vpFREE2 Forums

Question: When is a $100 loss rebate not a $100 loss rebate?

#1

Answer: when it is run by Tropicana Express in Laughlin.

I saw that the Trop Express had a loss rebate program when I visited in September 2013. Previously, their loss rebate program would send the entire loss rebate by mail so unless you were a local or planning a return trip at the right time, the offer didn’t do you any good.

Now, they advertise that they refund 50% of your loss the same day (or next day) and the other half by mail in 4 – 6 weeks. Sounds good, right? I did the offer on September 2nd, lost $100 and got $50 back in freeplay that day. I ran that through and cashed out for $56.25. Now, I had an impromptu trip to Laughlin on 10/31/13 and I stopped at the slot club booth and asked why I hadn’t received my $50 loss rebate in the mail. The lady at the desk said that you hadn’t lost $100, you only lost $43.75. Since $50 was already rebated on 9/2/13, I was not entitled to any further money. I asked to speak to a supervisor. Lauren was called over to explain. Besides being somewhat rude and condescending, she wasn’t particularly well versed in casino promotions.

Her explanation was that on 9/2/13, I lost $100, received $50 in free play, ran that through and it became $56.25 so my loss for the day was $46.75. I tried several times to explain to her that the loss rebate should not count against the day’s losses. That drew a blank stare. If they wanted to stretch the definition of loss rebate and daily win, they could have said that the $6.25 was a ‘win’ and would count against the $100 loss for calculating the mailer. But no, the entire amount of the rebate (plus the result) counts against the second half of your rebate.

So, I asked how you can possibly get the full $100 rebate. Lauren said that if you lose $100, get $50 back the same day and lose all of that, you would get $50 back in the mail. To me, that is a $150 loss. Again, this concept was lost on Lauren. Now, to further complicate matters, you could pick up your same day portion either the same day or the next day. I don’t know that I trust the money would be there the next day. Of course, there are no written rules available. The rules are posted outside of the slot club booth but no brochure available. I should have taken a picture of them.

Here’s what I can figure on how the program works:

Lose $100, pick up $50 same day, run that through, cash out $50, no future mailed rebate.

Lose $100, pick up $50 same day, run it through, cash out $40, get $10 back in the mail.

Lose $100, pick up $50 same day, run it through and lose it all, get $50 back in the mail.

I don’t know if you pick up the original portion the next day if you would then get the true loss rebate.

I have a real problem with this being billed as $100 loss rebate program. I brought 4 people down with me to do the promo. If I had known it ran like it did, I would have told them to skip it. I have never heard of a loss rebate program working like this.

I disagree with the Trop’s view that the same day loss rebate counts as wins against the mailed loss rebate. It is double counting the same day loss rebate. I see why they do it since it saves them a lot of cash.

I am debating whether to file with NGCB. To me, the promotional is misleading at the least and fraudulent at the worst. I thought I would post it here for feedback.

#2

This strikes me as a good deal if you know the parameters up front. On the first day, should you lose $100 or more, pick up $50 free play and play it through. After you play it through, make sure that your total loss for the day still exceeds $100. If not, keep playing either until it does or you win big.

Later you’ll get another $50.

Not bad. The big problem is that they didn’t explain it clearly to start with. Perhaps they thought they did, but the people in that casino were inventing the wheel all by themselves rather than using the design used by others. Johnny made some reasonable assumptions and that wasn’t the way it worked. Now he has explained the situation to the rest of us, we can take advantage of it if we like.

with respect to taking it to Gaming, we’re talking about $50 bucks here, Johnny, and you live out of state. Prudence tells you to kiss it off. You’re still on the casino’s mailing list, probably, and they may have a decent promotion down the road that you want to exploit.

(Alternatively, SARCASM ALERT, hire attorney Bob Nersesian for $4000. I’m willing to bet that he’ll collect your $50 for you. You’ll still be $3950 worse off but you will have prevented those $&^^%$ people at the Trop Express from ripping you off! Will that make you feel better?)

Bob

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#3

Bob, thanks for the reply. I guess what I find distasteful is that the Trop advertises this as through losing $100 will get you a $100 rebate. It won’t. Either free play counts as freeplay or as part of the win/loss calculation. It shouldn’t count as both. And picking up money either the same day or the next day should not affect the mailer but it might. If I play on day one, lose $100 out of my pocket and then pick up $50 in free play on day 2, turn it into $50 coin out, do I get a mailed rebate? I’m not sure.

I wholeheartedly agree that taking the issue up with NGCB for $50 is not cost effective. The only, only reason I would do that is to warn other people. Not everyone who plays belongs to VP Free or takes advantage of all the information available from fine gaming writers like yourself and a host of others.

Once I found out how the program is being implemented, I told my group of 4 other players and let them decide for themselves whether to continue or not. I told them to treat it as a 50% loss rebate and play accordingly.

By the way, my discussion with Lauren got a little bit heated and I could see the people in line listening to what happened. From what I could tell by their responses, they didn’t like the way Trop was implementing the program either.

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—In vpF…@…com, <vpf…@…com> wrote:

This strikes me as a good deal if you know the parameters up front. On the first day, should you lose $100 or more, pick up $50 free play and play it through. After you play it through, make sure that your total loss for the day still exceeds $100. If not, keep playing either until it does or you win big.

Later you’ll get another $50.

Not bad. The big problem is that they didn’t explain it clearly to start with. Perhaps they thought they did, but the people in that casino were inventing the wheel all by themselves rather than using the design used by others. Johnny made some reasonable assumptions and that wasn’t the way it worked. Now he has explained the situation to the rest of us, we can take advantage of it if we like.

with respect to taking it to Gaming, we’re talking about $50 bucks here, Johnny, and you live out of state. Prudence tells you to kiss it off. You’re still on the casino’s mailing list, probably, and they may have a decent promotion down the road that you want to exploit.

#4

They pulled that crap on my son and because it wasn’t worth the time to argue about it, he just gave up and went on…There is one thing you need to understand…there is another way to show a loss at the Trop in Laughlin, as well as, River Palms. I don’t need to get into specifics, but just think a bit of how it can be done, then try it! We did it on the initial loss, but not when he played the FP through. No reason to NOT show a loss at either place if you know what I mean.

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On Nov 4, 2013, at 9:15 AM, Bob Dancer wrote:

This strikes me as a good deal if you know the parameters up front. On the first day, should you lose $100 or more, pick up $50 free play and play it through. After you play it through, make sure that your total loss for the day still exceeds $100. If not, keep playing either until it does or you win big.

Later you’ll get another $50.

Not bad. The big problem is that they didn’t explain it clearly to start with. Perhaps they thought they did, but the people in that casino were inventing the wheel all by themselves rather than using the design used by others. Johnny made some reasonable assumptions and that wasn’t the way it worked. Now he has explained the situation to the rest of us, we can take advantage of it if we like.

with respect to taking it to Gaming, we’re talking about $50 bucks here, Johnny, and you live out of state. Prudence tells you to kiss it off. You’re still on the casino’s mailing list, probably, and they may have a decent promotion down the road that you want to exploit.

(Alternatively, SARCASM ALERT, hire attorney Bob Nersesian for $4000. I’m willing to bet that he’ll collect your $50 for you. You’ll still be $3950 worse off but you will have prevented those $&^^%$ people at the Trop Express from ripping you off! Will that make you feel better?)

Bob