Ask the Slot Expert: Video poker play recorded...eventually

I was in the middle of a Starbucks bonus stars challenge. Order two days in a row before 11AM and get 30 bonus stars. Do it one more time and get an additional 20 stars.

I made the first purchase at my neighborhood Starbucks. I made the second at the new Starbucks in the Suncoast casino when I picked up something I could snack on when I went to see The Social Reckoning at the Cinemark theater there.

When I checked the Starbucks app the next morning before making the third purchase to complete the challenge, the progress indicator on the home page indicated that I had made only one purchase.

Maybe the purchase at Suncoast's Starbucks didn't count. Some promotions state that they are valid only at participating locations.

I checked my account history in the app. It showed the Suncoast purchase AND the awarding of the 30 bonus stars. Even though the progress indicator was incorrect, I was getting credit for my action -- er, purchases.

A few months ago, I settled in on playing a particular video poker machine at Red Rock. It's one of three machines in a cluster. It is directly beneath an A/C vent but not underneath lights. I traded off being a bit chilly for having no reflections on the screen.

I ran low on credits playing the machine one day. I touched the on-screen button to open the slot club menu panel, which appears on the left side of the screen. I touched the buttons to redeem points for free play and I was rewarding with the spinning wait cursor.

I played a few more hands. Then I got nervous and pulled my card.

I knew I didn't have to worry about getting credit for my play in the slot club.

A bezillion years ago, a casino, which has probably since closed, in Atlantic City was having communication problems with a part of its slot floor. I don't recall how I was told that even though my play wouldn't show up in my slot club totals right away, it would appear once communications were restored. The player tracking software in the machine has to store player data when communications are down.

I played Mr Freeze's video poker machine on subsequent visits. I just didn't attempt to redeem points for free play on it.

Fast forward to two weeks ago. The bezel around the card slot was unusually bright. I suppose Red Rock replaced the card reader module in the machine.

After I put my card in, the welcome message never appeared at the bottom of the screen. The slot club panel opened on the left side, but it just displayed various promotional messages instead of the slot club menu.

The bezel was green, so some part of the tracking software registered me. There was a problem somewhere, though, because I was never welcomed. Worse, the machine did not display any messages counting up my points as I earned them.

I played a few hands until I got worried about my play being recorded. I figured I would report the problem at the slot club booth another day. And I hoped someone else would report the problem.

I played another machine. I checked my point total when I was finished for the day. The play on the first machine was not there.

I played another machine in the cluster for a few weeks. A few days ago, I checked the wacky machine again and the slot club software was still malfunctioning.

I thought somebody else would have reported the problem by now. I also thought Red Rock would have an anomaly report that showed no carded play on the machine for weeks. No one using a card in a machine for a couple of weeks seems unusual to me.

In any case, sometimes a casino doesn't know there's a problem unless someone reports it. I went to the slot club booth to report the problem, figuring that the rep would open a trouble ticket on the machine.

Well, the rep told me that this was a hardware problem and not a slot club problem. Slot operations, not the slot club, has the responsibility for the collection of player tracking data. I should hit the Service button on the machine and tell a slot floorperson.

Even though I was already finished playing that day, I took one for the team and went back to the machine and hit the Service button. Many people had played the machine while the club software was not working. I suppose they either didn't use a players card or never realized something was wrong.

I showed the floorperson what was wrong. I figured she would have to reboot the machine, so I stood up so she had access to all the locks on the front of the machine and record the reboot in the machine's log book.

She put her card in the machine and touched a few things on the screen. I tried to watch what she did, but she went so quickly and I had stood back from the machine, so I missed it. Have you ever noticed how the slot personnel get a much more interesting menu than the players?

The machine displayed a few messages indicating it was rebooting the slot club software. I asked if they triggered that remotely because she never used her key.

She told me that she triggered the reboot from her menu.

I have had machines reboot the player tracking software on their own. The point count always took up from where it left off. I wonder why the machine didn't detect that the tracking software was kaput this time.

After the reboot, she put my card in. I was welcomed by name in the message at the bottom of the screen and the usual slot club menu panel appeared on the left side of the screen. The tracking software was operating normally again.

She told me I could play the machine. I told her that I had already finished playing for the day. Nobody had reported the problem for weeks, so I figured I had better report it.

I checked my point totals at a kiosk. My daily points showed only the points I had earned from playing earlier.

My tier credits and free play points were much larger than I expected. Maybe I had played more on the machine than I thought when the slot club software was non compos mentis. My play was still being tracked, despite the problem with the software.

If you would like to see more non-smoking areas on slot floors in Las Vegas, please sign my petition on change.org.

Send your slot and video poker questions to John Robison, Slot Expert™, at slotexpert@slotexpert.com.

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