How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer
- How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer Cost
- How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer Make
- How Much Do You Tip A Poker Dealer In A Tournament
- How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer Near Me
I understand that you like all the dealers and you’re a regular, but it’s not about the monetary amount that you tip, it’s the thought that counts and the appreciation. As a dealer, I like the big tips and as a player, honestly, I tip $1 per hand. As a player, playing there to grind money, I will tip $1 per hand. Tip at least one $5 chip/session. Some players like to place a side bet for the dealer, up to 10%. Tip both the writers and the runners. Tip at least $1 for the first ticket. You can also tip 5% if you win. Tip at least one $5 chip/session. You can also tip 10% of your winnings, but it shouldn’t exceed $25.
Do you love the casino scene?
Does being a casino dealer seem like the perfect blend of glamour, excitement, and fun?
At first glance, being a dealer at a casino might seem like the perfect job. After all, you probably already enjoy the games you’ll be playing. And you will be getting paid to play them.
You don’t even have to risk losing any money while you play. The casino is banking all the action.
As a casino dealer, the amount you win for the house has no bearing on your pay, though. You get an hourly wage plus tips.
Compared to some jobs, being a casino dealer might be a great deal. As casino gambling continues to grow across the nation, more jobs become available, and fewer potential employees are out there to fill those jobs. This means wages are climbing, too.
This post examines how much you can expect to make as a casino dealer, tips and all.
What Is the Average Wage for a Casino Dealer?
Your average wage as a casino dealer isn’t impressive at all. It’s a service industry, so when you calculate how much you’ll make, you need to take the same kind of mindset that waitresses and bartenders take:
How much money you make is based more on tips than on your hourly wage.
And the better you serve your customers, the more they’ll tip.
In other words, if you’re not a people person, becoming a casino dealer might not be a great idea.
The hourly wages for casino dealers don’t vary based on the game, either. Blackjack dealers make the same kind of money as baccarat dealers, who make the same kind of money as poker dealers or roulette dealers (or croupiers, as they’re called).
The starting pay for an average casino dealer is between $8 and $10 per hour. Some of that is based on experience, too.
If you’re able to get 40 hours a week, which is unusual, you’re looking at $16,000 to $20,000 per year. Most casino dealers, especially starting out, don’t get 40 hours a week, though.
That’s barely enough to pay the rent if you have a roommate and live in a cheap apartment.
Depending on the casino and the stakes of the games you’re dealing, you can expect to make anywhere from $15 per hour in tips to $50 per hour in tips, on average.
That $50 per hour figure, by the way, is an outlier statistic. This assumes you’re working at a high-end casino dealing the higher-limit casino games to the high rollers.
Even then, some high rollers don’t tip — or if they tip, they don’t tip well at all.
Poker dealers make the most money from tips on the most consistent basis, but a lot of this depends on people skills. In some casinos, the dealers are required to pool their tips.
I once played at a casino in Las Vegas with an older poker dealer named Boris. He got mad at me for saying the words “Carpe diem” at the table. He said that I was only allowed to speak English at the table.
Being a friendly guy, I smiled and explained to everyone at the table that the phrase is Latin for “seize the day.”
Boris didn’t think that was helpful, either. He was surly and rude.
As a result, I didn’t tip him.
I shared the story with a professional poker player friend of mine, and he told me that he would have raised hell with the cardroom manager until Boris had been fired.
And the thing is… I don’t mind a little correction. In fact, I’m a humble guy. Had he been reasonably friendly and polite about it, I would have continued to tip him. So it goes.
Also, just because you’re dealing a higher-stakes poker game doesn’t mean you’ll make more in tips. Some of the high-rolling poker players are notorious cheapskates. If you’re dealing high-roller blackjack, craps, or roulette, you’ll do a lot better than if you’re dealing high-limit hold’em.
According to Glassdoor, the average wages for dealers and related jobs are all over the place. They suggest that the average dealer makes $40,000 a year. They also suggest that an average poker dealer only makes $20,000 a year.
Other related jobs include the floor supervisor, with an average salary of $53,000 a year, a casino host, with an average salary of $35,000 a year, and a casino shift manager, with an average salary of $27,000 a year.
The site also lists salaries by company, and it looks like Caesars is the best place to be a dealer, with a salary of $42,000.
