Fruit Machine Chat

I banked a few Indys when I found them practically empty, only got paid out on 1 - an arcade. Did a pub and a service for a couple of hundred but never got paid. Anything we can do about that or is it just pointless making machines I.O.U. these days?

Surely there must be some LAW!!!

Gamestec claimed they were "Nationally frauded"!

Not sure where fruits fit in but under English law gambling debts have never been legally enforcable.

The enforceability part changed in September 2007 AFAIK, when the Gambling Act 2005 became fully adopted.

Amongst other things :-

8. Gambling debts will become legally enforceable, helping to ensure those who win get paid.

I banked a Monty for £140 and got paid, Sceptre. Don't hold your breath with GamesTec, they don't like paying legit wins, never mind when they've been 'nationally frauded'

got a 140 payout from alan davies within 24hrs!! on a grail

I'm owed £55 for a Dead Mans IOU i got a week ago. Got told i would be called when switched back on and fixed.....it's back on, but nothing coming my way. Joke company, they really are.

grail empty:

"any malfunction voids pays"


the machine was in a malfunctional state.. you won nothing.

Who are the real crooks in this game? Those companies and the toolers, and all we get is the man-in-the-middle shit. I've sworn revenge on Welcome Break and it WILL be sweet. Any opportunity i find to cost them, I will - even if its blatant theft. An eye for an eye, a pound coin for a pound coin, etc.

Spyder, the point you raise there is interesting, because you could argue that either way.

The machine was designed to do exactly what it did. Unintentionally, yes, but as far as it was aware, it was functioning to it's exact design spec.

As far as I'm concerned, they can piss off. Every machine is designed to take, no one goes complaining when a machine eats all their cash as it has been programmed correctly to take so who the hell do they think they are crying like babies and saying machines are being nationally frauded when the opposite happens and a bit of bad programming costs them a fraction of what they make??? Can't have it both ways. For this reason alone I couldn't give a flying f*** if I see a machine getting robbed, tooled, ripped off because the behaviour of these companies is nothing short of contempt.

I banked an Electrocoin for £55 because it had absolutely nothing in it once, got told it had been "robbed" and never got paid. I always used to buy a drink in the place. I kept going in there, doing the fruit and not buying drinks. One day the manager said he noticed I don't buy drinks anymore, I said I didn't get paid out and I'm determined not to be ripped off so until I use up £55 of expenses on drinks I won't be buying any. Fair play he said, sadly the fruit didn't last there much longer but I saved £30 odd on no drinks!

Blame the likes of TOmmy O'Tool(e) for this... but never mind, he's having a well earned break now....

Matt Vinyl wrote:Spyder, the point you raise there is interesting, because you could argue that either way.

The machine was designed to do exactly what it did. Unintentionally, yes, but as far as it was aware, it was functioning to it's exact design spec.

"malfunction voids all pays and plays" is likely to be non-enforceable. Companies can and often do claim unenforceable stuff like this in their terms and conditions, simply to discourage and sound legal-ish Under contract law (since the exchange of money for a spin on a fruit can be deemed a contract between player and the company) terms have to be prominently and non-ambiguously displayed for the player to see and accept. It's unlikely a judge would accept the little scrawl of text in the corner of the fruit as compelling disclosure.

this is true, but the manufacturer will have an easy job describing the loophole in the program, then you would have to explain that you had done nothing wrong, which would be difficult to explain, due the explaination being quite specific..

Spyder wrote:this is true, but the manufacturer will have an easy job describing the loophole in the program, then you would have to explain that you had done nothing wrong, which would be difficult to explain, due the explaination being quite specific..

Quite frankly i'd have an easy time explaining i've done nothing wrong. There is no "right" or "wrong", just points of law. If I wasn't breaking the law, then it's tough cheese for the manufacturer. Just because they don't like something doesn't give them a legal foot to stand on.

It would be a very short discussion with the judge.

1. (me) Have I done anything illegal ?
2. (manufacturer) erm... no, but we didn't intend to..
3. (judge) case found in favour of the claimant !

It's not up to the player to judge the intentions of the manufacturer when they design a game. It's up to the manufacturer to make sure they supply a product that meets their own goals. The legal system will not help them in doing that.

Yes.


if this ever happens, you should represent whoever it is.