Introduction
We have secured an interview with a man named Andrew Stone that runs the most comprehensive online casino information portal we have ever seen(https://bestnewzealandcasinos.com). The site is targeted specifically at New Zealanders, to become the number one source of truth about online casinos in New Zealand. Andrew has been nominated for several awards within the online gambling industry for the work he has done demystifying the world of online casinos. Las Vegas Fab48 is pleased to bring you the inside story of this man, his mission and his insights into the future of online casinos in New Zealand for 2021.
Getting Started in Online Casinos
Andrew was first introduced to online casinos when taking a summer job answering support questions for one of New Zealand’s longest-running online casinos. Andrew quickly earned a reputation within the business as someone that could easily explain some of the more complicated concepts that many Kiwi players struggled with. After many high-profile customers started asking for Andrew by name, he was promoted into the VIP support program. This is where Andrew’s life changed forever.
“Most customer play for fun and know when to stop but there were customers that had gambling problems.”
Andrew’s eyes look past the Skype video at this point in the interview. He goes on to explain how he would contact players that he knew had a propensity to spend more than they should. He would offer them cool-down periods and advice them to take breaks. This was something unusual in the early days of online casinos explains. “It is more common today with stronger regulations, but in those days, there were many online casinos that would not look after their customers.”, claims Andrew. The relationships Andrew built during that time of his career are still with him today, “I am still in contact with many of the old players. When you spend time with some of these people, you can’t help but be awe of what they have achieved”.
The part-time job had turned into a passion. Andrew was now fully immersed in the online casino space but how did he end up running BestNewZealandCasinos.com?
Leaving The Casino
“I wanted to do more” was the reason Andrew gave for leaving one of the largest online casinos in the world. “It is common knowledge that people play across several online casinos but I was only able to help those that we’re playing with us, whilst they were playing with us”, explained Andrew. He was constantly hearing horror stories about other casinos not paying players, enforcing difficult-to-understand terms and conditions and generally getting ripped off.
Andrew felt stuck as there was no way for him to warn people of potential problem casinos until they were assigned to him within the VIP program. Customers were wary of taking his advice as he was aligned with his employer and could not recommend competitors. One day he got an email from a long-standing VIP player, whom Andrew refers to as “Bee”. “Bee mailed me to say that he had hit a massive Jackpot at one of our competitors but that they were refusing to pay. They stated that Andrew stated that because the jackpot was won with ‘free money, it would not be paid out” Andrew stated. This was the last straw, this customer had become a friend and he wanted to help. Andrew went through the terms and conditions at the competing casino and saw that progressive jackpots were excluded from the term that they were using to block the payout.
Andrew advised Bee on this and after explaining that Bee could take their complaint to the MGA, he managed to get Bee his winnings back. This was brilliant, Andrew had helped someone as an independent 3rd party. He made his mind up then and there that he would create Best New Zealand Casinos and help fix the broken online casino system.
BestNewZealandCasinos.com is Born
“I started Best New Zealand Casinos so that players get honest reviews and information about the online casinos out there”. BestNewZealandCasinos.com has been his passion ever since. The site has been running for just over 4 years now, it has reviewed more than 50 different online casinos in New Zealand. It has also created guides to extracting the most from your casino bonuses, how to use the various banking mechanisms and what protection is in place for players who gamble online.
The site also runs monthly competitions that roll up into an annual casino of the year award, that takes all aspects of the online casino into account before adjudicating as to which casino takes the top prize. Each month’s top 3 casinos are featured on the casino of the month page with the winner also being featured on the home page.
Best NZ Online Casinos also offers several guides for low deposit casinos bonuses, fast payout casinos, high paying casinos, no deposit casino bonuses, and casinos that offer NZ$ along with a raft of others for any type of player.
There is also in-depth coverage of the laws regarding online casinos and gambling in New Zealand and what action players can take when they feel like a casino has cheated them. Andrew is also available via email for any specific questions or queries that readers may have.
Where to find out more
Andrew can be contacted via BestNewZealandCasinos.com or his new CanadianCasinoExpert.com site (for Canadian Casino Players).