AusVegas Casino - Online Casino Review

AusVegas Casino

Overview

AusVegas is a browser only Flash technology casino and part of Lasseters Online which has been around since 1999. AusVegas is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lasseters Corporation; a publicly listed company on the Australian Stock Exchange and is licensed and fully regulated by the Northern Territory Government in Australia. Their software is by OGS Fire system which can be run on Windows, Linux, and on Mac. However, Mac users may occasionally have problems accessing their site. They offer live chat and email support. Their Live Chat also gives a photo of the person you are chatting with, which is a nice personal touch. Their whole site is friendly and nice, from the picture of the Managing Director on their about us page, to the child protection software they recommend. This seems like a very warm and fuzzy casino.

One very interesting point on their site, if you wish to take legal action against them they tell you where you can go (and I don't mean in a rude way). That is amazing. This is the first casino I've reviewed that has gone that far.

They also take gambling addiction very seriously. Punters can suspend their accounts for a period of time. Once they have suspended their accounts 3 times they need to send proof from a gambling addiction counselor stating that they don't have a problem before being allowed to gamble again. That's something to keep in mind before suspending your account.

Deposits

Ok, they are strict. There are account levels depending on if you have confirmed your details or not:

• Online allows for $500 deposits in 30 days and no withdrawals
• Age confirmed (you sent your stuff and they got it) $2500 deposit limit and you get your withdrawals back via CHECK.
• Bronze / Silver – this is the only one where you can get your money back via FirePay and Neteller.

They have got to be kidding. I deposit via Neteller, go through the trouble of sending my details (I don't have a scanner or a fax at home, so yes this really would be a hassle for me) and then I get my money back via check?! That's just wrong, plain and simple.

All amounts mentioned are in USD. They offer all the usual methods of deposit:

• Credit cards (Visa / MasterCard) – minimum deposit $5
• Neteller – minimum deposit $10
• Neteller InstaCash – minimum deposit $50
• FirePay – minimum deposit $5
• Citadel – minimum deposit $50
• PrePaid ATM – minimum deposit $40
• Moneybookers – minimum deposit $5

The following methods are only available for age confirmed or above. Minimum deposit for all methods is $50:

• International Money Order – Must be purchased from a bank.
• Check – Can take up to 8 weeks to clear
• Telegraphic transfers – Minimum of 3 business days

The following countries can only deposit via telegraphic transfer: Argentina, Bangladesh, Czech Republic, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Slovakia, Sri Lanka.

People from Singapore can only deposit $500 in 30 days.

Withdrawals

Once they have received your details confirming your identity they will send you a PIN in the mail. This PIN only needs to be used once to activate your ability to withdraw. You can not withdraw without activating your PIN.

"Your first withdrawal of funds will be sent to you in the form of a cheque through normal post. Once you have received at least one cheque deposit and we have confirmed it was cashed at your bank, your account will be upgraded to allow further withdrawal methods including NETeller and Firepay." Check withdrawals are charged a $5 fee. So, not only do they force you to receive your first payment back via a method you wouldn't prefer but they charge you for it as well. Lovely.

Check withdrawals take 7 – 14 business days to reach their location, however that time may be even longer depending on where you live. In my opinion once they receive the identification details from the player that should be enough. Sending the first withdrawal back via bank draft when one deposited via Neteller just seems excessive.

Minimum withdrawal is $20. Credit cards, Citadel, moneybookers, International Money Orders, Checks, and Telegraphic transfers are paid via check (don't forget the $5 fee). All other methods are paid as the deposit.

Terms and Conditions

They don't allow Australians or residents of the Netherlands to play on their site. Americans from the following states also can not deposit here: Indiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, and Nevada.

Found on the Registration Process page: "As per our Government Regulations, all players are required to provide sufficient proof of age* within 90 days of registering a cash account or prior to withdrawing funds from their cash player account, which ever comes first. (Please note: AusVegas reserves the right to request player identification at anytime). *Drivers Licence, passport or Birth Certificate" In other words, no matter what, you have to send in this information before cashing out. That is a hassle for the first cash out if you're like me and don't have a fax machine or scanner. However, it's a government regulation. There's nothing they can do about it.

