What You Should Consider Before Choosing an Online Poker Room

Many people have chosen to spend their time playing online poker as they observe the current events which have, in most cases, bedeviled most parts of the world. The situation in America is more precarious than that of some other countries. 

There are many poker options available to people in states that have legalized online gambling, such as choosing from a selection of top casino sites with a stunning range of games from the developer. While players from states where gambling is still illegal would have many onshore casino sites to choose from. But before you decide to pitch your tent with any poker room, you have to consider some essential things to ensure that you are getting into the right room.

A Caveat

It is good to make a general disclaimer before we move forward. Those residing in states in the US where poker and other forms of online gaming are regulated would have limited options according to the law, but not in reality. The meaning is that you are bound by law never to play in sites that are not regulated, and most of the offshore sites won’t even allow you to play on their site. The only alternative for you is to stick with what the state provides for you.

However, if you do not leave in states where online gaming is regulated, then you are completely prohibited from getting involved. Now, while you will have more choices to pick from unlike those in the regulated states, you will be doing it at your own risk. This is because you are not protected against cheating, fraud, and loss of money if the website packs up and runs away with your money. Now, the predicament of the Ultimate Poker in Nevada will teach you the lesson. When it went down, people got very angry. But because of the regulations in place, they all got their money back. Can you also recall the fall of Lock Poker? If the answer to this is yes, then can you recall the number of people that were refunded?

If you are not resident in the US, then your country or state of residence matters. With a lot of restrictions, many countries prevent their citizens from playing against people from other countries. Australia and some other countries placed an outright ban on online gambling. But some others leave their doors open to everything about online gaming. To ensure that you don’t land yourself in jail, we implore you to check the gambling laws in your country before you start playing.

Concentrate On How to Cash Out Your Money, and Not Much on How to Deposit It

Now, while many people normally worry about how to deposit into their casino accounts so they can start playing games immediately, they normally forget that the first and most important thing is to ascertain how to get their money out when they win games. The prepaid credit cards, debit cards, Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wire transfer, and the numerous e-wallets may be presented as the deposit and withdrawal methods, but have you read the deposit and cash out guidelines hidden in the ‘Terms and Conditions’?

In most cases, you are required to play a particular amount of poker hands with the money you paid-in before you can ever withdraw money from the poker site. Here, you are mostly required to play hands that are equivalent to the amount you paid in. The meaning of this is that you must bet the entire money a certain amount of times before you can withdraw a dime.

Also, chances are that you will have problems withdrawing from your account if you’ve not done so for a very long time. One player lamented heavily about the problems he is encountering trying to withdraw money that was transferred to him by another player. Casinos scrutinize withdrawals of this nature to avoid money laundering, and in this man’s case, they said they are scrutinizing things because this is the second time he is making a withdrawal in the site. In such cases, they would want the player to play with the money before they can withdraw whatever that is left. The money laundering regulations are placed by the licensing countries to protect the players and their financial system.

Check the Games and the Traffic to the Website

Now, the number one red flag that should make you flee is getting to an online poker site in search of games to play and discovering that their poker rooms are empty. Because of this, you have to check the traffic of online casinos and know the people that are online when you want to play games. Check towards the bottom of the screen, and you will see a log of how many players that are online and active. If you don’t see this in their site, check their traffic volume with PokerScout

PokerScout delivers the best statistics of online poker sites. When you look through their home page, you will see the top rooms in the business. This comes with a breakdown of current players, plus the average number of players that visit cash game rooms of each site every seven days. When sites go ahead to block them from seeing the action, which is actually a red flag already, they still get the estimates to give you an idea of what is obtainable. You can get their authentic statistics by visiting their poker rooms and looking at the flow in their chart for every 24 hours. The graph reveals the flow of numbers every day.

When you discover the rooms with the numbers that you are comfortable with, you can now slide in. You should also consider the types of action available in the sites. In some, you will have access to a lot of poker variants, while some may deliver the Omaha and Texas Hold ‘em types only.

Ensure That You Can Lay Complaints and Get Answers Easily

The last thing is that you must only play in online poker sites that have avenues through which you can easily contact them. If they do not have the live chat contact system, then their email address must be available for players to message them with, and when such messages are sent, they must reply within 24 hours. Through these responses and interactions, they make the players glad and also assure them that they are in control of situations. For the best form of contact, they should also have a phone number.

There are many other important things that should be checked, like the tournaments available and their prices, plus the highest stakes for real money games, and others. But the mentioned few are the ones that when you are not satisfied with them, you shouldn’t play in the online poker site at all. People who swim in the world of unregulated online gambling should make sure they consider these things with a religious level of seriousness. This is because they are in very fragile relationships with the poker sites they are playing in already and that is due to lack of restrictions and regulations. There are no bodies or authorities to hold the sites responsible. Though you are seriously discouraged from playing in such casinos or poker sites, making sure they have these qualities would ensure that you are at least minimally protected.