WARNING SIGNS OF A CHEATING DEALER

A general statement about cheating comes from former casino owner Harold Smith, Jr. He states in his website I Want to Quit Winners, "We could cheat all the time and they [agents of the Gaming Control Board] would never know it. We're far more ex-pert at this business than they are." If Smith's statements are true, then how can the average player ever hope to spot the cheating? The answer is, he can't. The important skill you can develop is how to spot a potentially cheating dealer or how to detect the fact that you are being cheated without actually seeing it.

There are a number of ways to spot the potentially cheating dealer. Some involve common sense, others require a little bit of inside information to understand. All of them can save you money.One sign is a dealer who is standing behind an empty table. Usu-ally this is a dealer who has cleaned out all the players. If he is consistently alone, that means he keeps on cleaning out any new players as soon as they sit down. They lose quickly and leave his table empty.

I have found this to be particularly true at the five-dollar-minimum tables in downtown Las Vegas, Reno, and Lake Tahoe. These tables are usually empty. I've also noticed that the dealers at these tables are always older than the dealers at the one-dollar tables in the same casinos.

This empty-table sign is one of the reasons why people will join you so quickly if you are playing alone. Not only do most players dislike playing alone with a dealer, but also insiders know an empty, table can be a sign of a dealer who is too successful for the players' good.

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