Interesting last few posts...

I'm not advocating one argument over the other, but imho, if I'm not making the $$$ I want or need to be making, I'm moving on. If the downs and different poker rooms aren't treating you fairly, and you're not making what you need to or feel you should be making, then perhaps some dealers should look for other career opportunities or part-time work?

See, that's how it's supposed to work.

You go to work and you try to do your best every time.

If your efforts aren't rewarded to the level at which you feel they should be, you address your grievances with your employer, you seek a new working environment that might better reward you, or you seek a new line of work.

Anyone who adopts a "this job sucks, I'm going to half-ass it" or more appropriately to this thread, "these players suck, I'm going to half-ass it" attitude has a pretty awful outlook on that a good work ethic is.

I believe I've been 100% clear in this thread. If you don't get it by now, you're not going to.


q/q

By the same token: those customers who demand A-list service, but consistently refuse to pay for it, should not be complaining that they do not receive it anyway for free.


q/q

But then they might have to get a job and actually do some physical work and what is funny is that when Tunica casinos were closed due to the flooding the dealers were all bitching about their pay. The casinos paid their hourly wage and the tips they were declaring on their taxes but it seems most were declaring little if any taxes so their checks were small.

I think your stance is, "I'm going to drag my heels if the players don't tip enough," and that seems to demonstrate a terrible work ethic, so I'm giving you a chance to clear it up.

Do you advocate reducing the level of your service if you feel your compensation isn't appropriate, or do you advocate always doing your best work?

A customer approaches you as an IT professional:

The customer says: "build me a website".
The customer writes you a check for $5k.

You are capable of building all sorts of websites.
You can build a $5k website (bargain basement).
You can build a $20k website (spiffy)
You can build a $2M website (world class)
With infinite effort, you could do even better.

So, as an IT professional -- and bearing in mind your "always do your best work" perfect work ethic -- which website do you actually deliver to the customer who wrote you that $5k check?


q/q

You may (or may not) have a valid argument for your point of view.

I'm pretty sure everyone in this thread probably agrees with TANSTAAFL.


However, based on the way you are making your argument, you are giving the impression that you deal in a room that takes no rake or time.

Or if they do, someone other than the players are paying it? Please clarify.



.

By the same token...

If those customers do not feel they are getting the "A-List" service they believe they deserve but consistently refuse to pay for, they can either take their business elsewhere. Start paying and demanding better service or stay with the status quo.

It's a two-way street in my mind. Neither Party (Dealer/Player) has to or needs to bear inadequate service, or inadequate pay, if they desire not to. It is their choice to remain or go elsewhere. If there is no where else to go for either Party, then they both have a dilemma.

To be certain, I'd rather be playing online but no longer can. So now I'm forced to play in local bars as they are the closest games to me. I would rather play in my shorts whenever I want in the comfort of my home, but can't. I can either continue to plah where I have to, or give it up and look for other hobby/entertainment/income. Same with dealers and other players, if they don't like the pay/tips, look for other work or at least ask what is it they can do to receive better tips/pay. And for players, tip or don't tip, but don't complain about dealing.

I also separate "service" work from dealing. Most waitresses who have "served" my table have a better personality and goes out of their way more often to make my visit/meal enjoyable. As a rule, I don't see dealers performing "service" in the same manner. Might be a subset of the service industry but if you were to ask the regular guy on the street to name 5-10 service industries, dealers most likely wouldn't be on the list.

I always do my best work. It's something my father taught me when I was young. I'm not that old, and I have no idea how old you are, but maybe this is a generational mindset thing. *shrug*

I don't half-ass things because I'm not getting tipped enough, or because I took the job at a discount.

We both have the option of refusing jobs that we don't feel compensate us correctly for our skills. If someone wants me to do X and they only want to pay me .5*X, then, if my pocket book can afford it, I'll simply refuse the job. If I need the money, I'll deliver X, but at no point will I ever give less than my best.

