Thoughts on Box Person vs. No Box Person in Craps

By Bill Zender

(This article was printed in Casino Enterprise Management Magazine’s June 2006 edition)

Last month I received an e-mail from a casino executive asking me my opinion on whether or not I would eliminate the position of box person from my casino dice games.  This is a great question for two reasons; first there seems to be a trend leaning towards thinning out the pit supervisory staff, and second, I don’t know of anyone who has made a valid attempt at determining the true affect caused when a box person position is eliminated from supervising a casino dice game.

In a time where increasing competition has decreased the percentage of gambling dollar that enters the average gaming establishment, management is constantly looking for area where they can decrease operating expenses.  I can just imagine the budgetary meeting between the casino’s financial officer and the vice president of casino operation and their discussion about reducing payroll costs.  After going down a list of live gaming position titles the group stops at the seemingly nebulous position of “Dice-Box Person”.  After a quick debate it’s determined that paying a person roughly $150 a shift (before benefits) to do nothing more than to sit on the table and watch the dealers conducted business is meaningless, and the reduction of that position will immediately save their gaming operation over $650,000 per year.  What a great idea.  Why wasn’t this done years ago?

The problem with this decision is that management has probably failed to take the time to identify what it may cost their operation by eliminating this position.  Did they take into consideration what functions a box person performances?  Whether or not the elimination of those functions has a detrimental cost attached to it?  A cost that may make the budget committees decision to eliminate the box person position less than an optimal one.

First, let’s start out this exercise by establishing what the casino saves during an 8 hour shift when it eliminates the box person position from an open table.  Let’s say the savings, after we realize the cost of benefits, will be approximately $200 for the one box person position for one table per shift.  Also, we need to add the cost saving related to a relief box person as well.  This can be calculated as 25% of the cost of a single box position since the relief is normally spending only a portion of the time on sample dice table.  The total savings per table per shift to this point is seen in Table 1.

Table 1 – Saving per Table per Eight Hour Shift by Eliminating the Box Person

Our next step is to review the responsibilities of a box person and list each specific function which that supervisory position performs during the operation of the dice game.  Also, we need to assign a metrical measurement to each function that is performed by the box person, or better yet, the cost of non-performance.  Last, we need to compare the savings from eliminating the position to the calculated cost assigned to the eliminated supervisory position to see whether or not the committee’s decision make good business sense.

First, what does the box person actually do while seated at the crap table?  Some of these duties are;

·        Drops cash and colors-up cash outs

·        Manages the bankroll

·        Watches one end of the table for dealer mistakes

·        Generally, is on the look-out for any mistakes

·        Controls the sped of the game

·        Additional set of eye for game protection

·        Customer relations

It’s a short list, but one that basically covers the box persons general responsibility.  We could break this down even further into sub-functions, but for this exercise be more specific is not necessary.  Generally we can reduce these function into four money saving or earning classifications;

1.      Saving money by catching mistakes

2.      Saving money through vigilant and overt game protection

3.      Earn money through maintaining an optimal game pace

4.      Earn money through return customer value created by good customer relations

All these classifications for saving or earning money for the live game operation are quite valid. It’s a commonly known fact that dealer errors cost the casino money.  Increased cheating and/or theft go without saying.  While these areas are not the easiest to attach common value, a rational estimate can be reached based on several operational assumptions.  Take mistakes for example; two assumptions need to be reached.   If the box person is eliminated how many mistakes will not be caught be the dealers that would have been caught by a diligent box person supervising the game?  Also, will the lack of supervision create additional mistakes because the dealers know their not being supervised?  Determining a reasonable assessment on errors is a difficult task and requires the establishment of a couple assumptions.

·        Non-corrected payoff mistakes in the players favor made by the average dealer per eight hour shift

·        The value or cost to the casino of each mistake

For argument sake let’s say that each dealer makes one mistake per eight hour shift and that a four dealer team creates four non-corrected mistakes per eight hours when a box person is not on the table.  Mistakes take into consideration over pays, sleeper bets, and color up mistakes, and depending on the dealers’ dice dealing experience this number could go up or down.  Next, let’s give the average mistake a cost of $25.00.  Again, this value is totally arbitrary and may increase or decrease with the tables limits and the venue’s market.  By multiplying the four mistakes by the cost of $25.00 we can assign the value of $100 to the classification “saving money by catching mistakes”.  Now our box person example is starting to come together.

