When playing slots, you can use free play, offered by the casino, to play games and win cash off of it. Some players are suspicious of it, while others are just curious:
Does the machine know if you are using free play credits or cash credits?
Barbara
It depends. Free play can be managed in a variety of ways – some systems deposit the free play into the slot upfront as part of your balance, while others rebate you back for each spin you take. In the latter situation, you’re using your cash to wager, and the free play is rebating you for that wager (as long as free play is available to rebate it, of course).
Most player systems nowadays load the free play from your players card in one form or another – we rarely see free play tickets anymore, which was more common in a different era (where you’d print a free play ticket at a kiosk and use it at the slot of your choosing). So this does mean it’s tracked at the players card level.
So while the slot may or may not know you’re using free play, the players’ card system will know, and from a practical perspective this helps the casino’s marketing team know if you claimed your offer, whether you used it all, and also make sure that’s properly accounted for in your overall win/loss records.
What it won’t do is have any impact on your expected wins and losses over time, because slots use the same payback settings regardless of whether you’re using cash, free play or a ticket.
Just like slots don’t have the ability to change payback based on whose player’s card is in the machine, it doesn’t have the ability to change based on cash vs. free play. The setting is a single one for all types of wagers.
So slots might know what’s been used, and the casino’s accounting systems will know for proper tracking and attribution of play. But for us it’s just another form of currency to use to try to manage a big win on a slot.
I have a question. I have been using my f ree play and after I’m done expending it, any of the winnings on the freeplay that that pops out of the machine as a pIay slip I give to my wife to use. Then I go ahead and use my own money to play the machines. Does the casino know or would care if I do that I’m doing that?
Hey Steve! We appreciate the question, and have answered it in its own post!
https://fliptheswitch.com/do-casinos-care-what-you-do-with-the-cash-earned-from-free-play/