G Casino Luton 2009 blondeite league

[Snatiramas]

Can you add me for another two please chompy sir. I have found myself available for this evenings donkfest and on checking I gave you one to few. Inadvertent cheating FTW

[Gamblor21]

4 for me in July, won't be playing any others as up in teesside.

[nirvana]

7 tourneys so far in July - may play 1 more next Friday but by no means certain - leaves the top 9 :-(

Chompy, see above for previous sumbmission imo

Gonna play tonight so its a definite 8 for this month with maybe 1 more on Friday - I'll let you kmow

[Michigan Jeff]

2 for me in July.  Relegation beckons....!!!!!

hopefully score some much needed points next week!!!!

[AlexMartin]

0 for me mate. And highly unlikely ill be playing any festival events as completely brassic at the moment. gl al,l win the lot, hit me up if u want a horse, minimum 35%equity mind.

[littlemissC]

sorry to hijack thread quick question

will the gukpt side events get many runners this weekend with dtd being on? i may be coming to luton instead now will locals be staying put does anyone know

thanks

[celtic]

sorry to hijack thread quick question

will the gukpt side events get many runners this weekend with dtd being on? i may be coming to luton instead now will locals be staying put does anyone know

thanks

100+ on saturday, 80-100 on sunday & the same for monday imo.

[littlemissC]

ty for the quick responce might as well come there with the other half instead of dtd then i cant win there atm ill give you boys a spin 

[Snatiramas]

I have never refused to deal at a tourney......never. And please I want you all to be very clear that I am talking about the physical act of dealing cards. Well last night I had just had enough.

I arrived early so that I could have a nice meal in the often overstretched for seating restaurant. I bought myself in at exactly 7.33 and 19 secs for a tournament that is supposed to start at 8.30pm. I am entry number five.

The six covers in the restaurant that seats upwards of a hundred all ate meals. I am not totally sure how it pays to have a restaurant with so few covers every evening. It was actually a nice meal. I reckon as long as you stick to steak then there isn't too much that can get cocked up.

The Wednesday night comp has really become flavour of the month. In fact it has become too popular.

So to the reason for my infantile behaviour. At 8.45 the seat draw goes up on the boards. Table 14 seat 1. Now I know that they only have 11 dealers so how am I table 14? Well ladies and gentlemen they have set up three self deal tables. So there are 11 dealer dealt tables with a couple of spaces on each for latecomers and three self deal tables that are full. The discount for self dealing is zero.

I support this cardroom. I go there even though I could go to other places. The Vic for one. I got to the tourney early. I supported the venue by eating there. What do I get for my support?

When I ask to see a manager I get a smirk.
When I explain to the manager why I think there may be alternatives to the way this comp is run I am fobbed off with stock answers. This just will not do. In a supposed customer service industry I am sick of being treated as though I am some sort of brainless idiot.

I want to make it quite clear that on a personal note I really like the cardroom staff. I love the room and I love my fellow players. I am just sick and tired of every answer I get being along the lines of it is more than my jobs worth.


Let us look at the problems, my potential solutions and the reasons I am told that they will not work.

Firstly why is there a mixture of dealer dealt and self deal tables? Well commendably the venue want to get as many runners in to increase the prize pool. The draw has to be random. They don't want to turn away somebody who has travelled a long way to play. The tournament is not advertised as dealer dealt.

So I suggest the following none of which are acceptable apparently.

Make the whole tournament self deal.
Answer. We would not get as many runners so we will not do that.

Okay if you want some self deal tables then give them a gesture of good will. Let them have their session charge back or a free snack.
Answer. We do not guarantee a dealer and you are paying for the use of the room. Fair enough then give some other gesture. Answer. No.

Okay so cap the number of tables at 11. Fill them all. Let everybody know that there are only 11 tables and that everybody else will be alternates. That would have meant that there would have been 13 alternates last night. Doing this would also ensure a prompt start time.
Answer. We get complaints from players that we will not open tables during other dealer dealt comps. Hmm thinks I, there are many ways round this one but that is for a different time.

Basically through all of this I am given the distinct impression I am wasting my time. Nicely but definitely.

We get to a point where they are breaking a table. Is the last table broken? That would be table 14. No chance. Table 12 is broken. Why? No answer.

