If you’re going to play at a casino, you might as well take advantage of the offers they extend to encourage you to play. This is advice we’ve been sharing since the launch of the site, and in the case of using a players card for comps, Brian’s been advising this since the beginning as well.
But sometimes, you start to wonder whether casinos are really trying to encourage players to play by making things so difficult to take advantage of the offers.
I shared my experiences of the long casino gift pick-up lines before (which has a modern solution in redeem later or ship to home options I’ve shared), but another recent example got me thinking about it again.
I was at a casino that had a gift option with a play to earn component. This isn’t anything new, and as a player with no history at the casino, I actually appreciated the ability to participate even as someone new to their building.
But after earning the required points, I had to go to a kiosk and print out a slip (after investing a few minutes to find a kiosk, and wait for the person ahead of me to click every on-screen button a few times). Then I had to take the slip to a promotions pick up desk in the middle of a smoking area. Fortunately there was no line, but it took me a bit to find it as well.
Another thing that was odd was they offered the choice of free play, but instead of offering it at the kiosk step, you had to print the slip, visit the promotions desk, hand over the slip and your card, show ID, and then they gave you the choice.
If you’re already on the kiosk and swiped in (having had to enter your PIN to get to the promotion), why not show a choice and print the slip only for those who want the actual physical item?
Another casino close to home has play to earn gifts for the public, but you claim it at the desk and don’t need to hit the kiosk – they swipe you in and verify you hit the required points. It’s a bit slower as a step in the process, but compared to walking around the casino looking for kiosks and gift pick-ups, it was a lot more straightforward.
Aside from burning time that players could invest playing, which is the primary point of visiting anyway, making us jump through hoops makes the promotions less enticing, which in turn can make the visit less critical. This is especially important when there’s other casinos within a similar distance.
When I lived on the East Coast I had three casinos I could reach within about an hour’s drive. Waiting in lines for gifts was sometimes inevitable, and I did it for the $25 gift card or the cruise certificate.
But where I live now there’s more than a half dozen casino choices within a 30 minute drive or less. Along with game selection and quality of customer service, good promotions are a potential tie breaker over which casino I’ll opt to visit. But just as important as a well-designed promotion is a well-executed one, and in this department it still seems like there’s a lot of room for improvement.
Recently we experienced a similar experience. At the casino you choose the gift while sitting at a slot machine and they ship to home offer instead of waiting in line. Our postcard we received in the mail showed pictures of the items offered along with the dates to redeem the offer. One of the items pictured showed a men’s shaving kit with extra blades in a zipper case. We opted for this. When we received it by a delivery company, it was just the empty case-no razor or blades. What a waste of drive and our time. We checked the postcard and the wording said, shaving case. So read the fine print, lesson learned. Another casino offered 4 weeks of giveaways but all the items offered were taken on the first day. So much for 1 gift a week offer. If you did not have email with them, you would have not received their notice all gifts were gone.
There are casinos that do offer gifts for different levels of play, some casinos do run their gifting giveaways like a well oiled machine but those are getting rare.
Wow – those are doozies of examples Cheryl! Some casinos have free play as a fallback if the gift runs out, but they also limit to one gift a week so there’s stock guaranteed every week. To run out the first week for a month’s worth seems like really poor planning!
And the shaving kit one is a major bummer! We love the idea of not waiting in lines and having items shipped, but when the pictures and such are probably being lifted right off Amazon, it runs the risk of being misleading if the picture isn’t accurate to what’s being received.