Indeed.com has more survey results and suggests an average of $15/hour, which equates to $30,000 a year. They had a listing for a dealer position in Black Hawk, Colorado, where the starting pay was $38/hour. That’s $76,000 a year.
ZipRecruiter suggests that top dealers make $400,000 a year, but I can’t imagine that’s accurate. The rest of their averages are in line with what I saw on the other sites mentioned.
The Perks and Drawbacks of Being a Casino Dealer as a Career
If you know anything about the service business, you probably know that dealing with the customers can be the biggest perk and the biggest drawback to your job. This is especially true in the casino business, though, because emotions tend to be amped up when money is on the line.
You’ll probably spend a lot of time on your feet if you’re dealing table games in the casino. If you’re dealing poker in the cardroom, you’ll probably need to bring a pillow for some extra cushioning at your chair.
One of the other drawbacks of being a casino dealer is that it turns what used to be a leisure activity into a work activity. Playing blackjack is great when you get to do it a couple of times a year for a few hours at a time.
But after dealing blackjack for 30 hours a week for six weeks straight, it becomes drudgery.
In most casinos, smoking is still allowed. That might or might not bother you. I’ve spent enough time in bars and AA meetings that cigarette smoke doesn’t bother me at all, but I’m not like most people.
One of the perks of dealing casino games is that it doesn’t require a degree. You can go to a vocational school to become a dealer, though, but the time and financial commitments are smaller than with other careers. You can usually be qualified to be a casino dealer after a couple of months and an investment of $1,000.
If you’re a night owl, or if you’re looking for a second job — we used to call it “moonlighting” — casino dealing might be perfect for you. After all, most casinos are open 24/7. And guess which shifts are the hardest ones for the managers to cover.
Most casinos are owned by large companies with human resources departments. This means that you’ll probably be eligible for a benefits package. These can include health insurance and retirement benefits, as well as paid time off.
Breaks are longer for casino dealers than you’ll see at other jobs. At most casinos, you work for 90 minutes and then take a 30-minute break. During an eight-hour shift, you get a total of two hours of break time.
If you like having stories to tell, being a casino dealer puts you in a position to have lots of anecdotes. Heck, I have quite a reputation as a raconteur just from the stories I have to tell by being a player. And believe me, I haven’t spent THAT much time gambling in casinos — not compared to someone who deals for a living, anyway.
What Are Your Job Responsibilities as a Casino Dealer?
How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer Cost
Think of the dealer as the host for a specific game. The dealer shuffles and deals the cards, or spins the roulette wheel, or directs the action at the craps table. The dealer also trades chips for money.
If you’re a poker dealer, you’re responsible for collecting the rake. It’s your job to make sure the players post their blinds.
If you’re dealing a casino game, you collect the players’ losses and pay out their winnings in chips.
It’s traditional to start your career dealing blackjack because that’s the most popular table game.
But in Europe, it’s more likely that you’ll start as a croupier — that’s the fancy name for the dealer running the roulette game.
The dice table is the toughest table game to be a dealer. Even after writing about craps for years, I still have to look things up. The action is fast, there are lots of bets on the table, and there’s just a lot to keep up with. Craps is the last game most dealers learn.
You’re responsible for maintaining your own gambling license, too. It’s similar to having a driver’s license if you’re going to drive for a company or a food handler’s permit if you’re going to cook for people.
If you have lousy credit and/or a criminal record, you might run into trouble getting your license.
By the way, I have a lady friend who dealt blackjack for years. She’s clueless when it comes to basic strategy. You’re not required to learn the correct strategies for the games you deal.
My advice to prospective dealers is to avoid giving advice to players. That’s a no-win situation because the players are going to lose their money in the long run because of the nature of the games. If they followed your advice, they’ll just blame you for this.
Who needs that kind of headache?
Conclusion
If you like people, enjoy casino games, and don’t mind cigarette smoke, becoming a casino dealer might be the career for you. You don’t get to keep the money the players lose, but they’ll often tip you when they’re winning, so you’ll get to root for them.
You’ll make at least $15,000 a year dealing casino games, but you might make as much as $100,000 a year. I’ve seen reports of dealers who made more, but I’m skeptical, and you should be, too.
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.“Right now, when it comes to tipping, it is a gray area with a capital G,” said World Series of Poker Media Director Nolan Dalla.
