Should You Tip Poker Dealer

I definitely would tip based on my expected net winnings. For a 100k win I would take home around 55k. Would probably tip the dealer 1500 and another 1k or so spread out to the cashier and other dealers. So about 5% of net. If they could take the tip off the 1099G I would tip a little more. If you get a complimentary drink, don't forget to tip. Casino waitresses usually share their tips with the bartender. A tip of $1 per drink is considered fine. Even if you are about to use a gift card or a coupon, you are still expected to tip. As for the dealer, you have two possible ways to give a tip. In a normal small limit Texas hold’em game, say $2/4, $3/6 or $4/8, tipping $1 or $2 for a normal pot is acceptable. The same is true when buying in for a standard no-limit hold’em game, $1/2 no-limit. Again, there is no definite answer here, and players may have different opinions depending on who you ask, but unless it’s a pot less than $10, a $1 tip (at minimum), should be given to the dealer.

Tipping the dealer is considered an act of courtesy that can further enhance your gambling experience, especially if you have a winning session. It puts dealers on your side and they will be much more likely to assist you during your gameplay, be willing to tell the other players not to crowd the shooter, or hold their bets, for instance.

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How Much to Tip?

Many people do not even know that they have to tip the dealer or the cocktail waitress. and even if they are aware that the etiquette requires them to leave a tip, they do not know how much it is appropriate to give.

Well, if you are among the $5 or $10 bettors, you should put at least $1 chip onto the pass line bet when you become the shooter. This way, the dealers will also be in the game and if your roll is a winning one, your tip will be generous. If your pass line bet wins, you receive $1 along with the pass line payout. Then, you are supposed to give the $1 to the Boxman and say “dealer money”.

If you are a regular player at a certain casino and dealers know that you are tipping well, they are likely to have a more friendly attitude and even praise your excellent gambling skills in front of other players.

Dealers usually receive minimum wage and they rely on tips in order to get a better monthly income. They are not responsible for your wins or losses, so technically, you tip for the service, rather than for your winning or losing streak.

Apart from the dealers, the other employees responsible for making your stay at the casino pleasant and dependant on tips are the cocktail waitresses. If you get a complimentary drink, don't forget to tip. Casino waitresses usually share their tips with the bartender. A tip of $1 per drink is considered fine. Even if you are about to use a gift card or a coupon, you are still expected to tip.

As for the dealer, you have two possible ways to give a tip. First, you can hand in your chips and say “For the dealers”. The second way is to bet for the dealers.

When to Tip

Many players hesitate as to whether they should tip when they join a table or when they are about to leave the table.

You are advised to tip “as you go” or in other words, you should tip during your gameplay. The latter applies especially if you have a winning streak.

Needless to say, dealers prefer to be tipped during your session, otherwise, you might bust out and complete your game without sufficient funds to tip with. The best approach for a player is to bet for the dealers once or twice upon the beginning of their gambling session and then, if they wish so, they can further tip when they are about to leave the table.

Your early bets will be highly appreciated and you will be provided with a better service. Postponing the tipping for the end of your session is not beneficial to you given the fact early tipping provides you with better chances of receiving better service.

One of the most widespread ways to tip the dealer is to make the so-called two way bets. In other words, you make one bet for yourself and another one for the dealer. In most cases, these are prop bets.

Should You Tip Poker Dealer Online

As already mentioned, the dealer appreciates every bet, but your courtesy would be even highly appreciated if you make a pass line bet next to yours. You don't have to adhere to the predetermined table limits, though. These do not apply when it comes to dealers' bets. Actually, dealers are supposed to take down the winning bets when they pay them.

Of course, you can always hand in the amount you wish right before leaving the table. However, the dealer won't have a clue you are going to tip, and therefore, you miss the opportunity to be provided with a better service. That is why most players prefer to make a small pass line bet for the dealer soon after they join the table.

Although dealers would appreciate every bet you make for them, you'd better choose a bet that has a low house edge such as Pass, Don't Pass, Come, Don't Come.

However, dealers nag when players make bad bets because they are usually considered a waste of tips. If you make a wager on Yo or hardways, you basically tip the casino rather than the dealer himself and such types of wagers are as discouraging to dealers as they are to players.

Robert Woolley

In my last two “Casino Poker for Beginners” articles, I introduced you to the poker room personnel you’re likely to meet. These people are paid to be there. Who pays them? You do, directly or indirectly. The “indirectly” part is what they get in paychecks, which ultimately come out of the rake — those chips that the dealer drops into a bin under the table after every hand.

Tip

Let’s talk about the “directly” part.

Tipping is always a controversial topic. If you want to start an argument on a poker-related online forum, just ask how much you should tip poker dealers. Or, better yet, express a definite opinion on the subject, and watch how everybody proceeds to disagree with you. Ask 10 poker players how dealers should be tipped, and you’ll get 11 different answers.

I won’t pretend to have the definitive answer. But I can give you some general principles that I think should govern your decision, plus my own specific formula.

