Recently highlighted in the press is the casino tradition of cashing checks on payday. Long queues are liable to form in front of casino cashiers on a Friday, and at some casinos even a free drink is on offer. It has long been an accepted custom, but the large casino companies do not offer the facility, quoting the bad publicity it would engender. In Las Vegas, anyway, the big casinos deal mostly with tourists, whereas the smaller ones have local clientele who take advantage of the check cashing.

A first reaction to the cashing of paychecks by casinos must always be one of horror - all those people being taken advantage of by cynical casino operators. On reflection, however, things appear to be less clear-cut, and may come back to something more basic - the approval or otherwise of gaming in society. The people who would protest most loudly about the practice would be the ones who criticise the very presence of casinos, or any form of entertainment that includes a wager, anywhere.

Are people mature enough to make their own decisions, or should they be protected from themselves? It is perfectly possible to cash a check at a casino and leave, or to cash it and spend the fees that would have been paid at a cash-checking center at the casino, or to cash it and blow the lot on 23 red. Each individual can make that choice, just as they can choose whether or not to drink too much or go to church on a Sunday. Many do just cash their check and leave. Of course the casino that will cash your paycheck is hoping that you will stay and play a while, they will positively encourage you and they must get results. Whether this should be a reason to abhor the tactic is another matter. The gaming industry is a business like any other, with targets to meet and shareholders to please. I’m all for gaming companies, and governments, paying for gambling education and problem gambling treatment out of their profits and tax revenues, but I’m also for people being presumed mature until proven otherwise. If you’ve ever queued at a bank away from home to cash a check, and then seen the cashier take a hefty wad of your hard-earned money as a bank charge, you might be glad of a friendly neighbourhood casino.

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