I don't understand how this Tuscany thing works. Why do players pull
their cards out? What do they have to gain from this? 

I have been questioned about this since my last entry here. The short answer is that casino bugaboo called “daily average.” I dislike this casino policy probably more than any other. Here is part of the section in More Frugal Gambling where I discuss “The DAILY AVERAGE TRAP”:  

Be especially careful when any casino benefits are based on your daily average. This can be a huge danger area not only for the player who uses the host system to get comps but also for someone who is depending on bounce-back cash from the slot club or room offers through direct mail offers.  

The obvious meaning of daily average is the amount of action (coin-in or slot club points earned) you give on the machines in one casino divided by the number of days you played on their machines. If you are staying in the casino-hotel where you are playing, this might be figured as a whole trip average. But whether it is called a daily average (for a day visitor) or a trip average (for the multi-day tourist), it is quicksand territory. 

The main problem comes in determining what a casino considers a “day” or a “trip.” We have a high-roller friend who is an expert in avoiding this problem. Writing under the nom de plume of Royal Cat, he gave a long list of ways you can run afoul of being “tripped,” meaning doing something that the casino might count as a “day” or a “trip” even if you don’t actually put any money into a machine. 

1.      Sticking your slot club card into any casino machine or kiosk, even to merely view your point balance.

2.      Presenting your card in the pit. 

3.      Any slot club transaction, including checking point balance, redeeming cashback, having free play put on a machine, or getting a comp for your points 

4.      Use of ANY coupon that has your account number on it, including gift shop or buffet discounts

5.      Playing on your card later in the day after checking out from the hotel, triggering a second trip rather than a continuation of the first one. 

6.      Inquiring about or paying off a marker

7.      Making a reservation for a hotel stay or event, even if you later cancel it. 

8.      Signing in to a VIP lounge 

There are ways that a savvy machine player can avoid being punished by an unreasonable use of technology (and hopefully some casino executives will read this and see how irrational rules keep gamblers from playing as much as they would like in their casinos). NEVER give “walk-through” play in a casino that worships the God of Daily Average. If you can’t give a substantial amount of play in this casino, don’t give any. You get in from the airport late your first night for a 3-day stay at this casino or you have only an hour on the last day before you have to check out and go to the airport, don’t ruin your average by playing for a short time. Sometimes a host is authorized to take these short periods into consideration, but you can’t talk to a computer to “explain” when they send out your next room offer based on a “ruined” daily or trip average. Instead play next door where they welcome your play, whether for long or short periods of time. Some couples with individual slot club accounts, as I always recommend, solve this problem by using one person’s card for their major comp play in a casino and the other card for these short sessions in the same casino. 

With all my experience in this area, I still can’t avoid this problem completely. A new casino opened quite near our condo here in Las Vegas. It would be handier for us if we could establish ourselves there and perhaps drop playing in a couple of casinos much further away. But we would have to see whether this new casino could offer the same benefits we had been getting elsewhere. There was no cashback so we would have to depend on bounce-back cash and there were no brochures on this to help us know what it took to get what. So we would have to “experiment.” After our early play, they started sending frequent “free play” coupons, sometimes 3, 4, or 5 times a week. Okay, we wouldn’t be pikers; we wouldn’t just play out the free play and then run.   Every time we used a free-play coupon, we would play for an hour or two – so we were putting in some serious weekly coin-in. What happened? Our free-play coupon amounts started decreasing. We had friends who were putting in the same coin-in as we were each week, but all in one day. They were getting much bigger free-play coupons. Oops, we were caught between getting “tripped” for using a coupon without playing and having a low daily average.

At some casinos, if you pull your card after you download your free play, the software used does not record a “play day.” That would be the reason why you might want to pull your card if you don’t plan to do any play that day except running the free play through once and then cashing out. However, this will not work at casinos with more recent software and all “action” is recorded in the machine records. 

In any case, casinos definitely frown on card-pulling - and sometimes take severe measures against players who do this, including cutting them off from getting all mailers. You are taking a risk if you do this.

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