Casino payment methods

Every payment method has two prices, one paid on the way into the casino and one paid on the way out, and the "cashier" (the casino's payments page) usually shows the first more clearly than the second. A deposit is built to take seconds and is labelled "instant", while the return journey depends on rules written separately by the method, the bank and the operator's terms; a player reading only the deposit column has chosen half a method.

We have arranged the methods below by what each costs in both directions, with numbers belonging to hypothetical players and presented as examples, since fees and rates change by provider and by country. We leave for the end the rule tying them together, because it turns the choice of the deposit method into the choice of the withdrawal method.

Cards, and the British ban on credit

A debit card is the simplest way in, provided the issuing bank accepts gambling transactions (card networks give them their own "merchant category code", which some issuers refuse). On the way out a card works only if it can receive a "payout", and otherwise the money takes another route (often a bank transfer).

A credit card can add a cost the casino does not mention, because the card's own terms may treat a gambling deposit as a "cash advance" (cash borrowed on credit), with a fee and with interest from the first day. A player who deposits $300 in this way pays two prices on the same evening, and the second is written in a contract he signed years earlier.

In Great Britain the question is closed. The Gambling Commission banned credit cards for gambling from 14 April 2020, online and offline (lottery tickets bought in a shop aside), after its own research had classed 22 per cent of the online gamblers who used credit cards as problem gamblers.

E-wallets, and the clause in the bonus terms

An "e-wallet" (an account holding money between bank and merchant, such as Skrill, Neteller or PayPal) works in both directions wherever the cashier lists it for withdrawals. Its costs, where they exist, sit in the wallet's own "fee schedule" rather than in the casino's terms: a fee for some ways of loading it, a fee for moving money to the bank and, when the wallet's currency differs from the player's, a conversion at each step.

The second price of an e-wallet is printed in the bonus terms, where some offers exclude deposits made with named wallets. A player who deposits $100 through an excluded wallet and expects a "match" (a bonus proportional to the deposit) receives none, and the clause saying so was there before the deposit; our page on welcome bonuses explains where such clauses sit.

Bank transfers, slow and plain

A bank transfer is the method of large amounts and the road that remains when others are closed, and its cost depends on the distance between banks. Between accounts in the same payment area it is often "free", while an international transfer can pass through "correspondent banks" (intermediaries between the sending and the receiving bank), each of which may take a fee from the amount on its way.

A withdrawal of $1,000 by international transfer that meets two intermediaries charging $15 and $20 (an example) arrives as $965, which the player learns from the statement. Before the first large withdrawal we would suggest asking the operator whether it charges a "withdrawal fee" or pays the sending bank's charges, and asking your own bank what it takes to receive.

Prepaid vouchers, a ticket for one direction

A "prepaid voucher" (a code bought with cash or by card from a seller, then typed into the cashier) carries money in and, where the cashier lists it as "deposit only", nowhere else. It has a merit, in our view, for anyone who wants a ceiling, since the value of the code is the most he can lose with it, and a cost on the day of a win, when the winnings need a second road the voucher never prepared.

That second road is usually a bank transfer, opened at the moment of the withdrawal with bank details (the bank's name, the account number, a statement in the player's name) and the documents the operator asks for. We would advise keeping vouchers for budgets rather than for winnings; if you expect to withdraw, a method that works both ways serves you better.

Crypto: volatility, irreversibility, exclusivity

A crypto deposit has three prices of its own: the "network fee" paid to send the coins, the movement of the coin's price while the money is at the casino, and the casino's rate for converting coins into the currency of the account, if it converts them. The second can outweigh any result at the tables.

A player who deposits coins worth $600, ends the evening 12 per cent up in coins and withdraws when the coin has fallen 20 per cent receives coins worth $537.60, less than he deposited after a winning evening! A "stablecoin" (a coin tied to a currency) is built to remove the movement, though not the other two prices, and no coin changes the irreversibility of a transfer once sent.

The last fact matters in two ways. A mistyped "wallet address" sends coins to an address the player does not control, with nobody obliged to return them, and a payment made in crypto has no "chargeback" (the dispute procedure of a card payment at the issuing bank), so a player who pays a dishonest site has no bank to ask.

Crypto is no warning sign in itself; exclusivity is, because a casino accepting nothing else has chosen the one method with no issuer between its cashier and the player, and our page on fake operators counts this choice among the warning signs.

The currency of the account

The "account currency" is usually chosen once, at registration, on a screen you may not remember reading, and it decides whether every deposit and withdrawal is converted. The conversion has a price, the "spread" (the gap between the rate applied and the market rate). That price is paid twice.

With a spread of 2.5 per cent each way (an example, since the real figure is in the terms of the card or of the wallet), a deposit of $400 becomes $390 of play and a withdrawal of $1,000 arrives as $975, so one cycle has cost $35 before a single bet was lost! An account in the currency of your card costs nothing of the kind, which makes it, in our view, the cheapest decision on this page.

The closed loop

The rule that ties the methods together is the "closed loop": a withdrawal returns through the method of the deposit, up to the amount deposited with it (only the remainder can take another road). Operators apply it as an anti-money-laundering control, so that money cannot enter by one door and leave by another under a different name.

A player who deposits $200 by card and $100 by e-wallet and then wins sees the withdrawal split along the same lines (each route repaid first), and a method that cannot receive money pushes its share to a bank transfer. The deposit method is therefore worth choosing with the withdrawal in mind, as we argue on our page on how to choose a casino, and the withdrawals page follows the days that the money then takes.

Each method in both directions

Method	Way in	Way out	Where the cost is written
Debit card	instant, if the issuer accepts gambling	only if the card can receive payouts	issuer's terms; conversion if the currencies differ
Credit card	banned for gambling in Great Britain since 14 April 2020	as for debit cards, where accepted	card terms (cash advance fee and interest)
E-wallet	instant	where the cashier lists it for withdrawals	wallet fee schedule; bonus terms that exclude named wallets
Bank transfer	slow	the route that remains when others cannot receive	sending, intermediary and receiving banks
Prepaid voucher	instant	none, where listed as deposit only	seller's fees; the second road needed at the withdrawal
Crypto	minutes, plus a network fee	where offered, irreversible	network fee, coin price, the casino's conversion rate

Questions

By the Rand Casinos editorial team · Last updated October 2026 · Online since 2007