Hi, so it’s been a while since my last post – and I want to apologise. It’s out of character, it’s not acceptable, and it makes me look like a lazy idiot! But I do have an excuse…

Why the time between postings (which has been about a week)? Well, I’ve been milking a slot promotion at my local casino, which has a limited timeframe to exploit. If you read this blog regularly, you’ll know I’m not a huge fan of slot machines, due to their typically high house edge. And I’ll generally tell you to avoid them too. But this promotion gives US the edge. About a month ago, our local casino began to remodel parts of the casino floor, and as a result they removed a few banks of slot machines. Many of these had jackpot progressive meters (but not linked – one on each machine), and under our local law, the casino is required to pay that money out. They can’t just turn off a machine, and stop people having the chance to win that accrued jackpot – unless they pay it out in some other way…

So what are they doing to pass back the several millions of dollars of accrued jackpots on these machines back to players? Simply, for the next few weeks, they’re having daily promotions on selected banks of slot machines, which have linked progressive meters. If you hit a jackpot progressive on one of these banks, you get either an extra $1000 or $100 added to your win, dependent on jackpot size. But here’s the best bit: any player who is playing on that bank of machines when the jackpot is hit will automatically receive $20 free.

Now $20 may not seem like a lot to some people. And you might question why I’m there. Well, this blog is all about beating the casinos, and in my book this was a promotion too good to miss. Let’s look at the maths (and my rationale):

The banks they seem to choose have typical $100 – $200 mini jackpots, and these are hit very frequently. The machines themselves are 2c and 5c machines, and I’ve found that those mini progressive jackpots get hit on the bank on an average of 2 times per hour. So, with that being the case, every hour could be worth up to $40 in promotional cash (on average). The requirement in the official rules of the promotion is that it’s only 1 machine per player, and that you must be playing at the time the jackpot is hit in order to be able to claim the free $20.

Now, many players will bet $1 a spin or more as they normally would, whilst this promotion is on. That’s great, because the more money people are playing, the faster the progressive jackpot grows. Some of those players will win big – but many will lose big in that average half hour between jackpots. The casino is banking on players losing $100 each to get $20. But I don’t work like that. I look for a legal edge, and exploit it.

Therefore, although it might seem boring to some, I’m happy to bet a single 2c credit, on a single line, for each spin. That gives me 1000 spins to lose my $20 stake. And of course I’ll win on some spins, and lose on others. What I’ve typically been finding is that by restricting my play to this very limited stake per spin (the bare minimum possible on a 2c machine), I’m losing $2 – $3 in the time between each jackpot, whilst maintaining the “playing status” required to get the promotional cash, when the progressive jackpot is hit by anyone playing.

So, let’s take a typical 8 hour day (and I’ve spent a few of those there this week – which is why I haven’t updated the blog): each hour I make $40 in promo cash (on average – 2 jackpot hits per hour at $20 promo cash for all of us), and I lose $5 – $6 per hour in slot losses. My net “win” is $34 per hour. 8 hours x $34 per hour = $272 TAX FREE (or about $350 before tax). I don’t know about you, but that’s a pretty good hourly rate with no (or extremely limited) risk to my bankroll.

If you consider I’ve been there each of the last 7 days for an average 8 hours, then you won’t be surprised to learn I’m up about $2,000 TAX FREE for the week. That’s better than most (non-executive) workers earn. And of top of this I’ve been earning comp points on my Players Card… which total about $60 for the week to date.

I intend to do the same for the next week or so whilst the promotion lasts. It’s a great opportunity to “beat the casinos”, legally, following the rules. When the promotion finishes I’ll steer clear of the slots as I normally do, and again concentrate on my chosen casino game, Blackjack. 🙂

So I hope this quick post explains my “absence”. I’ll make sure I don’t neglect to post further articles over the coming week. I love the fact that you’ve visited my blog to read the articles I write – and I want to make sure you keep coming back! This is about building a community, a fellowship of gamblers – if we all beat the casinos, then they’ll close down, and we can celebrate along with the rest of society. 🙂

As always, I’m available to answer your personal questions / comments, at admin@howtobeatthecasinos.com.