Ever since New Jersey decided to legalize and create their own regulated online casino environment, liberal winds have been blowing throughout the US. According to Wikipedia, some form of online gambling is currently legal in twelve out of fifty states.
While the future for American gamblers is looking brighter than ever, the nation still has a long way to go before reaching the same liberal status as Europe. Thus, many gamblers are looking for alternative ways to gamble. This leads us to offshore casinos, which are anything but a new phenomenon.
With a simple Google search, any player can find a ton of gambling sites that accept US residents to sign up and play with them. Doing so, there are three important things that you must know about.
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1. You Won’t Be Prosecuted For Gambling
In most American states, gambling laws are very restrictive. However, the vast majority of them don’t say anything about playing online. And even if they do, there haven’t been a single recorded case of a US citizen being penalized for simply gambling at an online casino.
As far as we can tell, the authorities don’t care about individuals who gamble online. What the police and FBI is looking for is only companies that are running gambling sites within the US. These do get busted.
However, offshore casinos that are located in other jurisdictions, such as Curacao, Canada, Panama and Costa Rica, can’t be reached by the authorities. These sites are under the regulation of their respective jurisdictions and are not doing anything illegal by allowing US players to gamble with them.
2. Your Payment Method Matters
As mentioned by GamblingBaba, fast withdrawals are affected not only by the casino you choose, but also by the payment method you use. Here, e-Wallets are superior choices as these have no transaction time at all. They include options such as Skrill, Neteller and ecoPayz.
When it comes to payment methods at US offshore casinos, it is not only the cash out time that is affected by your choice though. Because of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, certain banks in America are unable to handle gambling transactions.
What this means is that if you choose to deposit using a Visa or Mastercard, you may experience issues with your transaction. It may be instantly denied, it may be delayed or it may get stuck and then reversed. Therefore, using an e-Wallet is the best option, with cryptocurrencies being the second-best choice.
3. Doing Your Research Pays Off
In general, online casinos are safe. Most people are running legitimate businesses where they want to please their players. Simply because a satisfied player will return and the more people that play at the site, the more money it will generate. As you probably know, the house always wins in the long run.
Unfortunately, though, bad apples exist everywhere. Thus, there are in fact sites that will try to make an easy buck out of you by being dishonest. In difference to legalized US online casinos, such as the ones in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, regulations are generally poor at offshore sites. This means that casinos can get away with questionable actions. If you are affected, there’s little help to be found.
If you plan on playing at an offshore casino, doing your research is therefore of outmost importance. First of all, make sure that the gambling license the site is claiming to have is real. Also, check with several review sites about the casino’s reputation and pay attention to how long the casino has been running for. Additionally, trying out the customer support to get a feeling of their quality is always a good idea.
If you are interested in even more entertainment-related articles and information from us here at Bit Rebels, then we have a lot to choose from.
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