On Saturday may 24th, Paul pictured above was at the Millennium Lounge which is located in the Colonial Inns on City Road in Saint John N.B. Paul was a frequent player of the VLT’S at that location. On this particular evening he had been playing for some time but upon finishing his game he tried to cash out his credits, which was in the amount of $25.00.
To his surprise a message came up on the screen saying there was no receipt paper to print the transaction. He spoke to the bartender about this and was told that she would have to take his name and phone number. She also added that he should return the next day to receive his money, so he left the premises.
Three days later, on Tuesday morning he had remembered that he was owned $25.00 and returned to the Millennium Lounge at the Colonial Inns.
Once Paul tried to receive his money the Bartender told him that without a payout slip, they could not pay him!
He then explained the VLT had ran out of receipt paper and that was why he had no payout slip but his name & number were left at the bar so he could return to be paid.
But the bartender on shift that day insisted that he couldn’t be paid without a payout slip.
So Paul returned home and phoned the Atlantic Lottery Corporation in Moncton and to his disappointment he got the same answer from them as he had gotten from the bar. Paul feeling very frustrated at this point told the Lottery Corp.
He would proceed to go to the nearest hardware store and purchase a Sledge Hammer and return to the Colonial Inns and take his frustrations out on the Video Lottery Machines which are located in the Millennium bar Paul said the choice was theirs to make, $25.00 owed to him or thousands of dollars in damage to them?
The Lottery Corporation told Paul they would return his call to let him know what they would do for him.
The following morning Paul received a call from the Atlantic Lottery Corp. and was told to go to the Millennium Bar at the Colonial Inns to receive his $25.00. Once at the bar he was paid his money. Paul explained to the Bartender that it was a matter of principle.
She agreed but also told him that he was now banned from the Colonial Inns property for making threats to damage their Video Lottery Machines.
Paul explained to her that he did not feel this was fair but accepted it and left.
After Paul told me of his situation I decided to ask a few bartenders if this is a common occurrence some did say that it does happen periodically.
I was also told there are times when you are asked to take your payout slips home and bring it back later or next day to be paid because of cash float shortages.
Based on the Millions of dollars involved I cannot believe that people have to get that close to breaking the law or ending up in the courts and possibly receiving a criminal record over such a small amount of money considering the cut between the bars, the Government and the lottery Corporation.
14 comments:
If you have a story to share or would like something on this issue posted as anonymous please contact myself or Charles and I will take care of it,I am in the process of gathering as much material as possible. (thsmith@nb.sympatico.ca )I am currently working with an individual to start a N.B. VTL website I will post updates when warrented plus other related stories to follow-Tim Smith
Tim: Congratulations for such an excellent update. Very well written and well reasoned. Keep up this work and you are going to make great difference for yourself and the society.
I suppose Lottery Corporation is only used to taking money in and it is hard to give back. That is why they make it almost impossible to return even a dollar or in this case $25. VLTs and gambling is evil and this evil must be eradicated.
Our current provincial government is only good at making promises. Do not ever ask them to honor those promises then you end up in their bad books. Yesterday there was a story in the Gleaner that a gentleman from Boistown, former President of P.C. local riding, was promised by Lord government and by other Conservative party operatives that ambulance services would be relocated in Boistown if he would withdraw certain resolution at the last convention of P.C. party. He is still waiting. No morals no ethics when it comes to Lord government. Here are parts of that story:
June 6, 2005
Ambulance promise stalled
Man says politics delaying action
…
The former Tory riding president said he's going public with his story after many of the same officials are refusing to return his calls.
Tracy-Gould says they promised improved ambulance services in Boiestown, if he removed an embarrassing motion he planned to introduce at the Progressive Conservative Party's annual general meeting last November.
The group of individuals who approached him included Justice Minister Brad Green, Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Percy Mockler and Rodney Weston, Lord's chief of staff. Tracy-Gould said Robichaud was ushered into the meeting room and was instructed to bring the ambulance back to Boiestown by Mockler.
The beginning of Tracy-Gould's fight with senior Tory ministers can be traced back to 2003. That's when Health Minister Elvy Robichaud, flanked by former Southwest Miramichi Tory MLA Norm Betts, promised to improve ambulance services in the community at an impromptu election speech inside the Boiestown fire hall during the hard-fought election campaign.
In most of these places with vlt's you are treated like a third class citizen if you come to the counter with a payout slip they pretend not to acknowledge you are even there until everybody else is looked after first but if you need a fifty or hundred dollar bill changed to keep playing you can step right up in front of the line,just like the lord government if you say you like them and here is a donation for you party they pretend to like you but if you tell them there is someting going on you don't like and could you please fix it the reply is who are you? and where did you come from you must be with a different party please go away we never do anything wrong.
I notice when you come to this site you can click on see who's here and what surprises me is this is a story that concerns 49% of the voters that do not want vlts in this province yet the government hits on this site show they do not even read the story like this one because on the lenght of visit shows o:oo under time spent next to the government #s (Very Sad Indeed!!)
