Electronic funds transfer system for gaming machines

A gaming machine (4) is disclosed which includes apparatus necessary to send requests to and receive authorizations from an EFT system (11). All such requests for credit are limited to a preset amount, so that when a player uses an EFT transfer to obtain playing credit, that credit will be limited to no more than a specified amount. In practice, the player inserts his or her ATM card (debit card), keys in a PIN number, requests playing credit, and receives the preset amount of credit which can be converted to plays on the gaming machine (4).