Paddy Power Mobile Review
Paddy Power are one of the best known providers of online sports betting, casino, Poker and Bingo, with over 800,000 customers playing on their sites. Based in Dublin, Ireland, and listed on both the Dublin and London stock exchanges, Paddy Power is also a major high street bookmakers with 400 shops in the UK and Ireland giving the group a total annual turnover at the last count of 4.2 billion Euros. Paddy power is licensed in the Isle Of Man, where the local gambling commission operates a strong regulatory environment, requiring licensed companies to fully protect customers, and give a fair return on all wagers.
This is a very innovative company, that is often ahead of the competition, who were among the first to realise the potential of mobile betting. With over 30% of the online bets placed at Paddy Power being via mobile devices, they have developed some outstanding apps that give players a full mobile sports betting service, a casino with an excellent range of games, and a new 'Vegas' site for iPhones and iPad users. There are also specialist Video Poker, Blackjack and Roulette games that can be downloaded individually.
The sportsbook site can be downloaded by either getting an app, or visiting paddypower.com in your browser, with the iPhone and iPad app found at the Apple App Store, and the Android app being found at Getjar. There are quick links on the Paddy Power website and mobile site to get you straight to the download pages.
You can register a new account using your mobile which can be done fairly quickly by entering your details, getting a username and a password. Depositing and withdrawing funds can be done on a mobile device using credit or debit cards including Visa, MasterCard and Maestro, although on the main website, Paddy Power will accept a huge range of deposit options including Neteller, UKash, Paypal, Bank Transfers and Skrill. Withdrawing funds from a mobile is easily done, just click on the 'My Account' tab, choose 'Withdraw' and then select the amount. It can take 2 - 3 business days for withdrawals to get credited back to your account, which is quicker than many places. For security reasons, withdrawals can only be made to the issuing card.
The Paddy Power mobile site uses the sports betting side as a homepage and along the top are buttons linking to Horse Racing, Football, Casino, and Live Betting. The huge list of sports offered includes all the obvious ones, plus many less obvious ones like European Basketball, Hurling, Handball, and even Surfing. Paddy Power are well known for offering specialist bets, and here you can place stakes on Politics, for example, 'How many party leaders will still be in place at the next election?, and Hollywood, such as 'Who will record the next James Bond theme?' It is a very easy site to navigate, letting you place bets within 2 - 3 clicks.
For sports betting, there are a number of special bonuses available when you play on a mobile device with a useful Promotions button giving you quick access to the latest ones. These will change from day to day depending on what sports are in progress, but typical examples include IPL Cricket match losing bet refunds if any match is decided by the final ball, or Premier League Darts refunds if a game ends in a draw and you have a losing correct score bet.
The mobile casino site - Paddy Power Games - is exceptionally good, with a wider range of games than at the majority of similar sites. Featured games include European and American Roulette, Blackjack, Multi Hand Blackjack, and nearly 40 slots games. These include some of the most popular slots like Cleopatra, Wolf Run, and Da Vinci Diamonds, as well as the iconic Rainbow Riches slot, one of the best known slots games, which pays out up to 25,000x your bet amount, and has three exciting bonus rounds to enjoy. When signing up to Paddy Power Games, you can get a free £5 bonus chip when making a first deposit of £5 or more, but if you sign up via the main website, that bonus can be up to £50, so it may be worth getting an account from the desktop site, and then signing in on your mobile.
For iPhone and iPad players, there is Paddy Power Vegas, which is an online casino with exclusive games just designed for these devices, and you still get the free £5 chip when you make your first deposit of £5. Like many casino bonus offers any bonus received is in the form of playing credits, which can be used to play the games, but not actually withdrawn, although any winnings made with the credits can be. What is unusual is that you only need to wager the balance once to withdraw winnings, whereas many bonuses have to be turned over 30 or more times before taking any money out.
There are several ways to contact Paddy Power should you need any help or assistance. From the UK, you can call on the freephone number 08000-565-275, or from Ireland on 1800-238-888, while players from other countries can call on 00353-1905-0131. There is a live chat option from the main website, but not directly from the mobile site, and you can email support@paddypower.com, where a reply should be received within an hour or so.
The Paddy Power sports and casino mobile applications are exceptionally well designed, user friendly, and comprehensive. It would be nice to see Poker and Bingo added to the range, but this is a rapidly developing market, and these may be added in the near future.