"Please note that once an account has been enabled for CASH play you will no longer be able to play for free points in the account." Once you pay to play you must stay that way. J Actually, you can have 2 accounts – a play for fun account and a play for real account. You just can't play for fun and real with the same account.

They will share your email information with other LCPL sites. However, they do not share with third parties and you can request to have them not contact you at all. However, if you do request for no contact you will not be eligible for most of the bonuses they offer. Isn't that a lovely catch 22.

Be careful when you cash out. These people will apparently charge you for everything. "…AusVegas may charge a nominal fee when players choose to make a withdrawal from their AusVegas cash account to cover transactional costs. [Remember the $5 fee for checks.] Players requesting a stop payment/buy back on a cheque may be charged a nominal fee.

3.12 AusVegas reserves the right to charge additional transaction fees where multiple withdrawals (more than 5) are made within a 24-hour time period." They even charge you for the exchange rate: "For Players utilising alternative payment methods to deposit funds, AusVegas will apply the daily exchange rate as advised by our bank plus a nominal charge to cover transactional costs."

Don't let your account go dormant. ”A suspended account becomes dormant after a period of 183 days [approx. 6 months]. All dormant accounts are considered closed, and the balance of a Player's account will be withdrawn by AusVegas. The Player is entitled to apply to have these funds returned to them if application occurs within five years of the date on which the account becomes dormant." The good news is you can get it back by applying, and quite frankly you would be better off placing your money in a savings account than leaving it in a casino for 5 years. You have approximately 6 months to finish your game (if you leave the site in the middle of a game). Otherwise your money is forfeited.

Play your bonuses! If you get your bonus but don't play it within 14 days they may take it away from you.

"AusVegas cannot and does not guarantee that files available for downloading through the site will be free of viruses, or other codes that may corrupt or destruct properties." Why do they have a clause about downloading software when they run a non-download casino? (I know, I know, some people have to download Flash before being able to play. I still think this is an excessive clause.)

Bonuses

They start out simple enough. Then suddenly it just goes haywire on little details. Life really doesn't need to be this complicated.

• 200% Sign up bonus on first deposit. Maximum bonus is $100.
• Cash or the car. $20000 in cash or a car. Lottery type draw where every $250 wagered gets you one entry.
• 50% match and play bonus for regular players. It's only available for age confirmed and above status players who signed up for their emails. You must have received an email to be able to accept it. You have to deposit within the days mentioned.
• 30% Neteller deposit bonus for December. It's only available to players who signed up for their emails. You must have received an email to be able to accept it.
• Winners are grinners, losers are winners. My favorite type of bonus when I worked for a casino. There's no way of handing out cash for free on this one. They will give 10% on all losses for the previous 7 days on December 10th, 17th, 24th and 31st. Must be of age confirmation level or above.
• Slots tournaments. Deposit $25 on any weekend during December, play the slots listed in the promo, and have the potential to win up to $1000 in cash prizes. Must wager at least $250 and play $25 worth on the slots required for the given weekend.

Promotional Terms and Conditions

The requirements are not that bad. You have to wager 10X the bonus plus deposit. In other words, if you deposit $50 and receive a bonus of $100 you have to wager $1500 ($50 + $100 = $150 * 10 = $1500). Once you receive your bonus there's no going back. Either you make those wagering requirements or you lose it. Roulette, Baccarat, and Soc Bo are not included in the wagering requirements. Blackjack has to be wagered 20X instead of 10X. That's all there is folks.

The terms and conditions are different for every promotion and the promotions change regularly so I highly recommend you read everything before taking a promotion. You can often learn some very interesting things. For example, the $20000 or car promotion has a fascinating condition: "The prize will consist of US$20,000 towards the car of the players' choice, OR US$20,000 in cash, paid in weekly installments of US$500 to the players Lasseters Online or AusVegas cash player account." In other words, if you choose the money they will put in your account for you to gamble with every week, not give it to you cash in hand. If you choose the car the money goes directly to the car dealership. Once the winner is announced they have 12 days to claim their prize, otherwise Lasseter's will give the prize to someone else.

Signing Up

Easy, so far none of the casinos I have reviewed have asked for anything outrageous nor has the method changed from place to place. If you have signed up at one, you can sign up at any.

