Counting Chips Quickly

[ichthyologist]

Last time I had a home ring game, the cashing out took a great deal of time because everyone was really slow (including me) at counting chips, and I later figured out the end result was off by a dollar or so ($5 buy-in game -- so off by a non-trivial amount). Slow counting was also an issue a few times in the game when there were all-in moves.

One thought I had was that stacking the chips in racks (which I didn't have) could help a lot, but all the chip racks I've seen stack chips in columns of 20, which is perhaps too many for useful counting. I was hoping for racks that held 10 chips per column (or even 5), but I haven't found any online. Does anyone know if such racks exist?

If not, are there any other ideas/suggestions about how to speed up the chip counting (other than just experience)?

[HoldemPokerPlyr]

I stack my chips in columns of 20. Then do some easy math by multiplying the chip values by 20.

[Jeff_B]

Make them stack them up in many stacks of 5 and count the number of stacks?

[NickMPK]

How many denominations do you use? There is no need to have more than three. In a $5 buy-in game I would suggest 5c, 25c, $1. A stack of 20 5c chips is $1, a stack of 20 25c chips is $5. It really shouldn't take that long to count.

[Hairball]

I recommend cutting out "between" denominations. For example, there is no need for nickle, dime, quarter, fifty-cent, and one dollar chips. Cut it down to nickles, quarters, and dollars. When someone buys in give them enough of a low denomintation to buy about two chips of the next highest denomination. For example, in a $5 buy-in game give every player 8 $.05 chips, 7 $.25 chips and 3 $1 chips. This keeps the number of chips at the table manageable. This is especially useful in tourney-style games where there will be a lot of all-ins as it reduces the amount of time it takes for a player to count his stack.

[Grasshopp3r]

20 chip stacks are easy to count as you can break them in half twice and verify that the smallest stack is 5 chips. Watch the casino dealers count chips and that is usually how they do it.

[ichthyologist]

OK, thanks for the advice all. I think you've hit on a key point: the number of types of chips. Last time, I didn't really have enough of the smallest chip denomination to avoid having an "in-between" denomination; that shouldn't be a problem next time (at least if my new set in transit isn't delayed too much by the weather). And the whole situation was pretty chaotic last time for other reasons as well.

(One example: people were counting chips ten at a time by comparing the height to one person's stack of ten. But in comparing them, they started to mix different peoples' stacks together! I think that was the origin of the miscount.)

[ImprovinNewbie]

get chips with denominations. i play i 2c/5c cash game at my house and i could all stacks in denoms of 5....

[Agent Zero]

You might consider having only one player handle the chips-to-cash transitions -- the guy running the game or maybe the best guy at counting chips, or maybe just the most honest guy. This might alleviate the chaos; this appears to be a classic example of "too many cooks".

Cutting stacks into fives and tens as mentioned above is also very helpful in counting chips quickly. I can get six players, with about 50 chips each, going in about a minute or two by getting a stack of five, matching it with another stack of five, then using that as a reference stack for every other stack of ten chips. Just repeat the process backward.

[Lottery Larry]

Everyone should learn how to stack chips in standard amounts, for easy counting. This assumes decent chips of general uniformity- then, one stack can be confirmed for value and the others just quickly stacked next to it and checked for height.

One person should handle cash/chip conversions and verify the total with the receipient, before removing the chips and dealing with the next person.

Also, having one person buy all of the lower denom chips on the table can save a lot of time.