Is it true that some casinos can adjust payouts?

Question

A good friend of mine once told me that in some of the smaller casinos, they have a way that they can adjust a slot machine's payouts through a computer that is somewhere inside the casino's back room, so that a person won't break the bank by winning too much money?

I'm sure the casinos don't want us to know the answer to this, but I am just curious if this is true or not and if it is an actual practice, is standard practice within the entire gaming industry, just at certain casinos or was my friend was just pulling my leg?

Thanks for your replies.

Answer 1

if they do that they are risking losing their gaming license..so it is not done at all

Answer 2

It's not true. People believe the story because slot machines are a little bit mysterious, they don't know exactly how they work and assume that the machines can be fixed.

Go and watch the cash flow in any other game - roulette, dice, or whatever and you will quickly realise that the casino always makes a profit without having to fix the game.

It's the same with slots. The odds are set to give the player a disadvantage and the casino never has to resort to hanky-panky.

Answer 3

Sort of.  Just about all slot machines these days are computer controlled (even the old-fashioned ones that have actual reels).  And all of them can be programmed for a certain payback percentage.  But changing the payback percentage isn't done via a computer in the back.  The machine would have to be taken down and the chip replaced and/or reprogrammed to do this.

So the reality of it is, the casino can set the payouts on a particular machine when it is put into service.  But they can't instantly change them in the middle of operation.