Harrods Casino Review

Harrods is known for many things; shopping, style, class, and quality just to name a few. One thing they are not known for is running a top notch casino. Why is this? Well, it is most likely because they have never tried to run a casino. All that is about to change though, because today Harrods is opening its virtual doors to a shop of a different kind. That’s right; Harrods online casino is open and ready for business. Now it is up to us to decide if this is a strategic business move or if they should just stick to what they are known for. After all, brand extension is not always a good thing.

When you first walk through the virtual doors at Harrods you feel a bit as though you should have dressed for the occasion. It is a very classic look that is timeless rather than trendy. The closest we can compare it to would be The Ritz Club Casino. This new kind of charm carried us right on through to registration where we were asked whether we were a lady or a gentleman. This would be referring to the gender question that many registration forms leave as male or female. It is often times very small touches like these that will stick in your mind and help form your overall opinion of a site. If they can pay attention to these details, then we can’t wait to see what the games are like.

Harrods likes to be the one that sets the trend rather than the one to follow the crowd. With this in mind they decided to use Kismet’s software platform to be the power behind the scenes at their casino. As far as we know they are the only UK site to go with Kismet thus far. It doesn’t seem to be a bad choice though as it passed most of our tests with flying colors. For example, Kismet is offering both a downloading and non-downloading version of their product. We tested both and found them well up to par in their deliveries. The non-downloading is supported by a wider swath of systems, such as Mac, which opens the site to more players. If you are running a Windows based system, then you can take advantage of the more luxurious downloading options that will install on your own computer. A nice touch that we ran across here is that Harrods allows users to pick and choose which games they would like to download. Once you make your selections you are on now on your way to the action. While there are only 30 games currently offered on the floor, there is the promise of more to come very soon. Maybe this new set will see the addition of a Craps table as that is not currently an option. There are also no multi-player options but players do get the advantage of a very unique gaming console designed by Kismet. We love some of the “house” rules in play here, like the La Partage rule for European Roulette, as they shift the odds back towards the player and much closer to zero edge. Look through some of the tables and see what we mean.

Players of all levels will find some very tempting promotions ready and waiting for them at Harrods, but the real winners here are the VIPs. If you remember what Harrods does in the real world and what they are known for then this should not be a shocking new fact for you. It does take some serious cash to reach VIP status as it is only awarded after you wager over $10,000. But once you reach that mark, the prizes are sweet. The one that we are used to seeing is that VIP customers will receive 5% cashback on all of their losses, a nice prize but nothing to write home about. The one that is really neat is that VIP players can request their own custom games. We really wish that our budget would support this option as we are dying to know what all that entails.

We are all familiar by now that Harrods is a retail chain, and a very classy one at that. With this in mind we were expecting customer service to be one of their strongest areas. After all, as far as online casinos go this is the area where they have had the most real world experience. Its not that we found their set-up lacking it just had too many constraints to be easy to use. It seemed as though every option we tried came with some kind of strings attached. For example, there is freephone, but it is only available from 5pm to midnight. This is better than the 9am to 5pm we have seen before, but it is always nice to have 24 hour coverage. Next if you choose to go with e-mail they promise to respond within 12 hours for non-VIP inquiries. We did try this option and received our responses much faster than that. And finally they advertise live chat, but it was not available at the time of our visit. So you can see all the pieces are there, they just don’t have to be so labor intensive.

Harrods online casino is an all around safe bet. Yes, they have some key areas that need a little face lift, but one has already been sent to the surgeon. The site has already promised to add to its selection of games and in the very near future. With this kind of response to customer demand, a customer support re-vamping is sure to follow. When you couple this with their great VIP perks and haute all around style, Harrods casino is simply a good bet any way you look at it.