £30 playing funds.

Your wager requirement is calculated on your total playing funds accrued during the transaction – so the £30 in this case.

At Wink Bingo, the guys have a x2 wager requirement, which means basically:

£30 (playing funds) x2  = £60 (wager requirement) 

Therefore, you’ll have to wager AT LEAST £60 before being able to cash out.

Forfeited Bonus: If you do decide to cash out before you meet the wagering requirement, then you will forfeit your bonus. All your bonus cash will be wiped out.

Don’t forget! On the terms and conditions, you’ll also find your minimum withdrawal amounts, which will tell you how much you have to have in your account before making a withdrawal.

There are also limits on how much you can take out across a month and in a single transaction.

These wagering requirements do vary from site to site – some will offer none, some will offer lower amounts (like Wink Bingo) and others will have some crazy limits of x32 or more – hence why you really should check the terms and conditions!

Some of the Best Bonus Schemes Out There!

If all this sounds a bit too gloomy for you, fear not – there’s still some great bonus schemes to get your hands on! Take a look at some of these ones!

No deposit bonuses done right: Sing Bingo and City Bingo

Take a peek at a site like Sing Bingo or City Bingo, and you’ll find a fab no deposit bingo bonus waiting for you when you sign up.

The money is ONLY available to spend on bingo cards and your winnings from this deposit are capped at a maximum of £100 until you make a first deposit and meet wagering requirements (x4 your total).

But if you are looking for a quick way to try out the sites for free, it’s more than worth your while.

Spend then claim bonuses: Bet 365 Bingo and more

These are really popular with sites on the Virtue Fusion network and popular with online bingo fans as it’s really simple to claim and there aren’t too many additional strings attached.

What you normally do is sign up to a VF site – say Bet365 Bingo – and make your first deposit of £5. Then, you have 48 hours to spend it on bingo games on site. If you do this, you’ll receive £25 back, just like that.

VF sites are also good as they keep you down to a strict one bonus at a time rule – so everytime you receive a new bonus, you forfeit any outstanding ones.

That can seem a little unfair, but in effect, it keeps you in the habit of using them and also makes things a little less complicated.

Bonus Code Heroes: Joy of Bingo Network

The best sites for bonus codes are undoubtedly those on the Joy of Bingo network – such as Wink Bingo, Red Bus Bingo, Tasty Bingo and Bingostreet amongst others.

Lookout for their weekly newsletters, which give you special bonus codes every single week. These can be used when you make a redeposit to your account – and do remember, the usual bonus terms and conditions apply.

A Final Tip: Everything in Moderation!

Do remember that you also should go careful with trying to claim too many bonuses at once. A golden rule to adhere to is you give what you get, which generally keeps online bingo sites happy and knowing you aren’t fleecing them.

It’s a bit of a strange case as there are plenty of sites that love to push extra bonuses your way. And whilst it is tempting to claim while you can, too much in the way of bonuses can lead to getting you banned from sites – something you can read more about in our guide to avoiding being banned.

And don’t forget – a site isn’t measured just by how many different bonuses it manages to cram into it’s pages.

Take a look at sites like JackpotJoy Bingo, Gala Bingo and Tombola Bingo – both offer fairly ordinary bonus schemes with little in the way of redeposit bonuses – yet each has a huge fanbase of loyal players that keep coming back for more.

What you can take from this is to be wary of any site that appears to be offering something that seems “too good to be true”. Sites that are packed with too many bonuses can often be compensating for other things – so be sure to keep your eyes peeled.