I decide in five hands time I will make a not so silent, silent protest. I will not deal when it is my turn and urge the table to follow suit. If nobody deals then nobody will win chips, nobody will lose chips. If this was done at the start of the evening, when the table breaks you will join your new table with somewhere in the region of 10% less than average. I also ask Tighty to ask for a ruling.

Please understand I know this is infantile but ask yourselves this question. How upset must a customer be to act in this way? People do not normally describe me as Mr. Angry.

Now I know there will be a faction who read this who think I should walk with my feet and go somewhere else. That is not going to happen. This is my cardroom I will change it from within or get banned trying. Why will they not listen to me or anybody else?

Why do Grosvenor just not care about me? I can't answer that. I never see anybody from head office. If I did I might ask them who designed a massive poker room with poker tables with no lips so the cards going flying off the edge. There will be mis deals galore during the festival this week. Trust me. I rarely see Carmel. The players forum is defunct. Loads of promises from Luton but no delivery of agreed actions. I mean if they manage to make Tikay not want to bother continuing to try and help improve the experience then there is not much hope.

I challenge somebody at head office to meet with me at their convenience to discuss how to improve matters. I offer my services as a sales and marketing professional (currently under utilised) to improve the take in their cardrooms and food operations. I would take a percentage of the increase in actual profitability. Grosvenor I challenge you!!!

I am sending this post to the chief executive. I am going to send him a post every week until I get somewhere. Shawshank redemption will have nothing on my stubbornness.

On a positive note I finished seventh.......he who whinges wins, oh and just as Tighty was about to ask for a ruling we got broken....

[Chompy]

Name                 Played Won  2nd  3rd  Other   Pts      Score
Snatiramas           32     1    2    1    8       89       2.78 *
Tightend             43     2    2    1    11      108      2.51 *
Celtic               35     1    1    3    3       88       2.51 *
Gamblor              26     2    0    2    3       64       2.46 *
Winkie               18     0    1    1    5       43       2.39 *
Simon G              34     1    1    1    7       74       2.18 *+?
Tikay                37     1    1    2    5       76       2.05 *+?
Sir Donksalot        35     3    0    0    3       70       2
Alex                 10     1    0    0    2       20       2 *
----------------------------------------------------------------
Chompy               44     2    2    1    3       81       1.84 *
Nirvana              61     3    3    0    7       111      1.82 *+?
Holdorfold           13     1    0    0    2       23       1.77 *
Lucky                50     1    1    0    11      81       1.62 *
Pelham Boy           22     0    1    1    4       35       1.59
Claw                 27     0    0    1    5       34       1.26 *
China Mug            95     3    1    0    11      117      1.23 *
Jeff Buftybarger     17     0    0    0    1       7        0.42 *
Dingdell             17     0    0    0    1       7        0.41 *
Xpressman            11     0    0    0    1       3        0.27 *

Updated up to and including Wed 29 July

* July total included

Juuuuuuuuuly results
Name                 Won  2nd  3rd  Other   Pts
Sir Donksalot        2    0    0    0       45
Lucky                0    1    0    5       35
Holdforfold          1    0    0    0       15
Snatiramas           0    0    0    2       13
Nirvana              0    1    0    0       12
Claw                 0    0    1    0       9
Thomas Bernie        0    0    0    2       9
Tightend             0    0    0    2       6
Xpressman            0    0    0    1       3
Winkie               0    0    0    1       1

GO SNATTY, you is my hero. Steak for dinner and coco pops for breakfast! Give'em hell sir. I'll back you up if you need an annoying git to pester them with emails.
I enjoyed last night for the first few hours but it would all have been different had I ended up on a self-deal jobbie.
Some serious talent on my table, esp Ryan Stimples (I think), who plays a lot of cash on Sky. Watch out for this dude. Zero modesty but very good.
Anyway, 8pts (4pts x 2) to trouble-making Snatimaras for his seventh in a bumper field of 121.

Sir Donksalot was also present.

The following pair of laggers still owe me their July figure...

Sir Donkeys - how much longer before the magical 14 figure is unveiled?
Pelham 1-2-3

Quite a few other leaguers present last night. I've added one on to Celtic's and Tighty's played figure. Does anyone else need one adding on?