If I'm getting paid $180 an hour on contract, or if I'm getting paid $55 an hour on salary, I produce the same quality of work per hour without. If I accept the offer to work for you for X hours, you'll get X hours of my best work, period.

When you took your job, you knew that there'd be ups and downs, and you took the job anyway.

Which brings us back to the question I've been asking you:

Do you advocate reducing the level of your service if you feel your compensation isn't appropriate, or do you advocate always doing your best work?

So what exactly is self-righteous about going to work to make money? It's not player vs dealer in the poker room. We are not in competition. We provide a service to you. You choose to pay for that sevice or you choose to let others pay your way. We are there to make a living. You come there to play a game. It's apples and oranges. If paying for the service is too expensive for you, go do something else cheaper.

I go to work to make money. When I'm doing those couple minutes of charity work for the non-tippers (mind you, they are pretty uncommon.. just annoying when they show up), I'm annoyed at the freeloader who wants to mooch off of what others are paying for.

As I stated before, if someone is a routine stiff, and they play at my table, I'm going to do as little as possible for them. No effort in getting their cards in front of them, no effort in pushing a pot to them, and I'm definately not going out of my way for them (put the tv on another channel/find me a waitress/give the cards a wash for me). This is maybe 1/30 of the players where I work. Professionally, I'm going to do the job I'm being paid to do. The casino pays me X amount to show up on time, run a quick, smooth, game, know the rules, and drop the rake. I do that to the best of my ability every day. The players pay for anything extra. If they're paying, I do the job for them. If they're not paying me, I won't.

If a player is so concerned about how much they are making, stop risking your money at a casino. For the wannabe "pros" who stiff dealers, get a real job. You actually come out ahead every day that way .

If you'll all excuse me, I'm off to engage in almost all of my favorite forms of tipping, which should end up with me helping a single mom put herself though college

Your not doing charity work. You get paid by the casino. Regardless of tips. I realize it probably is not that high. However, your attitude sucks. I think that everyone that tips has a right for good service. They also have the right for the good service for the non-tippers. Because what you do slows the game up ever so slightly. Your not a professional by any means. A professional does his job to the best of his or her ability. The tips are not mandatory. I would rather have the dealer get a certain wage then tips. I do tip the dealers and haven't stiffed any dealers(Unless they make a mistake that cost me a lot of money) but feel that big business gets away with paying the dealers very little. I don't understand why everyone always blame the customer and not the business.

Is it the customers responsibility to pay the dealers? Not necessarily. I think the tipping system has caused big businesses to get away with paying service workers almost nothing. Waiters may only make 2.13/hr + tips. I used to work for that and got robbed by the management. I ended up getting minimum wage because of that. (It was tip share. Managers got fired for it but that did not help me)

i'm probably never going to return to this thread to read your answers but dealing in a $600 buyin nl deepstack tournament today one player wasn't getting any cards, we're 6 hours into the tournament and i finally push him a decent pot, he pulls out some cash from his wallet and tips me. the next two or three pots i pushed him again he tipped me. Finally my last hand at the table i push him the pot and he pushes me $20. all the players were complaining about him tipping me. this is money out of play, off the table - what in the world does it matter to you if he does

Were you dealing seconds so he would win or was it just luck that gave him the winning cards. Because if it was luck you didn't do anything to help him so why would he tip you and why would you accept it making people think you might have been giving him the winning cards?

I don't believe in communism, sorry. If you want others to get a free ride from your money, that's up to you. But I hate seeing these cheap bastards do it to people who are actually generous enough to throw me a dollar or two when they win a pot.

I deal 40 hands an hour. My game runs just fine.

Which, as stated, I do. I work when I'm paid. If you're not paying me, I'm not working for you. And once again..

"The casino pays me X amount to show up on time, run a quick, smooth, game, know the rules, and drop the rake. I do that to the best of my ability every day." -- Me.


Neither are any of the things I neglect to do for non-tippers.

The customer, in general isn't blamed. It's merely an annoyance towards people who are too cheap to tip.

