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Auditors explained that at River Rock “the site holds the view that patrons that buy-in with small-denomination bills can be paid out with big-denomination bills,” as long as floor staff judge that gamblers are betting reasonably.

Because B.C. casinos don’t have to record the denominations of bills that they pay out, auditors had to study the flow of bills between River Rock’s high-limit cashier windows and the casino’s vault. Auditors looked at cash deposited by VIPs from July 1, 2015, to Dec. 31, 2015. They determined that 99 per cent of the $40-million worth of $20 bills used by VIPs to buy chips was sent from high-limit cashier windows to the casino’s vault. The vast majority of $100 bills deposited to the high-limit cashiers — $50-million worth — were kept in the high-limit table area in order to pay out gamblers, the audit found. And another $90-million worth of $100 bills was transferred from the vault to the high-limit cashiers. This suggests that $20 bills not wanted by VIP players at River Rock were taken out of circulation at the casino, and $100 bills that were desired by gamblers were kept in play.

“Our analysis found that nearly all patrons that bought in with $20s were not paid out in this denomination,” auditors concluded. “It is reasonable to conclude that refining is occurring through the high-limit cages at River Rock Casino.”

The audit noted that the onus to report unreasonable play is on dealer supervisors and casino surveillance staff.

“River Rock does have criteria in place to help prevent refining for the purposes of money-laundering, (but) … the notion that nearly all patrons were paid out with $100 bills, regardless of the denomination that they bought in with, in part suggests that the controls in place to prevent a patron from refining may not be functioning as intended.”

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