Progressive Jackpot: Withdrawal Limits, Who Pays and How Exactly
The world of online gambling is a quite complicated one in many aspects. When it comes to progressive jackpots things become even harder for understanding. On the other hand, the progressive jackpot is truly the most exciting part of online gambling due to its enormous size in terms of money. Hence, I would not over dramatize if I told you that every online casino player should know these stuff sooner rather than later:
How a Progressive jackpot gets collected
Two different ways how it can be paid to a player, including pros and cons of both of them
Best Paying (RTP) Online Slots with Progressive Jackpot
A rating of online casinos with progressive slots (no withdrawal limits for progressive winnings)
What's a Progressive jackpot in short
Software providers create online slots (as well as other casino games). Then they rent out those slots to online casinos for some share of profit. Online casinos serve the slots to players.
More on how software providers and online casinos interact
In some slots, some part of each bet (spin) you make goes to the progressive jackpot pool. Due to the fact that thousands of players are spinning the reels each and every day, the size of a progressive jackpots may become really enormous (even millions of EUR).
One day a super lucky player is going to trigger the progressive jackpot and win all the money that other players have been contributing. It happens randomly (in fair slots), and chances to hit it are very low (something around 10,000,000 to 1).
Learn more about Progressive jackpot and its types
How bet size affects chances to hit a Progressive jackpot
Who pays a Progressive jackpot and How it can be done
As you can see, software providers are in charge of collecting the prize pool money. This is a very predictable thing to have, I would say, since it would become a nightmare to organize the process in any other way (imagine the negotiation process between hundreds of casinos).
Instead, each online casino (the number of them can easily reach hundreds or even thousands) send the jackpot money to the software provider. It can last for days, weeks or even months, until some lucky player triggers the jackpot.
Now it is time to pay the winning to our lucky boy. Software providers can do it in two different ways:
Either via the online casino where the jackpot has been won. Thus, opposite to a very common misunderstanding, online casinos do not pay progressive jackpots from their own pockets.
Or pay the jackpot directly to the player.
Let’s elaborate on both approaches.
When a Progressive jackpot is paid directly by the software provider
This is the best way for online casino players, no questions about that. Why? Because here you are going to get your bank transfer (or you might be offered with other payment options) usually in lump and without any complications or delays.
This is true, because software providers (especially the ones which offer a progressive jackpot) are often well-established international companies, and it is not an issue for them to sign a check worth even millions at once.
However, I would say that software providers tend very heavily to delegate their duties to online casinos, where the jackpot has been won. I don’t why this is the case, but don’t expect to get your winning from the software provider directly nine times out of ten.
When a Progressive jackpot is paid via a casino
Unfortunately, the same can not be said about online casinos in general. Yes, there are some of them which are quite big and reliable, but overall, in comparison to software providers, online casinos are much smaller operations.
This means that having an online casino as an intermediary can cause this sort of problems:
Online casinos usually set withdrawal limits (the amount of money you can withdraw daily/weekly/monthly). Even decent withdrawal limits (50,000 EUR a month) are going to make the withdrawal process tiresome (especially if we are talking about jackpots worth millions). Moreover, some online casinos have their withdrawal limits much lower (just a few thousands EUR a month), and in this scenario the process is going to take decades.
What do we all like to do with our pending withdrawal money? Correct, lose them back. For me it is hard to imagine a regular gambler who will patiently wait for years. I have heard and read so many stories about how people lose back literally fortunes.
Another huge problem is that an online casino, being a rather small operation, can easily go belly up. In this case your money is gone, and you can not simply turn your claim to the software provider. The software provider has completely fulfilled its part of the deal, namely, has sent all the money to the casino.
Not to mention that unfair online casinos may deny your winning due to some loophole in their terms and conditions.
Is it always a bad thing to have a casino as an intermediary?
I would 100% prefer to deal with software providers directly, but unfortunately it is not possible most of the time. Here the precautions every online casino player should take before playing progressive slots:
Always prefer bigger and older online casinos over smaller and newer (the strength of the gambling license is also a big deal).
Check out what withdrawal limits an online casino sets. I would not play in those venues where the withdrawal process would take more than a year.
Check out who pays this particular progressive jackpot, and how exactly it is done.
Nevertheless, there are some online casinos which do not apply withdrawal limits to progressive jackpots. This is what we all have to be looking for.
Player friendly online casinos with progressive slots
Where to learn about rules regarding who pays a Progressive jackpot
In my experience, online casinos are not transparent at all when it comes to progressive jackpot rules. It is usually quite a challenge to find this specific clause in their terms and conditions regarding those matters.
The best way to work around is to ask an online casino’s representative this question directly. Even better to make a screenshot of your conversation in case their policy suddenly changes in the future.
Conclusion
Hopefully you have got a better understanding on how the luckiest players get their progressive jackpot prizes. Maybe one day you will become one of those, and in this case you will be 100% prepared so that nothing is going to cloud your joy.
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