All bets at baccarat must be made before any cards are dealt. If the player wishes to bet on the player hand, he placed his wager in the space in front of him marked PLAYERS. If he wished to bet on the bank hand, he bets in the space beyond that one, which is marked either BANK OR BANKERS. These spaces are subdivided and numbered to correspond to the players' seating positions in order to identify each player's bet. Sometimes the section for player bets is not subdivided. In that case, the player places the wager in the portion of the betting space that is directly in front of him. In American baccarat, the house books all bets. Players do not bet against each other as in the European version of the game; they bet against the casino. Naturally, the casino is not going to cover any bets unless it has the advantage on the wager. This happens automatically when people bet on the player hand, because the player hand will win slightly less than half the time. Since the house pays even money, it is guaranteed a long-term profit. Since the bank hand wins slightly more than halt the time, the casino could not show a profit if it paid this bet off at even money. The technique it uses to solve this problem is to charge a 5 percent commission on all winning bank-hand bets. In effect, it pays ninety-five cents for every dollar bet on the bank hand rather than paying dollar for dollar

Counting out payoffs in ninety-five-cent sums can become quite cumbersome, so the house uses a simple bookkeeping process to simplify matters. In front of the two seated dealers on the layout is a small row of numbered boxes. Each box corresponds to one of the seat numbers. Every time a player wins a bank-hand bet, he is paid at even money, but a record is made of the amount of commission money the player owes the house. If the player in seat number 8 wins a one-hundred-dollar bet, the dealer will place a five-dollar commission marker-a flat button bearing the words five dollars on it-in the small box marked number 8. At any given moment, these numbered boxes provide the house with a record of how much commission each player owes the casino. The more the player wins on bank-hand bets, the more his commissions mount up. Of course, if a player has a lucky streak and wins ore hands than probability dictates, he will show a profit. But if he wins exactly the number of hands dictated by the laws of probability, it is the house that will end up ahead, not the player, due to the 5 percent commission. The casino can demand payment of these commissions due at any time it wishes. In practice, commissions are collected at the end of each shoe while the cards are being shuffled. If a player leaves the game before the shoe is finished, he must pay his commissions before leaving.

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