So how did you feel when a table stiffed you?

well its pretty obvious when in a 48 mtt and every dealer runs the same procedures - riffle, riffle, box, riffle > deal, that i'm not doing anything funky. Straight deal and he was just excited to finally get hands. Why not except the tips either? give me one reason that I should say "oh no sir keep your money, i'm only here earning 4/hour and dont appreciate your tipping"

I know many dealers that can do a standard shuffle and deal seconds or bottoms accepting tips makes you look guilty

I did not like it, that is for sure. Mainly cause I was not getting paid much without tips. I really blame the business for paying such a crappy wage. I think that the system is probably more to blame for your attitude towards non-tippers.

I think that it sucks that these businesses can pay such low wages and expect the customers to foot the bill. I believe dealers should be paid better for sure. These casinos make too much money, to pay these dealers so little. I think the government needs to stop giving themselves cost of living adjustments. They either need to abolish minimum wage or have minimum wage keep up with inflation.

What is the best way for the players and the dealers? The current system is not really the greatest imo.

Somehow in your mind, you do your job the same for everyone but go out of your way for better tippers. In reality, you are only really going out of your way to do a worse job for the stiffs.

There is nothing professional about this and you can reason with yourself all you want. If you disagree and think this is all perfectly fine then you should have no problem sharing it with your superiors. Go ahead and share your location and we can make sure they have a look at your posts.

I just read a lot of pages. Just want to say that some of these dealers disgust me to no end. And I'm probably not the only one feeling this way.

You provide service, we might tip.
NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND!
(we tip, so you might do your work like it should, if you feel like it, and you are not to lazy, and you slept well... )
You get the point?

And no, I'm not one of those who doesn't tip.
I know it's your work and you are there to make money. But some of you way to greedy.

What do you care? It's not your money. He was tipping by someone using their own money. You shouldn't care or have an opinion on whether someone tips him. You shouldn't care whether or not a dealer at a cash table is getting stiffed either.

The fact that you know dealers that actually do these sort of things with the seconds and bottoms is disturbing, and if they didn't dealers didn't do that would you still think this dealer was guilty for accepting tips?

Also to Q/Q - If you aren't giving 100%, you really don't deserve tips, simple as that. So many people use the "Do you tip when you go out to dinner argument" towards players that don't tip. When I go out to dinner, the waiter gives me a service, THEN I decide on how to tip him. I don't tip him beforehand and hope I get good service. If you aren't giving great service, then you are going to get exactly what you earn, and that's nothing. Sometimes even when you deal 100% to your abilities you are going to get stiffed, but guess what? That's a hazard of the job. You have little control over how players are going to tip, but you have all the control over how you deal. That $1 toke isn't your right, and it's not guaranteed, so please don't act like it is.

You should be fired.

I also wonder if the dealer turned the tips into the TD or floor so it could be put into the tip pool since tips in tourneys are usually split.

I feel the same way you do. Between the BBJ and tips (win 3 hands an hour on average/10 hrs per day), I'm giving away $30 in tips and $30 for a BBJ I'll never win, or never get paid properly for (not to mention rake). That's $60 a day, $300 a week, $1200 a month, and about $12k to $14.4 k a year (half of which is tips. That's like coming in January 1st and giving $6,000 to $7,200 to the dealers right there, and the same amount again for the BBJ.

I'll take the new car.

Dealers have to unionize and fight for better wages. Tipping should be illegal as it was when Atlantic City poker was first legalized.

And there is absolutely no way it should be legal to tip the floor (as is legal and done and causes favoritism and corruption in CA cardrooms.)

At $1/$2 and other small games, tipping can make losers out of marginal winners, and significantly impacts any winner. It also decreases the amount of money at the table available for me to win (it adds up at the lower levels--you stack someone and win $10 to $30 less). Obviously, at high limits, things can change.

*****

On a related note, I don't appreciate dealers coming in early in the morning (at the start of their shift) and being all chipper and waking up (invigorating) the players who have been playing all night. Let them sleep and lose money to me, thank you.

****

Oh, and btw, I tip; and I don't like it.