I’m dealing blackjack on a table quite close to the cashier when a customer comes up to me and throws US currency on the table.

Customer: “I’ll get that all in $100 chips, thanks.”

Me: “Sorry, sir, I can’t change that currency for you on the table, but if you take it to the cashier they can exchange it for you.”

Customer: “It’s money, though.”

Me: “Yes, sir, but not Australian currency, and I’m afraid I can’t exchange it for you, but if you take it—”

Customer: “The exchange is about ninety cents US to your dollar.”

Me: “I can’t just guess the exchange rate, sir.”

Customer: “It’s like you don’t even know how money works!”

The customer stormed off past the cashier and out the exit.

I work in a “gaming room” in a hotel — basically a small casino with only poker and slot machines. It’s the week before all non-essential businesses close due to the health crisis, and we are starting to put social distancing measures in place. The main one is putting every second poker machine out of order to force distance between people.  

I am told to do this just fifteen minutes before we open in the morning, so I rush around putting “reserved” signs on all the odd-numbered machines as we don’t currently have enough “out of order” signs to use. The signs clearly state that no one but the customer who put the sign on, or a staff member, can remove it to play the machine.

Me: “Should I force errors onto the machines, too? That way customers can’t play even if they ignore the rule and pull the sign off.”

Manager: “We’re about to open, so you won’t have enough time. It’s pretty clear what we are trying to do with the social distancing; I’m sure it’ll be fine like that until we can get enough ‘out of order’ signs printed.”

The very first customer of the day walks right up to our most popular lot of machines, takes a “reserved” sign off, and sits down to gamble, ignoring the two clearly available ones on either side.

I look wearily over to my manager.

Manager: *Sighing* “Yeah, I don’t know what I was thinking. Go ahead.”

It took a while, but I went around and forced errors onto thirty-seven of our machines so they were unplayable. Despite that, we still had quite a few customers taking reserve signs off and asking us to “fix” the machines so they could play them. Gambling on your favourite machine is more important than avoiding getting sick, apparently!

(This happens at least once a week when I walk the floor at the casino where I work. Guests will flag me down and then:)

Guest: “My ticket/card/cash won’t work in this machine. Fix it!”

(I take the item from the guest and insert it into the machine. It works perfectly, and the guest stares at me.)

Me: *waves* “Magic hands. Have a great day!”

(I’m working at a call center in a casino late at night.)

Caller: “Hey, I was wondering, do you guys sell alcohol all day?”

Me: “No, unfortunately. Due to state laws, we stop serving alcohol at 2:00 in the morning.”

Caller: “No way. For real?”

Me: “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that’s how it is.”

(At this point, his tone changes from disbelief to anger.)

Caller: “Even for high rollers?”

Me: “Unfortunately, yes, we have to abide by state laws—”

Caller: “Oh, we’ll see about that.” *hangs up*

(I guess he came over and sure did see about that.)

(I work in a casino. This particular story happens on a rather slow Sunday night. Sometimes, when an attendant has trouble explaining a game to a customer, they’ll call a technician over to better explain it. When I arrive at the game, it appears to be up and running; note that there is no money loaded on the game at this point, and that the customer is quite intoxicated.)

Attendant: “Can you just check the game’s history for me? She says she put in $20 and that nothing happened; I looked in the history and it was all played out, but she won’t listen.”

(I check the history and sure enough, $20 was put in maybe twenty minutes before my arrival, and all $20 was played out in ten games.)

Attendant: “Ma’am, your $20 was played out. Ten games at $2 per game makes $20.”

Customer: “But… but what happened?”

Attendant: “Your money’s been played out. You have none left on the game.”

Customer: “But it froze up!” *smacks some buttons* “Why doesn’t it work?”

Attendant & Me: “You ran out of money. There is no money on the game to play with.”

Customer: “But, but it was working for a while and then it just froze! What happened?!”

(At this point, a man walks over to the game to see what’s going on; it appears he knows the woman. We explain to him what’s happened and he understands immediately. He tells the woman they’re leaving and takes her by the arm, practically dragging her away because she won’t move. Eventually, he gets her to leave with him, but not after some wailing on her part.)

Customer: “NNNNNOOOOOOOOOO, it froze on me!”

(The attendant and I just exchanged looks, shrugged, and walked off. The lesson? Don’t drink and gamble.)