Does the FDCPA apply to casinos? How about their lawyers?
The question is of more than academic interest. The stakes are high.
First, of course, there is the money. Legal gaming operations directly lend billions of dollars each year to their patrons, and have to chase down hundreds of millions of dollars that are not paid back in time. The National Gambling Impact Study Commission, created by Congress, asked I. Nelson Rose to do a study in 1998 on credit and the casino industry. He found that the 12 casinos in Atlantic City that year issued approximately $2.13 billion in counter-checks, markers, to their patrons. This means that, in just this one city, players borrow more than $2 billion each year from casinos. This does not include personal checks written directly to the casinos or to others, or, most importantly, patrons’ use of credit cards, ATMs or other forms of credit used to get cash to gamble.
Most patrons were able to pay off most of their loans by the end of their trips and the markers were canceled as paid in full. Players redeemed more than $1.58 billion in markers prior to deposit. For some, however, luck was not as kind. So $543,174,000 in markers remained unpaid after the players had left the casinos.
Most of this money was recovered through the normal procedure of depositing the markers for collection through the banking system: The casinos collected $424,400,000 from the players’ banks in this way.
This means that $118,774,000 bounced. Having to chase down more than $100 million in bad debts every year turns casinos and their lawyers into major collection agencies.
For this complete story, please visit http://www.rgtonline.com/Article.cfm?ArticleId=55943&CategoryName=Gaming%20Strategies.
