Yes, they are mugging you off. That’s what we are trying to tell you. But nobody holds a gun against your head and forces you to give them your money.
Harry Monk:
Many years ago I was an AWP service engineer (slot machine tech) and you’ll never find anyone who works on slot machines for a living who would ever put their own money into one. Sometimes I would chat to the punters who were desperate for me to get the machine operational again, and when I asked them how they did playing slots, every single one said one of two things- “I break even” or “I come out slightly ahead”. Yet the bloke I worked for was one of the richest men in Kent, lived in a seven-bedroom detached manor house near Ashford and had a collection of valuable classic cars. Go figure.I do gamble. Once or twice a month I’ll buy a EuroMillions ticket. But when I do, I view it in a similar way to buying a cup of Costa coffee, The money is gone. If I did win, then Happy Days but I know it’s a virtual certainty that I won’t, and being £2.50 down isn’t going to cause me any major (or even minor) issue.
But betting large amounts of your disposable income on slots, horse racing or football is just a complete and total mug’s game.
I remember a character called “Bob Wilson” who used to run a number of amusement arcades at Leysdown, (now taken over by JBs after Wilson’s Death) not far from where I live, and where My dad once had a camp shop on a caravan site.
This Gaffer ran his slot machines at the higher-end of payout percentage (75% I think it was) and his argument was that he turned a tidy profit, because people would drive for miles to play in his arcades, because the illusion of taking 4 hours to go broke rather than 3 (75% payout instead of 66% norm for other arcades) kept the punters in his arcades longer, looking good for passers-by who noticed that his place seemed to be the place where young people wanted to gather.
When I was a teenager, it was normal to see Girls playing the slot machines, and of course seaside amusement arcades - the “must be over 18” was quietly looked the other way upon…
You wouldn’t be moved on unless you looked like you had run out of money…
“Loitering in Arcades” - wasn’t encouraged, let’s say.
Me, meanwhile - used to like playing the pinball tables, rather than the slots… Make my quid’s worth of two shilling bits go a lot longer that way…
It wasn’t until I approached adulthood, and could play the machines in the pubs that I developed a bit of a gambling problem with the bandits…
Never got around the “much lower percentage payout” thing you see…
The one machine engineer I had among my mates - explained things like “how to set the percentage” and “logic board workings” many years later, and I gave the entire thing up in 1997.
The money I saved in the 4 years following - paid for the wedding and our first deposit on a house…
To this day, I continue to bet around £50 on the gee gees however… Unlike Slot machines, - I’ve had a number of occasions over the years where I’ve won well over a grand, so no one at my end is complaining.
My advice to habitual gamblers is “Keep it small, and afforable - never back single-figure prices, always do multibets rather than singles”.
Winseer:
My advice to habitual gamblers is “Keep it small, and afforable - never back single-figure prices, always do multibets rather than singles”.
Back in the days of mechanical one-armed-bandits, Mills, Jennings, Aristocrat sort of thing, there were players whose advice was that if you pulled the handle down very very slowly, then gave it a sharp tug when the spring was fully wound and just before the cams went over-centre, that this was more likely to result in a win. This is complete and total ■■■■■■■■ of course. Gamblers seem to have a limitless supply of kiddology and self-delusion.
There is a vanishingly small number of people who make money betting on horse racing, and these people are sufficiently involved in horse racing to be able to influence the results of races. My Dad was involved in greyhound racing in the 1930s and it was a common strategy to give dogs a large bowl of water just before a race to slow them down. But for a punter getting his information from the Sporting Life, no chance.