Greatest Gambling Cheats Part 3: The Baccarat Offset.

The Baccarat Offset:

This is an intelligent and complicated casino cheat, its origins lie in the Blackjack Ten-Oh-Five mini-baccarat version, but entails a cunning development. The move is actually set-up whilst the player is sat at the table, rather than in the environs of the game. Similar to the blackjack move, the Baccarat Offset uses a mechanic and a claimer, although for the purposes of this casino scam, one person takes the role of both, the Mechanic/Claimer works within a larger team, the details of which are explained below:

In the first instance, the Mechanic/Claimer will approach the mini-baccarat table, placing a legitimate bet of $1, 025 (consisting of one yellow and one green chip; valued at $1000 and $25 respectively) in the ‘player’ betting area of the table.

Secondly, two different members of the team, the Chip-Bettors, each place a bet of $500 on the ‘banker’ betting area of the table, which must be the opposing bet of the Mechanic/Claimer, this means that the original bet is offset. When the odds are accumulated, the bet placed by the team as a whole amounts only to $25. Simultaneously, the Mechanic/Claimer is portrayed as a $1000 better or high-stakes player.

In a casino, a person making high-stakes wagers would call the attention of the floor man, who would then approach the table and befriend the gambler, simply because this is a large bet in any casino and they like to treat high-stakes players with special reverence- obviously because their continued custom is prized. The floor man would then ask the Mechanic/Claimer whether they would like their ‘action to be rated’, this means that they would then receive a complimentary service. At this stage, the Mechanic/Claimer would decline the offer of complimentary service, but the casinos’ floor man would remain and watch the game for a little longer. The Mechanic/Claimer would continue to place bets of $1025, and the chip-bettors to place $1000 bets, all in such a way that the Mechanic/Claimer is offset and $25 is all that is ever at risk.

At the point the floor man removes himself from the vicinity, the Mechanic/Claimer would then proceed to reduce the value of the bet to $125, (this is one black and one green chip, worth $100 and $25 respectively) and the chip-bettors would continue to place bets that offset the Mechanic/Claimer. Then, after playing a few more hands at this level, the Mechanic/Claimer would then reduce the bet to three green chips, $75. If the Mechanic/Claimer then lost that bet, they would continue to make the same $75 bet. Because the Mechanic/Claimer is already a high-stakes bettor, then there is no reason for them to leave the table after suffering a few loses, which with an average-stakes player, would have them running home before they lost their home.   

However, following a win on the $75 value bets on the side of the Mechanic/Claimer, at the point that the dealer pays the pay-out odds, the Mechanic/Claimer surreptitiously switches in two yellow (valued at $1000) in the place of two greens, so that the bet is now valued at $2025, once these chips are in place, the Mechanic/Claimer draws the attention of the dealer to the chips, claiming they have been miss-paid. The unwitting dealer, seeing the bet, will, on the whole, fall for the error; one, because the player has been established as a high-stakes bettor; and two, because the dealer would believe that he had assumed the bet was $75 because the player had already placed the bet in the previous bets, and that it was therefore his mistake for making assumptions.

It may appear that this move is largely impossible, but it has definitely been undertaken by various groups of professional gambling cheats. Obviously, such people need to be able to exude confidence in order to pass this move off, but if they have chosen a career path of organised crime, they will certainly attempt, and often succeed, with such a scam- especially if they are good at their chosen talents.

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