By definition, a tip is an optional payment given in addition to a required payment, usually to express appreciation for excellent service. It is also called gratuity, or, in poker terms, it is referred to as a toke. With the rise in popularity of big buy-in multitable tournaments, the landscape of the game has changed. Instead of a rotation of five or six dealers, events can require hundreds of them who rely on tips for most of their income.
How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer Make
In the past decade or so, it has become common practice that a certain percentage of the prize pool be withheld for dealers on top of the house cut. This has become a controversial topic among players and dealers alike. Tips have traditionally been considered an “optional payment,” so now that they are being automatically taken out of the prize pool, it has led to some confusion, disgruntled players, and stiffed dealers.
“In the old days, they didn’t take anything out for the dealers, but all of the players would usually tip 1 percent to 2 percent. I really don’t think they should take anything out,” said 1996 WSOP champion Huck Seed. “The house should get paid, and then people should tip what they want to tip. It shouldn’t be a mandatory tip.”
Seed says that he is an average tipper who always does so when he cashes in a tournament. The amount he gives depends on his experience and the amount of money he wins.
“We have had final tables where no one tipped,” said Dalla. “This is somewhat demoralizing. You have got to have some guarantees. You can’t have dealers essentially gambling on whether they will be compensated.”
Standard Practice?
Most players say that they tip anywhere from 1 percent to 4 percent of what they win, and usually more toward the bottom of this range if money has already been allocated for dealer tips. Information on what percentage of the prize pool is withheld for dealer tips can usually be found at the bottom of any tournament structure sheet in small print. Nearly all big buy-in events, including the recent Wynn Classic and most WSOPCircuit events, take out 3 percent for tournament staff.
At the WSOP, the percentage taken out varies with the buy-in amount of the event. Lower buy-ins, including the $500 buy-in events, have the most taken out at 3 percent. The $1,000-$2,000 buy-in events have 2.7 percent taken out, while the $2,500-$5,000 buy-in events have 2.4 percent taken out. All $10,000 buy-in events, including the main event, withhold 1.8 percent for tournament staff, and the $50,000 buy-in H.O.R.S.E. tournament withholds 1.2 percent.
Among the many players who agree with withholding money for dealers is 2006 WSOP champion Jamie Gold.
“I think that it is a good thing that they take out a certain percentage, because they (the dealers) deserve to be taken care of. I definitely think they should (take out the money), because there are some people who don’t tip,” said Gold.
How Much Do You Tip A Poker Dealer In A Tournament
Gold is known as one of the most generous tippers in cash games, but he was railed for his main-event tip snub. He said that what people might not know is that he personally tipped the final table dealers. Gold gave a dealer money to evenly distribute between the five to 10 dealers who sat in the box while he won the biggest first-place prize in live tournament history.
“Back in the old days, it was always expected to toke,” said Dalla. “Now we are in a new age where some people say, ‘Well, they are already withholding this amount of money for the dealers, why should I be expected to tip more?’ Those are both legitimate, valid points of view. Ultimately, the industry standard should be a compromise between the two.”
A compromise is exactly what dealers are looking for. Winner of the WSOP dealer’s event Erick Narciso agrees that dealers are just looking for a gratuity that is fair. When he won nearly $105,000 for the event, Narciso tipped four percent on top of the 3 percent that was already taken out.
“There is no reason to tip anything extravagant, but a tip is necessary, for sure,” said Narciso. “There are some people who don’t tip, and the dealers have to get paid, so I don’t mind up to three percent. I don’t think it should go any higher, though.”
Director of Poker Operations for Harrah’s Entertainment Jack Effel compares dealers to other workers who rely on tips to make a living.
How Much Do You Tip Poker Dealer Near Me
“It’s like any other service industry. Yes, you can tip your waiter the regular 15 percent or pay the automatically added 18 percent gratuity for big parties, but if you get excellent service, you may want to leave something extra,” Effel said. “I think our dealers are worth every penny.”
Taking a percentage out of the tournament prize pool has become standard in the
Cantu responded to the issue in depth and said that he assumed the dealers and staff were already taken care of from a part of the prize pool.
Read Part II of this article and more from Cantu.
[Correction: The story has been updated to remove the inaccurate statement that San Jose, California, prohibits tournaments to withhold a percentage of the prize pool for dealer tips. The city does allow that practice, but it must be approved ahead of time. Coordinators for Bay 101 simply did not submit an application in time to withhold tips for the Shooting Star event.]