Easy way to keep a gambling log?

I have never kept track of my play. When I did play a lot I never won that much, and rarely hit a hand pay; now we don’t play local at all (Mrs and I used to go a couple times a week), and we go to AC maybe 3-4 times a year.

But I hit a couple hand pays last year, and it ticked me off that I didn’t have my losses tracked to help with the taxes. So this year I want to track my play, and I want to use my phone to help. It would be simple to just open up a note page, but I’m curious if there is an android app that people use.

Thanks.

I keep a record but it isn't as detailed as the IRS would like for machine play.

No, I do not write down the machine ID # nor the amount won or lost from each machine: too much of a :PITA, actually.

Instead I write down the amount I start each session at a casino with, and then when I am done I write down how much I walk out with; I do the math and write down the amount I won or lost for that session; I also do it for craps play, and have totals for both slots and craps.

I do it for every session.

I usually play at two casinos and I do it for each.

At the end of the trip I tally everything up and write down the daily win or loss amount for each casino.

Been doing if for a couple decades; down $66K life time, which is not what I'd prefer but it's the price I pay for entertainment.

Quote: MrV

I keep a record but it isn't as detailed as the IRS would like for machine play.

No, I do not write down the machine ID # nor the amount won or lost from each machinelink to original post

This is the first time I hear this level of detail is required.

My understanding was that tracking the total for the location (casino) and type of game (slots or craps) per day is sufficient - essentially what you are doing.

I'm essentially doing the same thing - and tracking it in a simple excel spread sheet. You can even open the spreadsheet on your phone, so it's not really hard to update.

The fun thing is - if you track this in Excel, you can even do additional stuff with pivot tables - maybe you want to know if you do better on certain week days. Or if you also track the number of hour per session you can even calculate your hourly win/loss. And it's easy to see results of time per month for instance.

Quote: Mukke

Quote: MrV

I keep a record but it isn't as detailed as the IRS would like for machine play.

No, I do not write down the machine ID # nor the amount won or lost from each machinelink to original post

This is the first time I hear this level of detail is required.

My understanding was that tracking the total for the location (casino) and type of game (slots or craps) per day is sufficient - essentially what you are doing.

I'm essentially doing the same thing - and tracking it in a simple excel spread sheet. You can even open the spreadsheet on your phone, so it's not really hard to update.

The fun thing is - if you track this in Excel, you can even do additional stuff with pivot tables - maybe you want to know if you do better on certain week days. Or if you also track the number of hour per session you can even calculate your hourly win/loss. And it's easy to see results of time per month for instance.
link to original post

That’s what I was thinking of doing if there was no app (the app would probably use an Excel shell anyhow), I have Office for Android but only used it for documents, I never needed to learn how to set up spreadsheets. They can’t be that hard though.

I also just used the notepad on my phone by day and casino. Just entered the win/loss for each casino each day. I would then email it to myself so no one could claim it was made up while doing my taxes.

If you use Gmail for email, it may help to use the + trick when emailing yourself things. You can likely set up automatic sorting based on that.

https://gmail.googleblog.com/2008/03/2-hidden-ways-to-get-more-from-your.html

Easy Bankroll would be more than sufficient for you based on what you said.

There's Grambling Tracker as well but it has less features.

I used to keep a spreadsheet with a row for each daily visit to each place. Across the top I listed the games (or types of games if novelty, e.g. "BJ variant") and added notes to anything interesting, so the columns might be BJ, Craps, etc.

Keeping totals for each column can keep totals by game and adding those gives the grand total, so far, for the year.

Sometimes one needs to cater for foreign holidays, so I would use something like =100/1.311 to show $100 and convert it to £s.

Quote: charliepatrick

I used to keep a spreadsheet with a row for each daily visit to each place. Across the top I listed the games (or types of games if novelty, e.g. "BJ variant") and added notes to anything interesting, so the columns might be BJ, Craps, etc.

Keeping totals for each column can keep totals by game and adding those gives the grand total, so far, for the year.

Sometimes one needs to cater for foreign holidays, so I would use something like =100/1.311 to show $100 and convert it to £s.
link to original post

FYI not everyone is proficient at spreadsheets, some people want it to be it to be all set up and in a cookie cutter Format. That's where an app comes in... That's why apps are wildly successful.

I'm trying out this homemade Excel spreadsheet. I don't know if it's enough for the IRS, but I'm trying to figure out some sort of bookkeeping.




I would have separate entries for different games. Like MS Stud gets a line across, BJ gets another, Baccarat gets another. Slots are so TITO dependent, I would just add up the total buy-ins, and figure out my win/loss when I took it to the cashier. I may not bother with machine or table numbers on metal plates unless it's easy to do.
If I visit multiple casinos in one day, they each get a line with a list of games played on the same line & on the lines below.

The spacing of the columns in the photos above are not accurate. I just set them to minimum column width for the photos.
It hasn't even crossed my mind that I would get W-2G forms, so I should have a couple columns for those, one would be a cumulative total. I'm gonna put them right after the Total Cumulative $ column. If I was a player on a high limit slot getting hand pays every so often, I'd have a separate excel sheet for those.