Frequently, taking advantage of a casino promotion is a pretty simple matter. Match play coupons, multiple point days, and bonus payouts are common enough and usually do not require a lot of planning. There are other times, however, when some creativity is needed. Such an occasion arose for me recently at a Gulf Coast casino. They were offering a bonus of "five times" points for 24 hours (midnight to midnight) for new members to their Player’s Club. "New members" was defined as anyone that had not played with a player’s card since post Hurricane Katrina. The maximum bonus allowed was $1,000 plus you would earn an additional $200 from normal play (i.e., in essence this promotion gave you 6 times points on your player’s card). By taking full advantage of this promotion, you would earn a total of $1,200 in the form of "free play." Sounds promising thus far, but the key was to find a game that would make this promotion profitable.

If you are not accustomed to evaluating a casino’s point system, the process I am about to describe can be a bit daunting. One might think you could simply ask a Player’s Club representative what the return is on their machines using a player’s card and save all of that brainwork. But all I’ve ever gotten is a puzzled look from the boothlings when I ask that question. What they usually tell you is how much cash you will get for a set number of points, and it’s up to you to figure out the rest. Often, when I’m in an unfamiliar casino I’ll look to other players as a source of information. This saves me the effort, time, and money required to find out for myself. Generally this is someone that either I know, or know of, as an experienced and skilled player. So if you take this approach, be sure you can trust the informant to be accurate.

This is the process I used to determine if their "five times" bonus points promotion was worth my time and effort.

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