All bookmakers will compete for your business just like any other company in the world. Bookmakers do this in a great way, though they all offer incentives to sign up, and this often comes in the form of free bets. Nearly all bookmakers will offer you free bets or cash to sign up, with Paddy Power offering free bets for signing up. As well as sign up offers bookmakers also offer free bonuses for existing customers. Below are some of the bonuses explained. You can view all the offers here. You can check out our bookmaker enhanced betting offers here.
Sign up bonuses and free bets
All bookmakers like to attract new customers, and they do this by offering customers what they call sign up bonuses. These traditionally are given to customers once they register and deposit a certain amount. Traditionally they then have a wagering requirement which basically means you have to place a bet or bets of a certain amount before being able to withdraw the money. The bonuses tend to be given in 3 ways the first of which is a free bet, the 2nd as promotional cash and the 3rd is a risk-free bet. Nearly every bookmaker has a sign-up offer, and you can view all of them here.
Free bets explained
All bookmakers will offer free bets. A free bet is exactly what it sounds like, it’s risk-free as its free money given to you by a bookmaker. These are given in 2 forms, the first is what as known as a stake no return bet, this is when a bookie provides you with a free bet, but when it is settled the free bet stake is not returned in the winnings like a normal bet. For example, if you were to place a free bet on a 2/1 shot usually you would expect to have £75 returned, but with a free bet (due to it only returning the winnings and not the stake) you would only receive £50. The 2nd type of free bet is what we class as stake return or promo cash; these bets will return the stake when placed along with the winnings, so these are just like placing any normal bet. The advantage of these are that you are playing with bookmakers money and not your own.
Deposit bonuses
Free bets can be triggered in many ways, but one of the main ones and often the one that is associated with sign up offers is deposit bonuses. Deposit bonuses are the most common way of receiving free bets; this is the bookmakers’ favourite way of enticing customers in, it requires customers to use some of their money as well as getting them involved in betting. These work in several ways, one thing that must always happen is you need to deposit. The amounts vary, and so do the free bets you receive, some bookmakers will offer 100% matched bet on your first deposit while others will only offer 50% or even 25%. These offers tend to happen when you first deposit or sign up to a bookmaker, but you may also receive emails or texts from bookmakers with new offers for you.