In mid-February, Andrew Uyal, a Las Vegas Strip casino pit boss, wrote in his Behind the Curtain column on the www.gamblingwithanedge.com site an article titled Who Actually Cares? It was about tipping. One of the comments made to his article was about my writing, so Uyal forwarded it to me to make sure I saw it. I’m going to address that today.
When Bob discusses how a given game in a given casino has a positive EV, I have never seen him factor in tokes in his highly detailed calculations despite his listing every other conceivable variable involved. It seems to me that giving up even $5 or $10 or more on big wins would have a substantial impact on beating the casino if one only hopes to beat the casino by ~.02%
Do APs refrain from toking, because it’s the only way to maintain a positive EV? If APs do tip when they win, why doesn’t Bob cost tips in his calculus for the EV of the games he plays?
I have written more than a dozen articles through the years about tipping. The Cliff Notes of my views are:
- Tipping is a personal matter. Everybody must decide for himself.
- I tip less than many other players.
- If I’m teaching at a casino, e.g. the South Point now but it has been other places as well over the years, I always tip at least $5 on every hand pay. I do not wish complaints about this to get upstairs which might affect my welcome.
- If I’m playing at a 15-machine bar, which abound in Nevada and very occasionally offer very lucrative games/promotions, the only casino employee on sight is the bartender. If the game is lucrative enough, I tip more generously in these situations than I would in a regular casino. (If the game is not that lucrative, I don’t play.) A bartender can easily complain to the boss if I’m “winning all the time.” If he is well-tipped, he has an incentive to keep his mouth shut in this regard.
So, without expanding on the Cliff Notes too much, let me see if I can find something new to say. The letter-writer to Andrew Uyal believes that video poker players only have a 0.02% advantage. Believe me, if that were the size of the advantage, I wouldn’t be playing. I need a significantly larger advantage than that.
To show how this is not nearly enough, I used Video Poker for Winners and looked at NSU Deuces Wild (returning 99.728%) and assumed a slot club of 0.3%. This gives the player a 100.028 game, which is actually quite a bit more than the 0.020% edge posited. A dollar single-line player needs a bankroll of more than $1 million to have a 99% chance of not going broke in the long run. I’ve never heard of a dollar player having anywhere near this size of gambling bankroll. Those of us who do have larger bankrolls typically play for larger stakes than dollar single line.
In his column, Andrew Uyal addresses tips from the point of view of table games. In table games, the dealer and the player are face-to-face all-day long. A good dealer can enhance the gambling experience. In places where “when to shuffle” is a dealer-decision, a well-timed tip can sometimes get you one more hand. But unless you’re betting $100 or more, a $5 tip will almost always be cost-ineffective, and anything less than that could be perceived as an insult.
In video poker, you rarely interact with the floor people except in the case of a W2G. The floor people bring you the money. Period. I’m nice to these people. I learn their names over time. But I don’t see normal jackpots as a tip-worthy event.
An exception to this would be a high-value promotion where there are LOTS of W2Gs hitting all the time. Then tipping makes sense because if the floor people have to decide who to take care of first, it’s human nature to help the tokers first.  Since time is money on these types of plays, “sharing the wealth” a bit is smart gambling.
So yes, video poker APs tend to tip less than recreational players. With that said, there will always be APs who honestly believe that toking well is simply a cost of doing business and that minimum wage floor people need the money more than a player who can afford to play $50 a hand or more.
I understand that point of view. I also understand the point of view that when you lose $10,000, floor people never offer to share your losses with you. It’s a one-way street. They only want to share your wins.
Both points of view make sense to some degree. You’ll have to balance them for yourself.
Finally, in most cases I tip zero, which is why I don’t explicitly list the cost of tips in my calculations.
The one time I hit a hand pay jackpot, which was for $1k and before TITO was a thing, four casino employees were present to hand me the money. Of course, there were four $5 bills for me to tip each employee. At the time, I had no idea tipping these employees was something that was expected, so I gave out no tips.
Today, I’d still not be tipping in this situation. It was preposterous that 4 people showed up.
I’m wondering where that person came up with a figure of .02% Where would one get such an idea? Is it possible they meant 2% and got the decimal wrong?
.02% is 2%
No. 0.02 is equal to 2%, but 0.02% is only 1/100 as large as the other two numbers.
Ahh, I remember the old days of coins.
You would play video poker at the bar. The bartender had a locked wooden box behind the bar with the rolls of quarters. You’d buy the rolls of quarters from the bartender, get your free drink, tip the bartender for your free drink, and then tip the bartender for selling you a roll of lucky quarters if you hit a royal.
I also remember the change girls with their change carts full of rolls of nickels and quarters. Occasionally I’d hit a jackpot, track down the girl with the change cart, give her a twenty, and say “You sold me some lucky quarters.”
It was kinda fun back then. I remember playing video poker at The Sports Bar at the Mirage and buying rolls of quarters from the bartender Greg.
