Over the past decade, I have signed up to countless legally permitted iGaming websites to place sports bets and play online casino games from numerous award-winning providers.
Touch-wood, I have never encountered any serious issues on any of the sites I have joined, and I firmly believe that’s because I always read the expert reviews on reputable sites like AskGamblers before signing up anywhere.
With that in mind, here’s why only some reviews can be trusted, and most others can be taken with a pinch of salt. Let’s dive in and take a closer look at what this means.
Can All Online Casino Website Ratings Be Trusted?
No. Not all reviews can be trusted, and not all gaming sites or sportsbooks can be trusted for various reasons, either because they use faulty software, are completely unlicensed and unregulated, have poor reputations, provide unreliable or non-existent player support, or have terrible customer service standards.
Additionally, I’ve found that the worst sites that must be avoided at all costs will be notorious for not coming good on the bonuses and promotions they offer or will take forever to pay out winnings.
If a review is just trying to get players to join that site so that they can make a bit of commission, and they don’t have the player’s best interests at heart, this kind of crucial information that you should be aware of simply won’t be included in the reviews on dodgy, untrustworthy iGaming review sites, which is disgusting.
For the past 10 to 12 years, I have visited numerous review sites suggested by my friends or colleagues or ones I have randomly found online while searching for the latest casino bonuses and reviews.
However, the only site I can truly trust to point me in the right direction each time and take me to the safest sites is askgamblers.com. One of their latest top suggestions I recently joined was RocketPlay, and so far, so good, as always.
This site has been safeguarding players like me for almost twenty years by recommending only the most secure platforms/brands. It’s run by a dedicated team of writers and researchers who are committed to providing people with the latest, most accurate, honest, and unbiased information for the industry’s best sites.
They also have a Rogue/Blacklisted sites section that shows you which brands to avoid, which I think is fantastic, especially for beginners who are new to playing on sites like this. Before any of the featured brands are recommended to people like me on their website, each site is thoroughly vetted using the same rigorous testing and background checks to ensure it’s legitimate.
In other words, they have done all the hard work so that we don’t have to spend hours searching for the information ourselves, which is sometimes hard to find. I’ve found that their reviews always contain everything I need to know about a site that I’m considering joining.
They give me a much better insight without ever actually having to visit the casino itself, which massively helps me decide which sites might be worth my time. Quite often, they also have exclusive bonus codes for new players that other review sites simply don’t have.
What Is CasinoRank?
Their reviewed websites have also been given a unique score on their in-house ‘CasinoRank’ rating system – an innovative tool that focuses on reputation and complaint history, highlighting each brand’s credibility.
It includes 50% details about the brand, 25% AGCCS history, 15% user reviews, and 10% website design details, and I will only play on sites that have a 6.00 or higher score. I love this system because, as mentioned, it quickly helps me decide which sites can and cannot be trusted.
Key Areas Covered In The Ratings
The reviews are always laid out in the same user-friendly format, which makes it easier for me to quickly go straight to the sections that matter to me the most. A typical review contains the following useful information:
- Name and link to the casino at the top of the review. This area also has the CasinoRank score, a player rating out of 10.00, and the average complaint response time (if they have received any complaints, that is)
- You can see which author has compiled the objective review, and to the right of this, you will see an external link and new player welcome bonus information. Clicking or tapping this banner will redirect you to that site’s official registration page.
- You can also see ‘what we like’ and ‘what we don’t like’ about the site.
- Directly below, you can find general information/details about the site, with sub-sections including payments, games, customer support, and responsible gambling. The thing I like most is that all of their top-rated brands actively promote responsible gambling and have a range of safer gambling tools like deposit limits and session time reminders for people to use to help them remain within their budgets.
The key details include when the site launched, the official URL web address, where it’s licensed, who owns it, which affiliate programs it’s connected with, and what type of site it is (e.g., instant play, live, mobile, etc.).
The juicy parts of the review contain an editor’s overview of the site, general information, average payout speeds and which payment methods it accepts, how reliable/responsive the support is, which fruit machines, scratchies, and classic table & card favorites it has, how committed it is to responsible gambling, followed by a final verdict with some useful screenshots.
Right at the bottom of the main expert reviews, you can find player reviews/testimonials (good and bad), as well as information about the latest bonuses and promotions on that site, and a complaints form for anyone who wishes to raise a complaint with that brand, which is dealt with by the AskGamblers experts.
