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#14440 - 03/29/02 10:40 PM effect of casinos on banks and customers
rexinaudit Offline
Gold Star
rexinaudit
Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 292
New England
Our state is considering allowing one or more casinos to open. What have you seen as the effects or consequences of casinos in or near your market on your bank and on your customers?
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My opinions are not legal advice, not my employer's, and may change anytime.

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General Discussion
#14441 - 03/29/02 11:05 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
1 Peter 5:7 Offline
Diamond Poster
1 Peter 5:7
Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 1,339
TX
I can guaran-darn-tee that you will do more CTR's. You will be stunned by the number of customers who take more than $10K in currency out of the bank on Fridays - on their way to the casinos. That brings up the question of the social impact of gambling on your community, but that's another issue . . .
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Opinions are mine not my employer's, and should not be taken as legal advice.

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#14442 - 04/01/02 01:17 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Anonymous
Unregistered

An initial consequence of casinos in my area was that they paid their staff more than banks paid tellers and operations staff. This led to many people leaving bank jobs for the casinos, or people not in banking choosing a casino job over a bank job. So for a while, it was difficult to attract people to fill the lower level banking jobs. That has tapered off some, as the area reached a saturation point with casinos, with some of them closing.

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#14443 - 04/01/02 07:47 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Betty Banker Offline
Member
Betty Banker
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 57
SD
If you're talking traditional casinos - slots, blackjack etc., that's one thing. Customers usually bring cash and/or have a casino imposed limit on check cashing.

HOWEVER, if you're looking at what we have in South Dakota, which is a state sponsored Video Lottery, 'casinos' are on every corner, in every bar, and many have no limit on the number/amount of checks a customer can write. Customer impact in this case can be significant. Smaller towns don't seem to be affected as much: social stigma, gossip, and limited venues seem to keep problems to a minimum. The larger cities have more places to play, and I've seen accounts rack up as much as $8,000 in overdrafts from one weekend binge.

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#14444 - 04/01/02 09:31 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Anonymous
Unregistered

i have seen a LOT of nsf items come in for collection that are payable to the riverboats. some customers are wiritng upwards of ten checks a day for three to foru times what is in the accounts.

it's pretty sad and a little scary!

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#14445 - 04/01/02 09:51 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Anonymous
Unregistered

Its sad to hear what effect the casinos are having on the older crowd......We just recently went to a casino. There were four in the city where we went and all were full of older people. These casinos also seem to draw the older croud with "gold cards" etc.. We are just 50 and was able to get in on this deal.......free or reduced meals and rooms and such. I guess the strategy here is to get us to use more of our money to gamble because they have "saved" so much on room and meals. Didn't work on us because we set a ity bitty amount aside to gamble and that's it! No cashing checks, no cash advances on credit cards and no breaking 100 dollar bills. Sad that everyone doesn't have this control. I'm glad the casinos are 5 and 6 hours away so I will not be tempted more.

Another thing I noticed was how the city around the casinos had crumbled and decayed. Don't they put anything back in the community. Maybe they need a Community Reinvestment Act to comply with!

BWest

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#14446 - 04/01/02 11:05 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Anonymous
Unregistered

perhaps they should! ha ha

it's not just seniors that are succumbing to the gambling sickness either--although they seem to be the biggest group. but i see people my age (38) gambling away their rent & grocery money.

it seems to be hardest on the seniors though. i had one account that i got more than ten collection items on. al were written the same day. all were payable to a casino and all of them had been written against an account that had almost nothing in it to start with. then, to make matters worse, when social security finally posted, i took almost all of it to cover these collections and she called me whining that she didn't have anay rent money. my heart bled for her but at the same time i thought to myself that she brought the situation on herself and she has just got to deal with the situation.

i get several of these items a month and some customers are regulars, if you know what i mean.

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#14447 - 04/02/02 04:01 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
JMB Offline
Member
JMB
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 59
Michigan
FYI - If you are an OCC bank, you may want to look at the exam procedures for BSA - they include the possibility that the Bank will be meet certain criteria for a "targeted BSA exam". (There are many factors, but proximity to casinos is one - "Locations in high-intensity drug trafficking areas (HIDTA) or high-intensity money laundering and related financial crime areas (HIFCA)".) The exam is conducted by examiners from DC who do nothing but BSA exams.

As far as teller staff being attracted to casinos, many of the big banks in our area put together incentive programs to keep existing tellers and came up with a video on why a person would be happier in the long run to work in a bank when the casinos opened. (Working nights, weekends and holidays are high on that list). It took a while, but things have settled down in the staffing area, I think.

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#14448 - 04/02/02 05:31 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Rubaiyat Offline
Diamond Poster
Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 1,373
Lido Deck
JMB is correct that the proximity of a casino can trigger an OCC BSA targeted exam. It happened to us. And yes, the folks showed up from DC to do this. In some respects, this was a benefit for us since, as a result of the exam, we were in good shape when the USA Patriot Act came out.

Regarding the teller issue, we have not had an problem with losing tellers to the casino. There are issues occasionally with customers who spend too much time and money at the casino and we have become used to this, and have tried to be sensitive is dealing with this. On a positive note for the bank, we own the ATM machines at the casino which has been good for revenue. One additional benefit to the community is that profits from the casino in our area go to the local schools, and millions of dollars have already been allocated for building upgrades, etc. Of course, the argument still continues about whether this is enough to balance some of the unfavorable aspects of gambling. But, that's for someone smarter than me to decide!
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#14449 - 04/17/02 07:46 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Anonymous
Unregistered

Now the court has rulled that you cannot legally take their Social Security Direct Deposit and apply it towards overdrafts. Boy has this action really opened a can of worms! I am interested in what kind of stand other banks are taking toward overdrawing an account where deposits are Social Security direct deposits.

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#14450 - 04/17/02 10:37 PM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
Anonymous
Unregistered

We are over an hour away from the nearest casino. A lot of NSF's seem to be multiple checks made out to casinos for $200-$300 each. It isn't just on the weekends either. You would think these people would realize they were not going to win but two old sayings must be in force here. "A fool and his money" and "Where there's life, there's hope."

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#14451 - 04/19/02 03:29 AM Re: effect of casinos on banks and customers
cbinder63 Offline

Platinum Poster
cbinder63
Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 674
Colorado
Has anyone else noted that the majority of requests for credit information / credit at the casino are on customers with little income or frequent visitors to the dredded NSF list ?
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