Table 2 – Additional Costs from Estimated Mistakes

Determining the cost from cheating and theft is extremely difficult.  It requires consideration of the existing threat in the venue’s location and the estimation of additional threats due to the decrease in game protection from the remove of the box person.  Cheating and theft are related to events such as dice scooting, bets that are past posted, and the amount of chips the dealers palm off during a specific period of operation.  At one time I estimated an average dice table in Las Vegas was subject to about $5,000 in cheating and theft lost per year.  This number included the fact that a box person was supervising the games.  With the box person absent it would be expected that more scams and theft will be successful, and it could also be argued that these under protected games would become more attractive to the cheat or thief.  Additional cost accrued from a less attentive table could easily range between $5,000 and $10,000 per table.  (Note: What makes this estimation extremely tricky is that one major scam could cost thousands of dollars while most of the table’s operational time nothing illicit would be happening.  This makes it difficult to place a cost value per shift on potential threat.)  For argument sake let’s arbitrarily place a $15 cost per shift average per table on cheating and theft when a box person is not present on the table.

Table 3 – Additional Costs from Possible Increase in Cheating/Theft

Establishing the value of game pace requires more assumptions and calculations.  A list of assumptions is as follows:

·        Average number of rolls of the dice needed to produce a wager decision

·        Average house advantage

·        Average rolls of the dice per hour with average table action

·        Average total wagers on the table per roll of the dice

The first three assumptions can be calculated fairly easily and the last can be established through observations of your games.  For this exercise let’s use the following numbers noted in Table 4.

Table 4 – The Value of a Wager Decision in Craps

Rolls per decision are an accumulation of numbers based on the occurrence of a decision related to the number of win/loss triggering events and the chance of one of those events being rolled by the shooter.  For example; the Field, Hop bets, and any Craps are one roll bets regardless the number rolled, while placing the “eight” gives the dice an average of 3.27 rolls (36 divided by 11) to arrive at a win/loss trigger event.  [Note: In their book Practical Casino Math, 2^nd Edition (2005), Cabot and Hannum take into consideration 2 rolls of the dice as the average number of rolls per decision, and 30 to 60 rolls as the hourly average.]  Average house advantage falls under a similar thought process since different bets, their frequency, individual wager house advantages, and the betting strategy of the players have to be taken into consideration.  Subsequently, an estimated 2.5% average house advantage per wager decision is not out of the question.

Based on time spent sitting box and the number of times I had to instruct the dealers to “move the dice”, I would suggest that a table without box supervision would lose at least one and most likely 2 wager decisions per hour.  This would indicate that over an eight hour shift an unsupervised dice table could lose $80.00 in lost production because the dealer’s didn’t keep the same pace as they would have with a box person stationed on the table.  Now we can add the cost of a slower game pace to our list of costs.

Table 5 – Additional Costs from Slower Game Pace

Now here’s the real tough estimate to establish.  Determining whether or not there is a cost to customer relations when the box person position is eliminated, and what that cost represents in hard dollars.  Again, let’s look at the box person’s duties as related to the direct interactions with the customers.  The box person has verbal contact with the customer many times during the operation of the dice game.  He or she handles credit requests, orders the cocktail waitress for thirsty players, explains color-up cash outs, and handles customer complaints quickly before an incident gets out of hand.  The box person should also know who the good players are and will make room at the table for those players when smaller players or “lookers” occupy all the table rim positions.  How do you place a value on these customer interactions?  To begin with most box persons receive absolutely no customer relations training during their time on the box.  I don’t know of one gaming operation that has explored ways to upgrade customer relations involving specifically the box person position.

Let’s also look at the indirect affect the elimination of the box person position has on customer relations on the dice table; dealer hustling.  To what degree does “hard” dealer hustling of the players for tips increase when the supervisory position of box person is eliminated?  How can that problem be correctly estimated?  Hard hustling is similar to bad service; people normally don’t complain about hustling incidents, they just leave the property reluctant to return.  Some players accept hustling as part of the game, however; once many of your customers realize that they were hustled and relieved of a portion of their money (“Hey, Mr. A, did you want to make that eleven a two-way bet…throw in another $25), they feel cheated and then stupid that they let it happen.  How many customers will be lost to unbridled hustling?  Even if the casino’s policy is to split all tips among all casino dealers, not just craps, hard hustling on the crap table will still continue to some extent if the dealers are not properly supervised.  So where does this exercise stand regarding the savings/cost comparison?

Table 6 – Comparison of Savings vs. Costs

If we use the metric from Table 6 we present a good argument that the elimination of the box person position could save the casino $55.00 per table per shift.  That comes to approximately $120,500 a year in savings if the casino averages 6 open tables shifts per day.  However, if poor customer relations and strong arm tip hustling runs off just $400 per day in potential player win this savings plan goes out the window.

 Three suggestions; first, eliminate the box person position and see how well the same dice tables perform at the end of the year.  Is the win off?  Is the drop down?  What about the hold percent?  If these metrics don’t decrease then possibly the decision to eliminate the box position was the correct decision.  Second, consider scheduling box persons similar to chip muckers on the roulette wheels; as needed and not per table.  Today, if I was responsible for a dice pit this is how I would handle the box position situation.  This way you maximize the box person’s effectiveness while still managing their overall cost of payroll.