The past few years have been something of a rollercoaster for the gambling industry, with particular changes felt in the slots and bingo niches where the popularity of bingo has been declining whilst slot games have been experiencing a meteoric explosion in popularity.
Around a decade ago there was the initial boom when the needle started to budge and there was a bit of a landslide which saw traditional bingo players join gambling sites. Bingo Halls around the country were beginning to close as players were swapping their paper bingo cards for the virtual equivalent. The early bingo sites were offering players fantastic sign up offers in order to get them to take the time to register and some would even offer players a no deposit bonus i.e. you would get free bonus money without even spending a penny.
Free Bingo games were a massive attraction on sites such as Costa, Foxy Bingo and Rocket Bingo where players could bag hundreds of pounds, playing for free but winning real money. without even spending a penny on their bingo tickets. So, when did the mass exodus from bingo sites begin?
Tax Changes
In 2019 there has been some changes to the law where bingo sites are taxed on the bonuses they give out, this lead to online bingo sites like Rocket Bingo removing their deposit bonuses and opting instead for wheel based welcome offers. This has had a massive impact on the industry, to such an extent they’ve had to rethink their welcome offers entirely.
We’ve seen a lot of standard 300% or even 400% bonus matches for new players removed or reduced to a mere 100% match. This has also affected the re-deposit bonuses where these are sometimes eliminated completely. Understandably this move hasn’t gone down very well with the customers who really relied on this to motivate them and keep them playing at the site. Read More →