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Missouri casino loses more than $100,000 in scam
23 December 2008

RIVERSIDE, Missouri -- As reported by The Kansas City Star: "A counterfeit casino chip scam has cost the Argosy Casino Hotel & Spa in Riverside more than $100,000 in recent weeks.

"'It could have been worse,' said casino general manager Ameet Patel, who confirmed Monday that a man was arrested last week by state gambling agents. A cashier had detected several $100 chips that were slighter thicker than the casino's own and did not fit properly into storage racks.

"...No one has been charged yet, said Lt. Bob Zubeck, the patrol's gambling enforcement supervisor for the state's western district.

"...After the suspected patron was arrested last Tuesday, Patel said, the casino removed every $100 chip from play and replaced them with back-up inventory. Patel said an estimated 1,100 phony chips had been discovered so far.

"He said the counterfeit chips weren't detected until some were placed in a storage tray and, because of their thickness, did not fit properly..."

It really makes you wonder what Vegas loses annually in Chip fraud. This has to be one of their biggest risks.
In China you can buy "authentic" brand name product, that is made in excess of quota and shipped out the back door.
There there are clone products some as plane jane as Crest Toothpaste. Everything is identical and you can hardly taste the melemene.
I am surprized that the Casino went public with this.

Hmmm,
I always thought that the chips with larger denominations had RFID technology built into them...
I guess Argosy Casino tried to save some money and had bought cheap chips...
Also bought themselves trouble.

RFID is typically just a number.
Walmart plans to RFID each product.
That is not to say that every can of soup would have a unique number. It would simply be a more efficent than a bar code (ie all Cans of Campells soup would bear the same number).
Think of taking a cart full of items and instead of scanning each item simply sliding your cart under a scan bar and having your receipt printed in under 10 seconds.

From what I saw at G2E the RFID chips were used for bet management systems to detect dealer fraud (mis-pays) as well as to help with the rating systems.
It didn't look like they were trying to keep track of each chip individually but even if they were It would pretty tough for the casino to keep track of every chip, detect duplicates, and even still there would be duds.

Get 4 or 5 as a sample and you could figure out if they were sequenced pretty quick. It might be easier to get a unique radio-isotope and have that added to the clay/plastic mix so that they could be detected as fake or real.

The risk of the counterfitter getting caught would go up exponetially with the denomination as I am sure 500 and 1K chips are not as common as $100's or even quarters.

and all the guy had to do is get the size right!

I can tell you that in most LV casinos in which I have played the larger denomination chips have a tiny "bj" somewhere on the chip to indicate the game that they came off of. In addition, when I show up at the cage with $1000 chips (and sometimes $500) they call the pit to verify the walk amount. From what I understand, in the more up to date casinos the chips' RFIDs are read by a sensor under the cashier's counter. It might be done with the intent of keeping the cashiers honest, but it must also serve to detect lesser-quality counterfeits.

This is not as easy to do as you might think. The hardest thing would be getting the formula ratio of clay, brass, and lead just right so the weight and thickness is to spec. They picked a very hard chip to copy a Paulson Hat and Cane mold with a cog inlay. most chip manufactures put security measures in each chip and the cage person should scan each chip with a black light that is installed under the counter at least in Vegas they are. The crooks must have made over a 1000 chips and should have been busted after about 50 someone should lose their job over this
The small bj you see on some chips is just a manufacture logo (Bud Jones Chip Company)

Can't post more than one picture?

more pictures

one more

Thats cool info. They probably focused on the weight and not having the mixture quite right accounted for the difference in thickness. It would take guts to come in night after night and pass bad chips. You would think it would be less risky to crack them at the table then color up afterwards. Although the longer you spend at the tables the more camera attention you would get overall.

Its a good thing they didn't try this in Vegas cause they frown on this type of activity and have no sense of humor
but 10 racks of chips does take balls

Ron, I never knew that about the Black Light, is that very common or has it been used widely in the past, I know many of the Stations properties always called back to the pit when you had more than a few blackies

 :97- :97- :97- :97- :97-  LOL. Well slap me silly!  :72- :72- :72-  I always thought it stood for blackjack -- after all, I've never seen a chip that large from any other table game!  :30- :30- :30-  :125-  :127-  K+ Ron for those posts. :131-

I forgot about the black light. I have a couple of Paulson chips that were in casinos in the late 1990's. On those, the black light security measure is a picture of the top hat and cane, rather than the word "Paulson". Another black light change I believe to be a security measure is to have each clay color glow a different color under black light. I have home (fantasy) Paulsons and some other clay chips, and they don't do that. The casino chips glow brightly but in a different color set, so I think it's deliberate.

Yes the inserts sometimes glow a different color also. They can put what ever security tag the casino wants Some owners just like to see their name everywhere

On these Pny chips the owners requested Paulson put a micro dot on the chip also which is located on the 5 of the 25 and says Paulson 50 or 60 times and you can only see with a microscope

I will have to pay more attention when I next get to a cage. I have never seen them use black light or the what not... then again I was rarely cashing in much.

Heres some pixs of Glo used on dice....