Friday, January 25, 2008

Casino's Wonky Cash Machine paid out 20s instead of 5s!

Did you guys hear about this? It's showing up all over the internet.

What a big pay day for the players!

Thanks,

Preston
________________________________________
Regina gamblers cash in on wonky payout machine
Thu Jan 24, 11:01 AM

Some Casino Regina patrons who hit the jackpot at a cash payout machine are finding out the hard way that the house always wins.

After taking more than $27,000 they weren't entitled to, some have had to pay it back, while others have been kicked out of the casino and could be looking at lawsuits.

It all stems from an incident in October 2007, when an employee mistakenly loaded $20 bills into the $5 bill holder at a self-redemption kiosk. The goof meant that on Oct. 26 and 27, anyone who used the kiosk to redeem a slot ticket or break a large bill got 20s in place of fives.

"Many patrons used the machine repeatedly and either knowingly or unknowingly took money which was not theirs, which totalled $27,500," Bill Davies, Saskatchewan Gaming Corporation's vice-president of corporate affairs, said Thursday in a news release.

One customer took $11,000, making some 180 trips to the cash machine.

According to Davies, a customer eventually tipped off casino staff. Pretty soon it was payback time.

Casino officials used their electronic surveillance footage to track several people who went back time and time again.

They said they've recovered more than $13,000 from patrons who did so.

People who repeatedly took extra money from the machines have been banned from the provincially owned casino and other Saskatchewan Gaming Corporation facilities.

The employee who put the $20 bills into the machine is still employed at the casino.

"It was a mistake ... human error," Davies said.

The Crown corporation is resigned to the idea it won't get all of the money back. It's looking at suing to get more of the missing cash. Regina police are also investigating.

"It's important for the public to have confidence in the financial integrity of the casino," Davies said.

In the meantime, the casino has changed its procedures to make it tougher for staff to mistake bundles of 20s for fives.
____________________________

Now here's the deal. There is no need for the casino to sue the patrons to get its money back. All it has to do is threaten to ban them for life from the casino and that will be enough to have them return all of the money.

No gambler wants to be banned from a casino. They will gladly return all of the money. They would probably be willing to pay a stiff fine too--anything, as long as they can still gamble.

Thanks,

Preston
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Editorial Reviews of All or Nothing

New York Times--". . . a cartographer of autodegradation . . . Like Dostoyevsky, Allen colorfully evokes the gambling milieu — the chained (mis)fortunes of the players, their vanities and grotesqueries, their quasi-philosophical ruminations on chance. Like Burroughs, he is a dispassionate chronicler of the addict’s daily ritual, neither glorifying nor vilifying the matter at hand."

Florida Book Review--". . . Allen examines the flaming abyss compulsive gambling burns in its victims’ guts, self-esteem and bank accounts, the desperate, myopic immediacy it incites, the self-destructive need it feeds on, the families and relationships it destroys. For with gamblers, it really is all or nothing. Usually nothing. Take it from a reviewer who’s been there. Allen is right on the money here."

Foreword Magazine--"Not shame, not assault, not even murder is enough reason to stop. Allen’s second novel, All or Nothing, is funny, relentless, haunting, and highly readable. P’s inner dialogues illuminate the grubby tragedy of addiction, and his actions speak for the train wreck that is gambling."

Library Journal--"Told without preaching or moralizing, the facts of P's life express volumes on the destructive power of gambling. This is strongly recommended and deserves a wide audience; an excellent choice for book discussion groups."—Lisa Rohrbaugh, East Palestine Memorial P.L., OH

LEXIS-NEXIS--"By day, P drives a school bus in Miami. But his vocation? He's a gambler who craves every opportunity to steal a few hours to play the numbers, the lottery, at the Indian casinos. Allen has a narrative voice as compelling as feeding the slots is to P." Betsy Willeford is a Miami-based freelance book reviewer. November 4, 2007

Publisher’s Weekly--"Allen’s dark and insightful novel depicts narrator P’s sobering descent into his gambling addiction . . . The well-written novel takes the reader on a chaotic ride as P chases, finds and loses fast, easy money. Allen (Churchboys and Other Sinners) reveals how addiction annihilates its victims and shows that winning isn’t always so different from losing."

Kirkus Review--"We gamble to gamble. We play to play. We don't play to win." Right there, P, desperado narrator of this crash-'n'-burn novella, sums up the madness. A black man in Miami, P has graduated from youthful nonchalance (a '79 Buick Electra 225) to married-with-a-kid pseudo-stability, driving a school bus in the shadow of the Biltmore. He lives large enough to afford two wide-screen TVs, but the wife wants more. Or so he rationalizes, as he hits the open-all-night Indian casinos, "controlling" his jones with a daily ATM maximum of $1,000. Low enough to rob the family piggy bank for slot-machine fodder, he sinks yet further, praying that his allergic 11-year-old eat forbidden strawberries—which will send him into a coma, from which he'll emerge with the winning formula for Cash 3 (the kid's supposedly psychic when he's sick). All street smarts and inside skinny, the book gives readers a contact high that zooms to full rush when P scores $160,000 on one lucky machine ("God is the God of Ping-ping," he exults, as the coins flood out). The loot's enough to make the small-timer turn pro, as he heads, flush, to Vegas to cash in. But in Sin City, karmic payback awaits. Swanky hookers, underworld "professors" deeply schooled in sure-fire systems to beat the house, manic trips to the CashMyCheck store for funds to fuel the ferocious need—Allen's brilliant at conveying the hothouse atmosphere of hell-bent gaming. Fun time in the Inferno.

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Bio


Preston L. Allen is the recipient of a State of Florida Individual Artist Fellowship in Literature and the Sonja H. Stone Prize in Fiction for his short story collection Churchboys and Other Sinners (Carolina Wren Press 2003). His works have appeared in numerous publications including The Seattle Review, The Crab Orchard Review, Asili, Drum Voices, and Gulfstream Magazine; and he has been anthologized in Here We Are: An Anthology of South Florida Writers, Brown Sugar: A Collection of Erotic Black Fiction, Miami Noir, and the forthcoming Las Vegas Noir. His fourth novel, All Or Nothing, chronicles the life of a small-time gambler who finally hits it big. Preston Allen teaches English and Creative Writing in Miami, Florida.