[TightEnd]

Add last night to the tally for me please Chomps

Drew the self deal table with Snats  [  ] Eardrums benefitted from this

Played ok, rr with AK 22 out with av stack 9x bb and ran into AA. Close again, but no dice

really is a very odd comp, hugely variable standard of play and very quick from level 5 onwards. Still, where else can I get a good moan at Coco Pops for £5.50?

[tikay]

I have never refused to deal at a tourney......never. And please I want you all to be very clear that I am talking about the physical act of dealing cards. Well last night I had just had enough.

I arrived early so that I could have a nice meal in the often overstretched for seating restaurant. I bought myself in at exactly 7.33 and 19 secs for a tournament that is supposed to start at 8.30pm. I am entry number five.

The six covers in the restaurant that seats upwards of a hundred all ate meals. I am not totally sure how it pays to have a restaurant with so few covers every evening. It was actually a nice meal. I reckon as long as you stick to steak then there isn't too much that can get cocked up.

The Wednesday night comp has really become flavour of the month. In fact it has become too popular.

So to the reason for my infantile behaviour. At 8.45 the seat draw goes up on the boards. Table 14 seat 1. Now I know that they only have 11 dealers so how am I table 14? Well ladies and gentlemen they have set up three self deal tables. So there are 11 dealer dealt tables with a couple of spaces on each for latecomers and three self deal tables that are full. The discount for self dealing is zero.

I support this cardroom. I go there even though I could go to other places. The Vic for one. I got to the tourney early. I supported the venue by eating there. What do I get for my support?

When I ask to see a manager I get a smirk.
When I explain to the manager why I think there may be alternatives to the way this comp is run I am fobbed off with stock answers. This just will not do. In a supposed customer service industry I am sick of being treated as though I am some sort of brainless idiot.

I want to make it quite clear that on a personal note I really like the cardroom staff. I love the room and I love my fellow players. I am just sick and tired of every answer I get being along the lines of it is more than my jobs worth.


Let us look at the problems, my potential solutions and the reasons I am told that they will not work.

Firstly why is there a mixture of dealer dealt and self deal tables? Well commendably the venue want to get as many runners in to increase the prize pool. The draw has to be random. They don't want to turn away somebody who has travelled a long way to play. The tournament is not advertised as dealer dealt.

So I suggest the following none of which are acceptable apparently.

Make the whole tournament self deal.
Answer. We would not get as many runners so we will not do that.

Okay if you want some self deal tables then give them a gesture of good will. Let them have their session charge back or a free snack.
Answer. We do not guarantee a dealer and you are paying for the use of the room. Fair enough then give some other gesture. Answer. No.

Okay so cap the number of tables at 11. Fill them all. Let everybody know that there are only 11 tables and that everybody else will be alternates. That would have meant that there would have been 13 alternates last night. Doing this would also ensure a prompt start time.
Answer. We get complaints from players that we will not open tables during other dealer dealt comps. Hmm thinks I, there are many ways round this one but that is for a different time.

Basically through all of this I am given the distinct impression I am wasting my time. Nicely but definitely.

We get to a point where they are breaking a table. Is the last table broken? That would be table 14. No chance. Table 12 is broken. Why? No answer.

I decide in five hands time I will make a not so silent, silent protest. I will not deal when it is my turn and urge the table to follow suit. If nobody deals then nobody will win chips, nobody will lose chips. If this was done at the start of the evening, when the table breaks you will join your new table with somewhere in the region of 10% less than average. I also ask Tighty to ask for a ruling.

Please understand I know this is infantile but ask yourselves this question. How upset must a customer be to act in this way? People do not normally describe me as Mr. Angry.

Now I know there will be a faction who read this who think I should walk with my feet and go somewhere else. That is not going to happen. This is my cardroom I will change it from within or get banned trying. Why will they not listen to me or anybody else?

Why do Grosvenor just not care about me? I can't answer that. I never see anybody from head office. If I did I might ask them who designed a massive poker room with poker tables with no lips so the cards going flying off the edge. There will be mis deals galore during the festival this week. Trust me. I rarely see Carmel. The players forum is defunct. Loads of promises from Luton but no delivery of agreed actions. I mean if they manage to make Tikay not want to bother continuing to try and help improve the experience then there is not much hope.

