F.A.Q.
Are Free Bonuses a Scam?
One of the most frequently asked questions about free poker bonuses is "are they a scam?".
People are quite rightly suspicious of anything that they are told is "free".
After all, why would any one want to give you money for free, right?
In the case of the free money bonuses that we have listed here on this site they are all genuine 'free money' offers.
The money that you get is yours to play poker with at the selected poker room.
It is not yours to withdraw and walk away with without having played any poker.
This is free 'poker' money - so it is intended for poker players to use to play poker with.
And of course there will be terms and conditions attached.
These sites are giving you real money to play with, so they will have terms in place to protect themselves from fraud. Because they are more at risk from fraud with these offers than the player could ever be. The site stands to lose a lot of money if they are not careful when handing it out.
So they put some terms and conditions on these offers.
All the offers that we have ever come across include the condition that you must not already have an account at the poker room where they are offer the bonus.
This is a business model that involves bringing new players to the poker rooms. Giving money to players that already have an account at the poker room would not be of any use then, would it?
Also, some countries seem to have more fraudulent players than others, so a lot of the time players from these countries will be excluded from the promotions.
As an example of the type of fraud that players try with these offers, imagine that a player gets a free bonus and then proceeds to lose it very quickly at the tables.
Many times this player will apply for another bonus using a different name, maybe a family members name or a friends name.
As you can imagine the poker sites that have these bonuses also have ways to check if the players are genuine, so usually doing this is a waste of time.
After all, if you could do this what would stop you from doing it one hundred times? That way you could accumulate thousands of dollars of free money.
Will I have to pay back the money if I lose?
Another frequently asked question is 'what happens if I lose the free cash?'. Some players think that if they lose the money they will have to pay it back. Generally this is not the case. We have never found a bonus deal where you were expected to repay the free money if you lost it.
The poker sites know that many players will lose the bonus very quickly.
They don't like it and they do their best to help you to make the most of the free money, but if it happens that you lose it all then, don't worry, they will not be looking for the money back from you.
Why was I refused?
Many many times a player will apply for a free bankroll and be refused. If this is their first one some of these players will be convinced that it is all a scam and there is no way any one is giving out free poker cash.
Players that this happens two fall into two general categories.
The first category is fraudulent players. They know that they are trying to cheat but think that if they shout loud enough and kick up a fuss they will get the money in the end.
Well, I can tell you now that if you are not entitled to the free bonus for whatever reason then you will not get it no matter how much of a fuss you make.
The second category of players that get refused are genuine players that have done everything correctly, and have checked the terms and conditions and know that they are entitled to the bonus money.
So why were these genuine players refused?
There can be many different reasons why a genuine player that is entitled to a particular bonus gets refused.
Many times that player will have an existing account at the poker room that they have not used in a while and simply forgot that they had it.
I know that has happened to me.
Another relatively common problem is that the player that finds the free bonus site has already visited the site of the poker room, and so when they download the poker software they are not properly tracked to the poker site that is giving out the bonus.
If a player is not tracked properly to the poker site then they will not give the free cash. That is how their business model works, and there is absolutely no way they will give cash to a player that is not tracked to them.
Read the instructions!
In order to avoid this happening to you be sure to read the terms and conditions fully, and then to read the instructions provided by the poker site for claiming the cash. Then read the instructions again and be sure that you understand them fully.
Taking your time at the application stage of the process will help you avoid any problems later on.