I guess I should’t be giving away how old I’ve gotten. Fun back in the day though!
I also remember playing video poker at bars. Guys would walk up, buy two rolls of quarters, and order their free drink. They’d get their two rolls of quarters and free drink, wait until the bartender turned his back, then walk away with their two rolls of quarters and free drink. No tip. Back then, you could drink your way to your grave in Las Vegas for free.
As a $1-$5 VP, semipro AP/recreational hybrid, I tip in the range .5 to 1.0% for W-2G hand pays. If more than one staff person is involved, it’s up to them to split the tip. I guess my approach makes me more of a recreational player than a “semi-AP,” doesn’t it?
If you’re planning on tipping on a hand pay, that could conceivably alter your strategy. I recall one play on $1 FPDW where it would normally be best to draw to 222pair rather than hold the five of a kind if the pair was 9’s or lower (apparently, the decreased chance of drawing a wild royal if you would be pitching a pair of 10’s or higher made holding the five of a kind the better play in that instance). Anyway, at the casino where I was playing this game (long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away), $1000 was a hand pay. If you were planning on tipping $10 for that hand pay, that made holding the five of a kind the better play in every instance, as the payout for 2222 was effectively reduced to $990.
There might be other plays in other games that are so close that dictates one play but dictates another. As I’m only a quarter player these days (given how awful VP has become), tips don’t enter into it for me, but a few years ago, I did hit a big progressive at an Oregon casino (over $3700 on quarters) and I tipped the various little helpers $20 each (total $100). Probably too generous, but I was enjoying the death glares from the other patrons a bit too much 🙂
These strategy variations pop up if you use certainty equivalent adjusted EV (CE=EV-Variance/Bankroll/2). Another one: hold aces full in double bonus instead of drawing to the aces.
Tips can get expensive for a player who is in & out of a casino a lot. Whenever I go to the casino I try to minimize the practice of giving away tips. In casino poker rooms across the country it seems that it is very customary for a winning or losing player to tip the dealer after they win a pot. After I win a pot in poker I don’t tip the dealer and I enjoy the faux pas it creates at the table. With every dealer change there is a different dealer response on a no-tip winning pot. You can read the dealers body language as if they are expecting something before they start the next deal, but they are not getting it. It’s a wonderful moment in poker when that happens.
Regarding tipping live poker dealers, with all due respect, if you stiff them, lol, I’m tellin ya, you’ll pay for it. If you play long enough, you will regret it, trust me. I learned poker in the old “Gardena Days”, before there were dealers. In a perfect world, maybe you could not tip anyone and not reap any repercussions. But in the real world, you need to find a happy balance. Don’t overtip, you’ll hurt your own game. But don’t stiff them either. There will be a dispute some day in a big pot, and you won’t like the outcome. In addition to the dealers, I frequently slipped the floormen tokes also. It pays to be friendly. It pays to have friends. lol
I agree that if you don’t toke the dealer, eventually there will be a “hometown decision” re a disputed pot, and you will not like the outcome. Whether you might save more than the amount of that pot by not toking is a matter of chance. And whether you want to put up with the subtle blackmail of “don’t tip, and don’t expect a decision in your favor” is a matter of taste and personal tolerance.
I generally toke $1 if I win more than $10 and $2 if I win more than $50. I hasten to add that I do so more out of a feeling of obligation than any desire to reward the dealer. There is one instance where I will NEVER tip a given dealer–where he/she is a little bit too eager to pull the rake out of the pots. Threshold = $20, but they snatch a dollar when the pot reaches $18–or $17. I also will not tip a dealer who rushes the action.
I am aging and quite possibly getting wiser. My tipping has gone way down. Closing in on 200 W2G’s and kinda wish I had half of those tokes back. i have won way too many poker hands to keep track of, maybe 50,000 and I have tipped at least a dollar. Tournament wins, cocktails, servers…so a couple hundred thousand is missing from the bottom line. I should have tipped 40K or so. If you are going to put in 2500 hours a year for several decades, the leaks could easily add up to a quarter million or more. Leaks include more than just overtipping. As long as it is a well thought out decision and not an obligation, by all means enjoy and tip lots. The games are tougher and the margins tighter, have to adjust or you will perish. Right Tony Bigcharles?
I always tip for a handpay. Most of my play is in one casino and I know most of the workers. I have also heard casino employees (including foodservice personnel) talking about people who hit jackpots and never tip. I do not want to be that guy.
Tipping is indeed a personal choice endeavor. I tip minimally at the BJ tables only after a winning session..and it is dependent on the given dealer at the time. I never let tips eat into my expectation to any degree. Like every other customer service worker, some dealers just do a better job and try harder; some just have a more compatible off-beat sense of humor which makes the game more enjoyable; some ( many?) despise casinos and the management as much or more than those of us on the other side of the table. Further, some don’t deserve any tokes at all because of their attitudes. Some get it..some don’t…
when do new articles come out?