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View Full Version : Belterra Casino - Indiana :(



Ohio740
03-24-2010, 09:24 PM
Just back from 2-night stay at the Belterra Casino & Hotel in southern Indiana ... WON'T BE BACK !!!

Oh my gosh where do i start ... arrival started off good, we arrived at 4:30pm Monday and our room was suprisingly ready. We proceeded to our room on the 12th floor which was a non-smoking floor ... we exit the elevator and immedietely smell the stench of stale smoke and as we head down the hallway to find our room we pass an older gentleman walking down the hall carrying a lit cigarette !! so much for the non-smoking floor.

After we put our bags in the room we went to the players club ( My Choice ) and me and the DW got our players cards and off to the casino floor. First thing i try is a $1 WOF ... 8-spins and zilch ( wasn't surprised but just hoping to get a lucky hit to start things off ) my wife then played several penny machines at 30-40 lines x .01 and lost $60.00 like nothing ( less than an hour ) i found a .01 Rembrandt Riches and was playing max lines ( i think 30 ) X .01 and actually hit bonus a few times and played quite long on my $20.00. I then played several machines including Zeus, Kitty Glitter, Buffalo, Wicked Winnings and Wild Flurry ... i lost on all but Wild Flurry in which i turned $15 in to $60 TITO. My wife found a .01 slot called Kaleua and was doing quite well for over 2-hours and hit several bonus rounds that paid between $4-$23. She kept playing and lost it all after 3 hours ... not bad for $20 and 3hrs play.
OK .... now is where the bad happens .. i fall for the WOZ which they had 4 of them, burnt through $40.00 like nothing. Decided to try a $1 Double Diamonds and lost $100 over 40 minutes. Went and played Quick Hits .25 at MAX of 1.50/spin trying to hit a progressive and blew through $60.00 in no time with no Bonus games ! Went and found wife and she had lost $40 playing Cleopatra II, lost $20 playing Kitty Glitter and $20 playing Stink'n Rich.
We decide to take a break and get a sandwich .. grilled ham/cheese and fries for each of us and was $14.80 .. food sucked bad. Had me a couple beers at $3.25/each and then we headed back to play. I said " let's try the
.25 cent WOF .. bad mistake .. lost $30 in less than 20-minutes. Looked down the row and seen a .25 Top Dollar and put $20 in it .. hit bonus in 4 spins and was offered up to 80 and turned down for final offer of 30 .. figures. Ended up losing the $20 and decided to call it a night.
Tuesday we decided to leave the Casino and head to Subway for lunch, came back and started playing. I found a .01 slot called HOT HOT 777 or something to that effect, got bonus several times and even re-triggered bonus spins a couple. I had my $20 up to $74 at one time and kept playing till finall cashing out with $10. My wife continued losing $20's here and there on machines including Buffalo, Sizzling 7's, Sex In The City ( OMG there were people playing $6.00 a spin on this !!! ) We both tried several machines from .01 x 30 lines to .25x3 machines and could barely get any play time well alone hit anything.
In short we spent lots of money ! we had over 1900 points from the 2 days on our cards and i go to the casino host around 11:30am Wednesday ( today ) and ask if we could please get 2 lunch buffets comped ... to my amazement the guy says i have $10.05 in comps and my wife $6.40. We should have left but decided to try the lunch buffet at 12:15pm. cost before comps was $26.85 for 2 lunch buffets. OMG .. i am not very picky when it comes to food but this food was aweful, i honestly could not finish anything i tried and i tried fried chicken, mac&cheese, salad, pizza, flank steak and it all SUCKED bad, together me and DW didn't eat $5 worth of food .. it even had a bad appearence as if it were saved from the day before.
Overall our experience was aweful, bed was hard in room .. our room had a door that divided 2 rooms and we could here the ladies next to us talking like they were in our room. buffet was terrible and not even close to the $12.95 lunch and $17.95 dinner price.
And to wrap things up at check in the guy said he needed a credit card to hold a $100 deposit on ( which is normal ) at check out this morning i told same guy i was paying cash for the 2-nights and gave him $176.96 which was charge for the 2-nights ( $79/ night + $18.96 tax ) and .... i get home today and look at my online banking and it shows they deducted $276.96 from my account ... called and got the run around saying this was my deposit and would show back up by next Monday, i tried explaining the $100 should have been the deposit cause i paid the $176.96 cash for the room. She gets half smart and says " wait 5-days and call back if it's not refunded "