Playing

I took the 200% bonus on my $50 deposit. That gave me $150 to play with and a wagering requirement of $1500 if I play slots and $3000 if I play blackjack.

This is a non-download browser casino. Hence there aren't as many games to choose from, sometimes you need to reboot, and the games don't have any of the cool options available in a download casino. However, you do get to play immediately. No waiting for something to download.

The games on offer are baccarat, blackjack, roulette, and slots. No poker. I can't believe they don't offer poker, but they don't. There's no expert play, no automatic repeat, no nothing, no frills, nada.

The navigation in the lobby is horrible and annoying. You enter and you get two choices, slots or table games. At the bottom of the page are the slots choices, but you have to scroll down to the bottom of the page to get to the bar inside the browser window which slides and shows you all of the slots games. I can understand why they would do this rather to save the punter an extra click, but it could be done better. Personally I would put the Slots and Table Games buttons side by side rather than vertically stacked and move up the slots games so you don't have to scroll down to see the slide bar in the window.

Their slots are well designed. Each slot has its own theme and the theme is consistent in the graphics throughout the page. I like that. I have a real thing against slots that are all the same machine and a few graphics changed from slot to slot. It's lazy design to me and I feel the customer deserves more. So, in this regard AusVegas has done quite well. A few slots have bonus rounds with free games. Others offer nice music and noises when you win. The sound is crisp and clear, the graphics are perfect in Flash (my preferred technology for a browser casino). They don't offer auto-play so my hand is tired of clicking. The minimum bet on most slots is 9¢, which I like. The payoffs are ok. I've had some nice wins. Overall I like their slots a lot.

Showgirls is perhaps my favorite slot. The name invokes a horrible movie from the 1990's but the actual game features old time showgirls in colorful outfits from the 1890's. I also love the flowery backdrop on the game and the colors. Big Sushi Momma has paid off the best so far. It's also my favorite sound-wise. It plays some Japanese music when you win; the drums music is especially nice. You can see my win in the picture where I got the free spins. One free spin got another free spin and in the end I got 18 free spins and won around 240 points (which is $2.40, but I was only wagering 18¢ so I can't complain). My only complaint about Big Sushi Momma is that sushi is one of my favorite foods and playing this game is making me hungry.

Diamonds and Pearls is one of the more expensive slots games starting at 20¢ and it also seems to be the tightest. I have been playing in there for over 15 minutes and have yet to win anything substantial.

The other problem with browser casinos is the dreaded time out. Sure enough I got one in the middle of a slots game (see pic). That means it's time to reboot.

The rules of their blackjack are average. You can split up to 3 hands, but aces can only split once. The dealer has to take another card on 16 but has to stand on 17. Double down can only be done after the first 2 cards have been dealt – not after. You can double down on split cards.

The other thing about browser casinos is the bizarre error messages you can get. Check out the picture here:
This happened after I left a blackjack game for the lobby. I didn't even click on slots yet.

I've been playing Showgirls for 20 minutes now and I don't think this game ever gives the free spins. It does give nice wins every once in awhile, but I want a free spin. I try out Aztec after checking their paytable and seeing that they also offer free spins. Sure enough after a few minutes I got 7 free spins! Yeah! I only got 81 points from my free spins, which sucks, but I still like the free spins. It gives my hand a chance to rest.

I have been playing for hours now and have decided to rap up my review without finishing my gameplay (the boss would like to see some actual work).

Overall

AusVegas is an ok browser casino with nice simple games. They don't have a large selection. Soc Bo was mentioned in their bonus terms and condition but I couldn't find it on their site. They also don't offer poker, which is a pity and hurts them on my grading scale. To their benefit the slots are well designed and nice to play. Due to the small selection of games there isn't much to say about this site. The customer service was just ok. One time I contacted them and it took over 10 minutes to get a response from their Live Chat. You can see your entire transaction history, but the way the game play history is laid out isn't helpful at all. Punters would have to take the information and put it into an excel file and fuss everything quite a bit to get any real information out of it at all. That is not only time consuming but a hassle and unnecessary. They could simply format the page better. Overall it just didn't offer enough. It’s a sweet site, but it could be better. However, if you like to play slots on a browser then this place is a winner. Overall I give it a C+/B-.