Close call yesterday here in Saint John. A tanker truck was way too
close to the only place in Saint John where my people get there Methadone.
Thank God that no one was injured or that it didn't take out the Shoppers
Drug Mart on Crown Street during the gas explosions.
Sometimes a person does not think of things until they happen.
Methadone is a godsent for many
and for those who did not receive there dose because of the evacuation, I pray that it was over before the hour before the store closes so they could get their dose.
If a person is on Methadone they cannot receive it if they are
in the last hour that the store closes. Thats the rule and sometimes believe me its hard to adhere to everyday but one must keep within the guidelines.
It is sad day in New Brunswick. Lord government continues to hide facts about Orimulsion. First it shut down the MLA committee hearings and now it is refusing to extend the term of Auditor General who is looking into Orimulsion. Power rates have been already increased by 9% in a short time. More increases will come to make up for over $3 billion loss through Orimulsion boondoggle.
Then of course Lord government is set on collecting from poor through VLTs to make up for its financial boondoggles like Orimulsion. It simply refuses to listen to outcry of people. Lord government is not operating in the best interest of the province and it must go.
The truth is bernard is hiding alot more than the voters think and the cracks are starting to show.
He is definitly in no hurry to limit hours of play or a introduce a day of respect for suicides on the vlt issue because it is his cash cow and he is hoping to gain as much currency as possible to cover his mishandleing of the public purse another few deaths to buy more time to cover his tracks has no bearing on his conscience,He's running out of things to say and places to hide from the auditor he seems instead to keep digging a deeper hole to climb out of or with all of the expensive traveling he's been doing he believes if he's going down then he'll go down in style while the tax payers flip the tab While he even blindsides the rest of his own party and leaves them with nothing but blanks when it comes to answering the voters of this province.
Following is the answer Mr. Fitch, Energy Minister gave in the legislature, about rising power prices. Neighbouring jurisdictions have higher prices so should we? What kind of logic is that? Orimulsion, Orimulsion. Lord government screwed up and we are going to pay the price for the incompetence of Lord government.
Now what Mr. Fitch is going to tell us next? They have bigger returns from gambling in Los Vegas so should we? Lord government is based on lies and distortions.
Fitch's response below:
----
Mr. Fitch: Mr. Hay, in front of the Public Utilities Board, explained why the cost of electricity is going up. For years and years, it was evident that the electricity rates in this province have been below the neighbouring jurisdictions around us.
Tim great job!,Hope you stay at it I think people will find it easy to talk with you because you know this nightmare first hand and you have a friendly disposition which helps alot.
Also the government will be done for the summer at the end of this week so it looks like Mr.Lord will still be collecting for another few months it looks like a bad summer for those who are hopelessly lost to this addiction but I'm sure bernard will be doing well after all no consience seems to serve him well when it comes to exploiting the weak including the poor and the homeless too. take care will be looking for more information down the road.
Tim: You should bring that Sledge Hammer to Fredericton to knock down all the walls Mr. Lord has built between himslef and the people of this province and to deny people access to the government.
Mr.Lord will be on voice of the province thursday evening at 8:00pm
be shore to call in about this and many other issues your upset about!!
(((((((( Rogers Channel 10 ))))))))))
that's amazing that they didn't agree to pay him,,,,and then later did! Now he's barred........He can drink at home ---where it is cheaper or quit drinking and gambling!
Very well put together but I'm sure this is only one of many many near misses,It's only a matter of time just as in Nova Scotia besides there has probably already been something to this effect happen in New Brunswick but because they have nothing to fall back on a deal was reached to not say anything avoiding bad publicity on this issue.
It is curious how I compare this issue to the way drugs were sold back in the seventies up until the early ninties in and outside of malls,school entrances and busy uptown areas basicly wherever people had a habit to gather and became a province wide problem with the avoidance of becoming addicted to it and so the law stepped in to clean it up.
It is an interesting way of looking at VLT addiction as exploitation and it does seem to hold meret based on that theory.
It is true vlt's have been under Government Control for about 15 years in this Province which in all respects must have netted slightly over a billion dollars to date in that alotted time and yet not one dime has ever been set aside through a properly regulated program of any type whatsoever to build a structure in which they were ever to be housed.
This seriously leaves one to take a second look at the possibility the New Brunswick Government had no intentions of running this program other than to reach out as far into the crowed populas as possible which in turn comes back to exactly what has been suggested,Exploitation by the Governing body of the New Brunswick.
With no changes to this program as Suicides started to rise through a no way out addiction trap,also a very weak addiction services act does tend to point in the direction of inflicted addictive suicides upon the the obsessively weak by none other than the Government of New Brunswick with the sinsere intent of financial gain to the death of it's own people.
Exploitation definitly fits the bill and there should be an inquiry into the way this program has been handled over the life of it's existance to see if indeed the government of New Brunswick is Guilty of Murder for Prophet through a widespread highly addictive program as they are fully aware of the title this addiction holds over all other forms of gambling (The crack cocaine of Gambling)
# posted by Timothy Smith S.J.N.B. : 12:46 AM
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