New rules for casinos on agents who bring high rollers to the tables in Las Vegas

Instead of submitting annual reports to the Gaming Control Board, licensees will be required to keep records of their agents and have information available for inspection by board officials during audits.

The move is part of state government agencies’ efforts to reduce regulatory paperwork for businesses.

Diane Presson, a 23-year Control Board supervisor who oversees the board’s monitoring of independent agents, said just over 300 agents are registered with the state to recruit high rollers to play at Nevada casinos.

Registered agents live in all corners of the world, and some have the authority to offer high rollers credit terms to convince them to play at a certain property. Some agents, Presson said, work for multiple resorts at one time.

One of the largest casino marketing companies that work as agents is Atlanta-based Casino Junket Club, which represents more than 80 casino companies, including 23 in Nevada — 16 in Las Vegas.

Presson said at one time, casino companies were required to report quarterly about their contracted agents. Reports required the name and location of agents and how much they were compensated by the resorts.

Eventually, that was changed to an annual report due every Feb. 15, but resorts said the administrative requirement occurred at a busy time when companies were focused on bringing in high rollers for the Super Bowl and Lunar New Year.

Now companies will have to keep records that the Control Board can review upon request.

Licensees must record when agents entered a contract, how much they were paid and when their contracts ended. Files for each agent must be kept for five years.

Presson said, unlike licensees, registered agents don’t have to be scrutinized in suitability investigations, and there have been few occasions where board investigators had to review actions taken by registered agents.

“While we do feel like it’s an area that we still want to have oversight of, we just decided that was something that we could leave at the property level,” Presson concluded.