PayPal Casino Sites in Canada
PayPal is a popular way for Canadians to send and receive money safely and securely. It is used to pay bills, make internet purchases, and to send money to family and friends at little or no cost.
The payment method has a core product that operates like an eWallet, parking funds between your financial institution and merchants or friends. However, is it accepted at online casinos?
Contrary to what other websites may tell you, PayPal is NOT accepted by online casinos in Canada.
If you really want to use PayPal then there is one hack you could use in conjunction with cryptocurrency which we will explain later in this article.
Why isn’t PayPal accepted at Online Casinos?
PayPal is simply too “American” to be used by Canadians directly for online deposits and withdrawals at most overseas gambling sites.
The company stopped processing US online casino deposits shortly after the recklessly misused UIGEA of 2006 went into effect. Slowly but surely they also began restricting the use of the method for other “gray area” jurisdictions where online gambling law is ambiguous.
Of course, in Canada, it is neither illegal nor specifically legal for residents to gamble offshore and that is about as gray as you can get. A similar but murkier situation has existed in the US since the UIGEA with Justice Departments under different administrations interpreting the legal landscape differently.
We’ll spare the gory details of how Neteller founders John Lefebvre and Stephen Lawrence were charged by US authorities for money laundering, even though internet gambling (other than sports) has never been illegal there and the founders had no active role in the company when they were arrested causing the company to lose more than 60% of its business overnight.
PayPal operates on the side of caution, so it’s not hard to imagine why we can no longer deposit and withdraw with PayPal directly except in a transient fashion – when a gaming site gets creative and lets us use it… until they feel the heat.
Old PayPal Tricks That Used to Work
It’s true that for quite a while, players were able to fund their accounts with secondary PayPal products such as PayPal Cash and PayPal Business Debit Mastercards. However, in 2018, the company announced it was pulling these ‘workarounds’ from the Canadian market and as of now, they are only available for US PayPal accounts.
What About PayPal Digital Gift Cards?
Again, these are only available via PayPal US, eBay US, and Facebook Marketplace which only allows regional access.
Here’s the final bit of bad news for PayPal account holders in Canada who want to gamble with their own funds parked in the PayPal eWallet product…
Don’t count on it if you prefer to play at overseas casinos! However, provincial sites will accept PayPal deposits and payout to your bank in about 4 business days.
The company has placed so many roadblocks in your way that it’s simply easier to use another method to fund your casino accounts.
That’s not to say it is impossible and it is certainly worth asking a support representative if they have any “special ways” for you to do it, but alternate methods seem to come and go when they appear at all.
PayPal Hack – Use it in conjunction with Cryptocurrency
There are few holes the company has been slow to patch, and we will show you here one way to use PayPal surreptitiously as a withdrawal method at overseas casinos serving Canadian players!
Please note: This may change over time but has held true for long enough to consider it a viable method.
There is one caveat, however. You’ll need to transact with the casino using cryptocurrency on Coinbase. Other exchanges may offer the service but we are still unaware of any that do.
While we can no longer purchase BTC or other digital currencies with a Canadian bank account or credit card. It is still possible to use a debit card to buy coins.
- Purchase BTC with a Canadian debit card
- Deposit digital currency from Coinbase into your favorite online Canadian casino account
- Win and cash out funds to Coinbase
- Link your Coinbase and PayPal accounts
- INSTANTLY “sell” the coins to yourself at PayPal
- Spend the money online or withdraw the money to your Canadian bank account. It will arrive within one business day, sooner if early in the day, later if after 7:00 PM ET or on weekends or holidays
Was the good news worth waiting for? We hope so!
Alternatives to PayPal
We tirelessly scour the payment industry and offshore casino websites online for safe and secure ways Canadians can deposit and withdraw.
Some methods allow only deposits, and others (PayPal) only allow withdrawals. Some, like the top four on our list, will work for money going into and coming out of overseas casino sites. All should work for provincial lottery monopoly casinos like PlayNow, etc.
Simply click the link to learn more about each method and to find Canadian casinos that welcome and accept your patronage using the particular facility or device.
- iDebit – Deposit and withdraw between your bank and casino with this instant funding gateway
- Interac – You know about Interac. Step by step guides for Interac Online and Interac e-Transfer casino banking
- EcoPayz – A true eWallet for Canadian online gamblers
- InstaDebit – Similar to iDebit, a direct bank transfer method
- VISA – Debit cards have a higher deposit success rate than credit cards. However, payouts can only be done to a depositing credit card. Use Visa debit to fund other methods
- Citadel – Instant banking for deposits at a select few casinos
- eCheck – Deposit using an electronic check. Sports Interaction and a few others accept this automated clearing house (ACH) method, but deposits are not instant
- Paysafecard – Pick up almost anywhere, deposits only for Canada
- Entropay – No longer a viable method for deposits or withdrawals
- Neosurf – A bright spot in the payment landscape. Learn how to fund online and how to use it as a withdrawal method
- InPay – Danish processor who transacts in the local currency, saving conversion fees
- Vanilla Prepaid – This method works at a few casinos. If you see it listed as a deposit method, be sure to ascertain whether your card can be used for international transactions – not all can
Canadian PayPal Casinos Conclusion
As a stand-alone product, the PayPal eWallet is next to useless for Canadian gamblers these days. It is very difficult to locate a reputable operator who will process your transaction using PayPal.
That’s not to say it is impossible, just highly unlikely.
We currently find PayPal’s best use to be a quick (instant) way to convert Bitcoin into CAD. Parking all or part of your winnings in your Coinbase CAD wallet takes the funds out of the volatile marketplace with immediate access to trading if you want to gamble in the market with it.
However, considering the amount of hoops you have to jump through just to gamble online, you’re better off using an alternative payment option.
