I was fortunate enough to be the cage and vault roundtable moderator at NIGA’s annual Indian Gaming Trade Show and Convention in Phoenix this year, and the truth of the matter is boy, did I learn a lot!
No matter how long you have been in this great industry and no matter how many things you have seen or done, attending this kind of event can be refreshing and educational — not to mention an incredible opportunity to network and meet new friends. More than 40 people attended the cage and vault roundtable, including representatives from coast to coast and from small, medium and large gaming properties.
The roundtable’s initial agenda consisted of four items, but by the end (three hours later), we had discussed 23 different topics. I’m not going to list all 23, but here are the highlights:
Cage Exceptions
These are nationwide issues: Why are there so many cage exceptions? Why are most of them petty issues? Why are we spending several hours a week counseling cage employees because someone forgot to circle a.m. or p.m. in the key log? There are automated key systems available and, though they are pricey, it is worth it to be able to serve guests more quickly and effectively. Nonsense regulations written 15 years ago are handicapping customer service. We spend more time answering exceptions and counseling employees than we spend providing superior customer service.
Ticket Redemption Kiosks
I’m not surprised this topic came up — after all, the industry is leaning toward TITO. The big issue is: Who should be in charge of the kiosks? Slots, the cage or IT? Someone — anyone — must take ownership of the kiosks if your property wants a good return on its investment.
The roundtable concluded ownership should depend on the size of the property. Smaller properties that have five or less kiosks will benefit if the cage has ownership, but larger properties will benefit if the slot department has ownership. Either way, IT will play a big role.
Kiosk-to-Slot Ratio
According to the experts, the preferred ticket redemption kiosk-to-slot machine ratio is 1-to-125. If your kiosks have an ATM feature, it should be 1-to-100. These ratios were generated by kiosk vendors in conjunction with end users. Following these ratios will help eliminate long lines at the cage and at booth redemptions. It will also spread the work load evenly throughout the kiosks, meaning less down time.
Scheduling
Scheduling is a challenge for all of us, especially at smaller gaming properties. Bad scheduling will lead to poor customer service and hard costs, such as overtime and turnover. If you are having overtime problems, you should try 4-day/10-hour scheduling. This will allow you to concentrate on peak-time scheduling and overlapping shifts. For example, the beginning of the day shift is usually slow, but as the day progresses, it becomes busier and busier. Overlapping allows you to make sure you have the peak times covered, as well as giving your cashiers more time to balance. If your entire staff is on a 4/10 schedule, you can overlap the entire shift. That way, if someone calls in sick, you will have coverage shortly. With the price of gasoline, one less day of driving is another benefit to your staff. If you’re at an Indian Gaming property, for example, your cashiers likely commute 20 to 30 miles each way to work; the 4/10 could save them almost $10 per week in gas alone.
Cage Automation
All cage managers want to make their operations faster and more efficient, but cage automation has been slow to catch on in the industry. Some technology companies have made huge progress in cage automation in the past seven to 10 years, but as a whole we are behind — many cages are still operating in the manual mode.
Technology can automate employee banks, systems for table fills and credits. There are known patron software systems, Title 31 software systems, automated manual marker systems and so many more, but still the cage area lacks an efficient and user friendly automated inventory software system. It is up to us to let vendors know about the need for cage automation.
I am looking forward to NIGA 2008 and the opportunity to share more information with my colleagues and, hopefully, meet new friends.
Thank you, NIGA and Dianne Wyss, for putting this together.
Al Zayas is Director of Cage and Credit Operations at Cache Creek Casino Resort. He can be reached at alzayas[at]netzero.net.
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