Desmond Ridley

What I cover

Two questions, in this order. How much of every dollar a game gives back, and how long the money takes to reach your account once you ask for it. Most coverage of this category answers the second loudly and the first not at all, which is backwards, because over any real number of sessions the percentage costs you far more than the wait ever will.

I read audit certificates before I read marketing copy. If an operator quotes a payout figure without naming the testing house and the date, I treat the number as decoration. Where I cannot source a figure I say so rather than estimate it, which is why the pages here carry game class return percentages and method level payout windows rather than invented per operator statistics.

How I work

• Payout speed is recorded as two numbers, operator approval and money in account, never collapsed into one.
• Return to player figures are taken from published rules and paytables, and per operator claims are only repeated when a named testing house and a recent certificate date exist.
• Bonus offers are assessed on the wagering multiple, what it applies to, the cashout cap and the game weighting. Headline size is close to irrelevant.
• Every figure carries the date it was recorded, because operators change terms without notice.

Background

My working life has been spent with probability rather than with casinos: a mathematics degree, then a decade in actuarial and risk analysis before I started writing about gambling products. That background is why the arithmetic appears in the open on these pages instead of being asserted. A reader who can follow the division can check my conclusion, and that is the point.

Contact

Corrections are welcome and acted on. Reach the desk through the contact page, and see the weighted criteria behind these assessments in how we rate payout speed.