This is a topic I thought a lot about over the weekend and wanted to address and who better to ask then the Grifter. I don't play high limit yet, I only play $10-100 and that roughly says you make $16/hr. So I wonder should I tip? Will it actually make any difference whatsoever? For example if the pit boss sees me tip is he/she less likely to kick me out for counting? I've never received any heat so I doubt this is a concern and I doubt they would take that into account if they wanted to kick me out. The casinos here in Alberta are different than Vegas as we cannot make a seperate bet for the dealer. I guess it could be as simple as putting an extra $1 on your stack and saying thats the dealers but I never see anyone do that. The dealer won't give me better penetration if I tip nor will it affect any sort of players club points (since they don't have one). So my question is why should I tip? Just to be nice? But I try to take BJ seriously, and could be accused of being a bit cheap, so I don't like tipping much. I do tip on occasion but try to keep it to less than $2/night ideally maybe only $1 or $0.5. But I would like the Grifter and some other serious player's opinions on this issue. I guess if I was playing high limit I would have have a higher expected profit so then maybe I could afford to tip $1 or 2 per hour. And honestly, the only reason I feel the need to tip is I feel pressure sitting there with all those stupid 50cent pieces, especially if I have made a lot that night.
Sure its nice to tip if you're winning but if you tip too much you're just wasting away all your profits and it will only make your losses that much more expensive, because they sure won't give you back your tips when you start to lose. And though I sound like a bit of a jerk I completely understand how the dealers make their money as I work pt at a casino as a poker and sometimes bj dealer.
Another thing is I very rarely buy any drinks at the casino, they are too expensive (the same price as a regular bar) to buy every time I go and still consider BJ profitable. If I want a drink, and I have only had alcohol once while counting, I usually just go the poker room during a negative count, pretend like I'm going to play and take a free drink from there (pop).