*** Belterra - won't be back ! Ohio where we live passed the casino issue and we will have a new casino in Cincinnatti in 2012 ( 40-minutes from Belterra ) i'd say boldly if these riverboats don't change their way lots of people will be headed to the new casino when it opens in Cincinnati

Meant for this to be a fun trip for me and DW to get away, we were together and had fun at times but overall we were very disappointed !:(

snewbfire
03-24-2010, 10:11 PM
Sorry you had such a bad time, but I do appreciate your trip report. It has been two years since I have been there, and I had considered going back to see if they had changed. After your trip report it tells me they are just like they were the last time I was there. The last time I was there I like you had lost quite a bit of money the night before, had also got my win loss statement for the previous year to see if I had ever won anything there. When I got it it showed not one winning session there, had lost everytime, and most of my trip bankroll each time. Then to add insult to injury the next morning when I tried to get a breakfast buffet I was advised that I didn't have enough to get a buffet on a weekend, only through the week. That was when I decided if they were going to be such a greedy company and so stingy with their comps they didn't need my business. Haven't been back since and that was a little over two years ago. Still get an occasional thing inviting me back and a free hotel room. That is one place that definitely needs to learn how to treat their guests. I don't see how they keep going, after reading your report I know now that I won't be going back.

thelma
03-24-2010, 10:30 PM
:(
This is awful...
I'm sorry it happened to you and your DW.

Ohio740
03-24-2010, 10:48 PM
The last time we were there was in 2005 and we had fun and were treated well, we gambled lots less money than we did these last 2 days but yet they comped our nights stay and gave us 2 dinner buffets free .. not to mention the friendly employees and casino hosts. These last 2 days I know we went through $1100 and thats not including any winnings we spent back while playing and they could not even offer us 2 free lunch buffets .. now that is SAD !!
Also forgot to mention earlier ... me and wife never seen anyone hit anything decent while we were there and believe me we was roaming the casino and playing for way too many hours ! At the bottom of the escalator they had a bank of 4 Sex In The City slots and they carried a max bet of $6.00 as there is 4 seperate games being played at once .. i never played them but watched an elderly lady blow through $200 in about 20 minutes or less.

I AM DONE WITH BELTERRA !!! and i think there future is gloom unless management steps it up and starts running the place right and treating people right. There must be alot of people who feel this way because the place was not crowded at all ... after midnight you could have any machine you wanted, i'd say 80% were sitting empty ! i was telling my wife i wouldn't mind losing so much if they would at least let you play a while ...

Diamond49
03-25-2010, 02:45 AM
So true , a casino should comp for buffet since you are staying there ( no free room) and losing. I wouldn't go there either. I live in So Cal and my favorite casino is Barona in San Diego county and when I book an overnight stay (always comped) and as soon as I get there even before I even start playing I go to the players club and I always get a food coupon for the cafe. When I take my niece she will order room service and by the time i'm ready to leave , it will have been comped. Hopefully the new casino will have great comps for their players. Good luck on your next trip. Lilian

KathyLiz
03-25-2010, 03:54 PM
Ohio--

Except for the smoking room and the buffet, this could be my usual report of a trip to a casino. I haven't found one yet that paid me anything, except 2 cruise ships. When I read about all the good luck others have on the forum, I reflect on my visits, which is just about identical to what you just experienced. Am trying yet another casino, Hard Rock in Tampa this weekend. Hope to have a better experience.

KathyLiz

maxgirl
03-25-2010, 04:11 PM
machines that tight and no reasonable comps add up to one thing= place is suffering. I experience the same thing here. Its so obvious when a place is taking every penny it can get. I hope the Cincinnati Casino is a fair place to play, surrounding places have a lot to worry about if it will be a decent place to play.

Ohio740
03-25-2010, 05:15 PM
Thanks for all your comments ...

