Surely one of the biggest and most powerful impacts technology has ever had on casino operations came when ticket-in, ticket-out (TITO) payment processing was introduced to the casino floor.

It’s been around so long now and has been so widely accepted that many of you might not even remember the days when machines made payments by dropping coins out of a storage area in the machine called a "hopper."

Of course the coins then landed in metal trays which were specifically designed to make as much noise as possible so everyone around knew the casino was paying out another lucky winner. This is why machines make that funny chirping noise when they’re printing a cashout ticket today.

It’s meant to mimic the sound of coins falling into a tray, even though to most it sounds nothing like falling coins. Regardless of the noise, no one can argue the impact TITO systems have had on the entire gaming industry.

Easier payouts for players, reduced labor costs for casinos and far fewer moving parts to break down in the games themselves are just a few of the many advantages of TITO.

There is one advantage of TITO most players have never heard of though, and knowing about it just might save you hundreds or even thousands of dollars some day.

Many of you have likely heard of someone who left a TITO ticket hanging out of a machine after cashing out. Maybe you’ve even done it yourself. If you’ve been fortunate enough to realize your error before anyone else noticed the ticket hanging out of the machine, no problem.

If you’ve returned to your machine only to find the ticket gone though, now you have a problem.

Most of us might look around for a suspect or simply chalk up the lost ticket as an expensive lesson learned, but there is a much better way to solve this problem. You don’t have to accuse other players of taking your ticket and risk offending someone, and you certainly don’t have to give up on getting your money back.

There’s still hope.

TITO tickets are printed by the machine when the cashout button is pressed. Each TITO ticket has a barcode and a unique number, and each is logged into a computer system as soon as it’s printed. What most people don’t realize is the casino has the ability to track these TITO tickets.

They can go to your machine, find the TITO number in the cash out history of the game, and then punch that number into their computer system to find out if the ticket has been cashed or inserted into another machine.

It’s still possible someone cashed it out and ran if too much time has passed, or maybe they even laundered it by inserting it into a different machine and cashing it out. In either case you’re likely out of luck. It’s also possible it wasn’t cashed out or played though, especially if you were quick enough to realize your error and get some help right away.

And even if it was put into another machine, the computer can tell which machine accepted it. You and casino security can then go see if the "lucky" person to find your ticket is still playing the machine on your money, possibly getting at least some of it back.

Even better, if the ticket hasn’t been played or cashed out yet, the casino can put a stop-payment on it in the system. They can flag it as stolen and pay you the value of the ticket, knowing the one taken by the opportunist is no longer able to be used in any machine or kiosk and will be confiscated if presented to a cashier for payment.

I actually did this for a patron at a casino I ran some time ago, and it worked like a charm. The guy who had found the ticket tried to put it in several machines, but I had already locked it out. When he tried to cash it at the cashier instead, we took it from him. He wasn’t too happy and tried to claim it was rightfully his for a while, but a quick lesson on how the TITO tracking system worked along with an overview of our security camera layout was enough to convince him to give up the fight.

So next time you or one of your friends absent-mindedly leaves a TITO ticket in a machine after cashing out only to find it gone when you realize your error, don’t go on a self-induced bounty hunt or give up all hope. Simply go to the nearest security or slot staff member and explain your situation.

You might be pleasantly surprised at how much can be accomplished with the help of a little technology nowadays.