Page 26 - June 2007 • Southern California Gaming Guide

The Frugal GamblerTM, Jean Scott Bus Schedules (Continued)
Page 26
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA GAMING GUIDE
June 2007
Jean Scott, The Frugal GamblerTM
QJuestions & Answers from “The Queen of Comps”
ean Scott, author of The Frugal Gambler, More Frugal Gambling, Frugal Video Poker and other insider gambling books, is a household name to millions of casino players. She has been featured on national television shows including Dateline, Hard Copy, To Tell the Truth,
48 Hours, and numerous Travel and Discovery Channel documentaries. is month Jean answers more questions from her legions of readers.
Q: What’s the difference between cashback and free play?
A: Cashback is cold hard U.S. currency that the casino puts right into your hand; money that you can stu in your pocket, then walk straight out the casino door. Free play is a given number of credits you must play through the machine once before you can cash out. To redeem your free play, sometimes you’ll get a ticket to put into the machine; other times you download it into a machine using a PIN. Often, some machines are excluded from free play, and sometimes you must play the free play on speci c machines.
Obviously, players prefer cash, but casinos prefer to give free play. A good number of people continue playing on these credits until they’re gone. You don’t need to feel obligated to do this, though. Play it through once, then stop and decide whether it’s wise to cash out or count it as part of your gambling bankroll and continue playing.
Q: What’s the difference between coin-in and coin-out players club systems?
A: Most casinos gure your points by coin-in. at is, when you put $100 through the machine (either in new money or replaying credits), you earn points for that $100, win or lose. A few casinos, however, award points according to the amount won, which is the coin-out gure.
Which way is better? If you’re playing a negative- expectation game, the coin-in system is better, because over the long run you’ll lose, but your points will be based on the larger coin-in gure. When we play positive-expectation games, we like coin-out, because in the long run we earn more points that way.
Some players don’t like the coin-out system, even though they understand the long-term advantage to those who play positive games. ey feel it’s a double whammy when they have a losing session: ey lose money and get fewer players club points. However,
because so many hands, especially on video poker, are ties, this di erence is not as big as you might expect.
Q: People are always talking about RFB or RFBL when they’re discussing casino comps. What do those abbreviations mean?
A: RFB is short for room, food, and beverage. If you check into a casino RFB, you can usually eat and drink at any restaurant or bar owned by the casino (not by an outside contractor), and your room is free. RFB usually covers only the person who registers into the room and one guest. To take more guests, you’d need to ask your host for more comps.
RFBL is short for room, food, and beverage, with the “L” standing for limited. Your room is free, but you’re limited in your restaurant choices, sometimes to just the bu et and co ee shop and not the ner restaurants. You need to ask when you check in which restaurants are covered when you’re RFBL, so you won’t be surprised by charges on your bill when you check out.
Look for Jean Scott’s new publication, The Frugal Video Poker Scouting Guide that lists video poker pay schedules and a mini-wealth of video poker information. Check out www.QueenofComps.com online or call 1-877-798-7-RGE for information.