Foxwoods - Dealer Incompetance in the 1/2 No Limit Game

[DVDerek]

I've been playing the $1/$2 No Limit Game at Foxwoods for about a year now. It's played with buyins ranging from $40-$100. When you get below $40 you may rebuy for up to $100. When I first started playing the dealers were very good about enforcing the table stakes. I played last friday and had repeated clashes with three dealers over this.

I sat down at a new table, with everyone buying in for $100. A seat opened up about 30 minutes later and an older gentleman sat down with a chip rack with about $500 in it. He began playing his hand from the chip rack. After the flop (now $30 into the hand), I reminded the dealer that there was $100 table limit for buyins. She relays this to the big stack who proceeds to count $100 in chips outof his rack and places them on the table. The dealer says nothing of this, and I'm not involved in this particular hand anymore so I don't pursue it.

This gentleman leaves his chip rack on the table. He's playing with chips that aren't in the rack, but just the presence of the chip rack on the table is wrong. I'm waiting for a floor to enter the area, but there's none in sight. After a while I ask, "When a new player sits down at the table, how are they to know that the chips in the rack are not in play?" The best the dealer can give me for an answer on this is "Well, we'll tell them." I press her on this, and then the best solution she can come up with is to have him put the rack of chips on the rail.

Watching this player, I caught him twice taking chips from the rack, supposedly out of play, to play with. I don't think he was doing this on purpose, but it was still being done. When I first started playing here I got yelled at for paying time out of chips I had in my pocket and now they have no problem witha guy sitting down with $500? I raise the issue again, appologizing for being an ass, and the dealer begrudgingly offers to color the player up so he can put the chips in his pocket.

In effect, I spotted a rules violation, brought it to the attention of the dealer, and the dealer did not act, despuit knowing it was a violation of the rules. I continued to press on the issue, and the dealer did nothing. I suppose I could have requested that she call a floor, but I was really trying not to come off as the hard ass. It is the dealer's job to enforce the rules.

Much later in the session, two new players sat down next to me with a mix of green and red chips. I counted them up, and one had over $150 while the other had about $120. At this point my stack was over $350, so I was glad to have the extra money on the table. Still, the dealer said nothing to these players.

This story actually spans three different dealers, so the issue is not with a single dealer, but rather the service at foxwoods. I am writing a letter to the manager, but with little competition in the area, I expect absolutely nothing to be done. Just wanted to share my frustrating tale and let you guys know to be on the lookout for things like this.

[ohkanada]

I agree the dealers do screw this up. When I played a few weeks back, I had to remind the dealers a few times that about the rule. If one really wants to add money when they are not allowed to, it is not very difficult.

In general, FW dealers are barely competent. Sure there are some very good ones but it seems the games I play, I get the new ones. Although I will say that I think they had more problems a year ago with the new dealers.

Ken

[grandgnu]

I think the problem is that they just don't cater to poker players. We don't bring a lot of money for the casino to take, like a slot player does.

In addition, there are plenty of players who don't tip and who are abusive towards the dealers. Not to mention the hordes of unwashed players who don't have a clue about string bets, splashing the pot, board/table talk, etc.

Add on top that there are no competing poker rooms for Foxwoods, and well, there you go. Hopefully I can win enough scratch at the Poker Classic to move my butt to Vegas and have some selection. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[b0000000000m]

At Borgata last week, a terrible, terrible player bought in for $900 in the $1/2 NL game. Neither the dealer, nor the other players, said anything. Boy was that fun.

[ QUOTE ]
At this point my stack was over $350, so I was glad to have the extra money on the table.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well--if you're glad to have the extra money on the table when you have it covered, why do you care about the extra money on the table when you don't have it covered?

You should be indifferent towards it in terms of the immediate moment, and happy about it in the long-run given that you likely will be increasing your stack in the future, and therefore will be "happy" about the extra money at some point.

p.s. I realize that none of this changes the fact that the dealers were not performing adequately, and were non-responsive to a customer's concerns. Foxwoods has, without a doubt, and by far, on average the worst dealers I have ever encountered. (Although they do have plenty of fine ones).

[DVDerek]

[ QUOTE ]
I think the problem is that they just don't cater to poker players. We don't bring a lot of money for the casino to take, like a slot player does.

In addition, there are plenty of players who don't tip and who are abusive towards the dealers. Not to mention the hordes of unwashed players who don't have a clue about string bets, splashing the pot, board/table talk, etc.

Add on top that there are no competing poker rooms for Foxwoods, and well, there you go. Hopefully I can win enough scratch at the Poker Classic to move my butt to Vegas and have some selection. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't plan on tipping much, if anything, the next tiem I go to foxwoods. If a dealer is competant and quick, then perhaps I'll change my stance. But as it stands it appears as though my tipping is getting me the same terrible service I'd get without tipping.

Foxwoods is taking $100/hr from the $1/$2 NL tables, not to mention the other play that poker players sometimes bring in (slot playing girlfriends, an hour at the craps table, a hotel room, etc). I'm not buying the "they don't bring in enough money." I chaulk it up to the lack of competition.

Come on Mohegan... bring back poker!

[mosch]

You're a nit.

Don't be a nit.

[midas]

When the dealers pool tips like in FW you're going to get mediocre dealers. There is just no incentive for them to get better.

[b0000000000m]

What chance do you think an organized campaign on the players' part would have on changing the pooling policy?

[ohkanada]

None.

[toots]

[ QUOTE ]
Not to mention the hordes of unwashed players who don't have a clue about string bets, splashing the pot, board/table talk, etc.


[/ QUOTE ]

(I always find the incompetence of the staff at Foxwoods to be nicely matched by the incompetence of my opponents, but on to the subject at hand.)

So, I'm playin' at the binky NL table the other day. Half of the players are actually out of diapers for a change, so I figure there'll be some basic understanding of the rules of the game, but no indeedy not.

There's one pot where a few players are all-in, a couple of whom had been grinding their stacks up over the last several hours. I asked for a chip count from one of the guys who chopped the eventual pot, and the result was that by the end of betting, there was over $950 in the pot, which ain't too shabby for a $100 max buy-in game.

Anywho, half of the spudlings at the table were jabbering away about who had what cards and what the winning hand might be. Unfortunately, that half was the half that wasn't in the hand.

The dealer, a rather small woman, kept asking them to STFU (but in much nicer terms), and they kept asking, "Why not? You mean we can't talk about the hand even if we're not in it?" I may have shouted at one of them "Especially if you're not in it!" but it didn't slow them down any.

The dealer was sweating marbles, because she couldn't find any way to get these guys to quit breaking the rules.

Now, I personally don't mind talking about hands like this, but I also know that it offends the crap out of nearly anyone else who, given 30 seconds and both hands, can differentiate their backside from a hole in the ground, so even I know to keep my gob shut.

Ok, I didn't completely shut up. I did say things like "holy crap, that's a lot of chips," but these other guys just keep rambling on about what they thought was going on. Even more interesting was if they had shut up, they would have been exposed to some rather interesting drama, listening to one guy just about going out of his mind, crying calling the whole way down. (He did get half the pot.)

At this point, I'm thinking that the main draw of the binky NL game at Foxwoods is the entertainment value, and the sheer cluelessness of both the staff and patrons is just frosting on that cake.