I challenge somebody at head office to meet with me at their convenience to discuss how to improve matters. I offer my services as a sales and marketing professional (currently under utilised) to improve the take in their cardrooms and food operations. I would take a percentage of the increase in actual profitability. Grosvenor I challenge you!!!

I am sending this post to the chief executive. I am going to send him a post every week until I get somewhere. Shawshank redemption will have nothing on my stubbornness.

On a positive note I finished seventh.......he who whinges wins, oh and just as Tighty was about to ask for a ruling we got broken....

[jcnev]

I agree with snatty on the double standards of self - dealing and dealer dealt. This issue is likely to appear again on Saturday with the £100 jobbie. The event is likely to gain in excess of 100 should it get to the same numbers as last years event then 197 will be the final number. The likelihood of all dealer dealt is bordering on 0%-0.1%.

Last year they were naive in thinking that a festival £100 tourney would get in excess of 100 runners and therefore did not have enough dealers. This year though surely they cannot use the same excuse as they have history to compare to. They should be planning in advance to have enough dealers to cover the cardroom to its capacity.

There are also some who believe the festival doesn't actually start until Sunday this is a load of "tottenham" the GUKPT website states the Saturday event as the first of the side events.

Lets hope they have planned it well this year and the cardroom has been covered by dealers. If not then post here on Sunday the top reasons you heard as to why they didn't have enough dealers.

[TightEnd]

I agree on self deal/deal. I was on Snatty's self deal table last night. To be fair to Nina it must be a real FML moment for  her that the random seat draw  threw up both me and Snatty on one of the self deal tables....

Also to be fair to the card-room staff (those below the Invisible Boss, even when she is not ill) I gather that the Pit Inspectors complain that the wed comp takes up too many resources (ie dealers that need to be paid)

I think a sensible solution, to avoid self deal and to make the comp more playable too, is to give it a cap of 100. That gets people there earlier, they can then start the thing on time (not 20 minutes late like last night again) and latecomers go in as alternates

[Simon Galloway]

OK my thoughts on what I experienced.

I don't see the point in putting in a cap, if the cardroom will take 150 and the cost of that is a few self-deal tables to begin, then ok.  There have been plenty of whinges in the past about alternates not getting in when they could have set up a new table and turning customers away, so which way round is it?  The real problem seems to be mgmt's incredible attitude towards the success of the new tournament.  Rather than being happy with the extra footfall, registration fees and presumably pit action, they want to moan about the extra resource drain.  Well guess what, the increased revenue helps pay for that extra resource.

Self deal to help cope with an unpredicted spike in demand on a given night is much more preferable than a shut out imo.  So if it normally attracts 110 runners and they have the dealers for that, and one day 150 people turn up, I prefer 4 self deal tables than 40 alternates.  However, where self deal is not right is where mgmt deliberately under resource for an expected turn out - if they know that they will get 110 runners and resource 7 dealers for it, they are basically saying "FU, we don't want to pay for the extra dealers, we will put the cost onto the players."  "And if they don't seem to moan, perhaps we will try staffing 6 dealers the week after!" Any time the cardroom has had a demonstrably reasonable attempt at catering for the needs of the tournament, I personally don't mind a couple of levels of self deal.

"You are paying for the use of the room."  Well it depends on how they want to account for it.  Let's say for ease of maths that the cardroom costs £Y a night to have stood empty.  Then after staff are budgeted, the room costs £2Y to host a given tournament.  Then assume that the reg fees for a given torunament amount to £2Y also, a breakeven affair.  Well now you can have a bit of a Mexican standoff between self deal refusals on the players side and discounts on the management side.  You will still have a cost neutral evening, and of course some unhappy bunnies.  As the incremental players wouldn't be costing the house anything extra (because no extra dealers are supplied to meet and the sunk costs of having the room are there whether these extra people come in or walk away) ) there is no sound reason why a discount couldn't be applied to those additional players,a free drink from the bar or a free sarnie, which costs the house a fraction of the retail price and a fraction of the reg fee.  Then the room generates £2Y+SOMETHING (and has extra people retained on the premises) where SOMETHING is a net positive figure after discount has been applied.  The normal reason will end up being that some bean counter in H.Q .will notice that the complimentaries have gone up £50 in a week and has to be stopped, rather than noticing that the reg fees have gone up £200 and needs to be maintained.