MAXGIRL - i think you hit the nail on the head about the place suffering, there were people playing but it was nothing at all like last time we were there in 2006 .. this time i noticed alot of the older people that were playing were not playing much, seen several playing the .01 cent machines and brtting 9 lines x .01 . And also we noticed after around 11pm there was hardly anyone in the casino, they have 2 floors and the downstairs is all slots with the upstairs having a few table games and poker room. I think there was only 6-8 blackjack tables but everytime i walked by 4-5 were empty with just the dealer standing there.
My wife made the comment to me " can you imagine what it costs to run this place, the electric bill alone would be CrAzY " and i started thinking about it and she made a good point. With the economy not being what it was 5 years ago less people are gambling and the ones that do are gambling less ... so in turn i'm sure they are tightening the machines up to make money, i told my wife that but she then asked me
" Well by state law don't they have to pay out a percentage of what they take in ? " i told her i don't know all the details but i know they do.
I also was listening in to a conversation between 2 of the housekeeping people in the hallway and heard one girl tell the other " i was hoping to pick up an extra day or 2 but there is just not enough rooms to clean so i wasn't able to "

OK OK .. here is my thinking and please comment if you think the same way. Wouldn't it be smarter for a place like this to really treat the patron well and try to get as many people coming ? I called the hotel 2-weeks before we was going to reserve a room and asked the lady if i could possibly get a night free if i stayed one, told her we had been there 4 times between 2000 and 2006 .. she said " We have an online special right now for $79+tax and that's the best we can do ..... my thinking would be this --- we have 250 rooms here sitting empty tonight, wouldn't we be better off to give people a room for free or a deep discount like maybe $39/night and have them here ??? knowing 9/10 would most likely spend money in the casino or on the extremely overpriced food.

Just don't understand what the people running these places are thinking .. guess they are just full of greed, and i can see this place being closed in the next few years.

Anyone else have experience with Casinos owned by the same company that owns Belterra .. they are called Pinnacle Entertainment and they own the following ..

RIVER CITY CASINO ST. LOUIS
LUMIERE PLACE CASINO & HOTEL ST. LOUIS
L'AUBERGE DU LAC CASINO RESORT LAKE CHARLES, LOUISANA
BOOMTOWN CASINO NEW ORLEANS
BOOMTOWN CASINO RENO, NEVADA
BOOMTOWN BOSSIER CITY RIVERBOAT LOUISIANA



just curious as these casinos are all owned by Pinnacle Entertainment .. just wondered if the company as a whole is hurting or your thoughts on any of there casinos i listed above.

treyster
03-25-2010, 08:31 PM
Thanks for the TR as we have contemplated a visit to Belterra on and off for the last few years. Maybe we'll re-think.

munozst1
03-25-2010, 08:37 PM
I go to the L'auberge Du Luc in Lake Charles and they comp pretty good. Recently, they converted comp $ to real $ of course on a 3:1 ratio. I had $800 in comp $, and it's hard to spend that much on buffets.

Anyhow, recently I've done well there as far as winning. In the past I've been spending a ton of money there and other casinos but I'm trying to reduce my betting amount. Even though I win some good handpays I will lose almost all of it within a week or so because I keep betting too high and too consistently. Now, I'm just playing for fun and if I come back with more $ then great. I'm not sure how this is going to effect my comps, but right now I get $60 in free play every week.

The LDL is a fairly new casino, so the rooms are still nice and I can usually get free rooms on weekend and weeknights.

maxgirl
04-01-2010, 06:24 AM
Sorry I did not see your reply sooner or I would have commented back earlier......... I totally agree with you that thats pretty stupid not to offer a free night to someone or at least let you know they would definately evaluate your slot play and comp the room off at check out. If you have been there 4 times before and used your players card they could have checked out your play and made a decision based on that, chances are you paid MORE then the value of that room and then some everytime you spent an evening in the casino. I always heard a bird in hand is worth two in a bush:D you got me as to how they make decisions to get customers in the door. Makes no sense to me!

Ohio740
04-01-2010, 04:49 PM
Whooopti Doooo ... today they sent me $5.00 in FREE play, like i am going to drive 3 1/2 hours for that, NOT

Going to plan our next trip to Wheeling Island .. about an hour closer and i've heard positive feedback. Has to be better than our experience at Belterra !!