Let’s start with the general. I will be so bold as to assert that if your recipe for tipping, whatever the specifics of it may be, fulfills these principles, you’re doing it right, and you may safely and confidently ignore any detractors who think you should do it their way instead:

  • If everybody tipped the same way you do, the dealers, waitresses, and others who depend on tips for their livelihood would make an hourly rate with which they’re content.
  • You either tip every person in the same position (e.g., every dealer) exactly the same, or the differences in your tipping are based on the person’s performance. You do not tip either more or less based on gender, appearance, or other characteristics over which the recipient has no control.
  • You do not withhold tips to punish service people for things that are outside of their control.
  • You are neither so stingy that you breed resentment from the people who are serving you, nor so generous that you seriously cut into your own profits.
  • You feel good about what you’re doing. That is, you’re not feeling guilty for being a tightwad, and you’re not expending so much mental energy deciding how much to tip that it interferes with paying attention to and enjoying the poker game.

Now for the specifics — or at least the specifics that I settled on years ago, and that have stood me in good stead ever since.

Dealers

I tip cash-game dealers one $1 chip for every pot I win or chop. It’s the same if I just pick up the blinds, or I win my biggest pot of the night. I increase that to $2 or occasionally even $3 if the hand takes unusually long to play out.

Hands might take longer because of multiple side pots, or because of the need to count down large stacks of chips, or because the floor had to be called to settle some matter, or because players had difficult decisions, each requiring time to think. The extra money is to compensate the dealer for the fact that he or she will get out fewer hands than usual in this down (a “down” being the time dealing to one table, usually 30 minutes).

I will tip an extra $5 if I win a high-hand jackpot. I also like to give a little extra reward to dealers who are exceptionally good. Once in a while a dealer really impresses me with how he or she keeps the game running smoothly, rapidly, and enjoyably. For such outstanding performance, I give the dealer an extra $1 chip as he or she is leaving for the next table, along with the message, “I like how you run the game.”

Should You Tip Poker Dealers

Similarly, I like dealers who consistently enforce the rules. Some dealers are reluctant to correct players who are talking about the hand in progress, or speaking in a language other than English, and so forth. Sadly, players who get called out — even in the most respectful manner — for breaking rules get embarrassed and tip less, which makes dealers gun-shy about rule enforcement. So when a dealer professionally handles a difficult situation like that, I do the same kind of end-of-down extra, with an encouraging message such as, “Thanks for handling things so well.”

Just as an aside, one of the reasons I prefer the two seats next to the dealer is that I can deliver those tips and messages quietly and semi-privately. If I’m in another seat, I might wait until I can catch the dealer away from the table, rather than have all the other players watching and listening.

Maybe something like once a year, a dealer will do something so outrageously insulting or unprofessional that I will stiff him or her — no tips for the rest of the down or shift. It would take too long to explain the kinds of bizarre circumstances that have led me to that “nuclear” option, but they’re very, very rare.

Poker Tips Pdf

Those are guidelines I follow when tipping dealers in cash games. Tipping of tournament dealers is a separate matter, which I’ll address when I do an article on all aspects of tournament play.

Cashiers

Video Poker Tips

There are only three ways to leave a cash game: If I lose all of my chips, I have no reason to stop at the cashier, let alone leave a tip. If I leave with a profit, I routinely tip the cashier $1. If I’m cashing out but with a loss, I don’t tip.

I realize that this is not strictly logical; after all, the cashier is doing close to the same amount of work either way. I admit that it is mostly an emotional point for me, in that it’s easier to give away a tiny bit of my profit than it is to deepen my loss.

Should You Tip Poker Dealer Locator

So I repeat: On each of the specifics of my methods, one could argue that there are different, and even better, ways of doing it.

Chip runners

It’s rare that I play in a casino that uses chip runners, so I haven’t developed the habit of tipping them. On the occasions that I’m in a place that uses chip runners, I usually only think about tipping them long after it’s too late. It’s possible that this neglect means that I’m a horrible person. I’d like to think that if my regular places of play used chip runners, I’d have this process worked out better.

Floor personnel

If the floor person does me some special service, such as counting out and bringing me a high-hand jackpot, I’ll tip a dollar. Otherwise, I have not found much call for tipping them. It would be unseemly, for example, to tip such a person for making a call in a table dispute that goes your way, just as a baseball player doesn’t tip the umpire for calling him safe at second base. Unlike the other people in this list, floor personnel are not being paid minimum wage, and are therefore much less dependent on tips to make a living.

Cocktail waitresses

I think $1 per drink (whether soft or hard) is both decent and standard.

I’ve asked a few dealer friends about my tipping protocol, and they have all endorsed it as one with which they have no argument, which pleases me.

One final thought: If there is a poker room where you think you will be spending a lot of hours over a long period of time — your “home room,” so to speak — err on the side of tipping more generously. You might be pleasantly surprised at all the ways the staff can make your time there both more pleasant and more profitable if they decide you’re a player who is worth extra effort to keep happy.

Robert Woolley lives in Asheville, NC. He spent several years in Las Vegas and chronicled his life in poker on the “Poker Grump” blog.

Poker Dealer Salary With Tips

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Should You Tip Poker Dealer Near Me

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