City of Dreams Manila, part of the Melco Resorts and Entertainment Group, has taken the initiative to promote and observe responsible gaming practices in the Philippines.
According to Mark Chapman, vice president for finance of COD Manila, the face of gaming in the Philippines is changing following the government’s decision to move away from offshore gaming operations.
As such, Chapman is seeing potential new areas in online gaming, as well as expanding COD Manila’s other offerings in the resort/leisure sector, food and beverage with a number of restaurants and the retail experience.
Mr. Chapman admits that he is a newcomer in the resorts/gambling industry, having joined COD Manila just two and a half years ago. Previously, Mr. Chapman was in the corporate sector in the United Kingdom specifically working for Xerox Corp.
“I have been working with COD Manila for the past two and a half years, but I’ve personally been in the Philippines for 10 years,” he said, revealing that “my background is working for Xerox Corp. The photocopier company and I spent most of my career working in the UK.”
He was eventually tasked to set up operations in the Philippines. It was supposed to be an 18-month stint to put up a finance and shared services team. However, he admits, “it was only supposed to be short ... to come here for 18 months... but I loved it so much. They eventually brought more work here so that lasted longer.”
After Xerox, Mr. Chapman ended up taking an interim job for a logistics company and then went to an American company before finally moving to COD Manila after that.
“I’ve only been in the industry for a couple of years, but even in the short time I’ve been working here, I’ve seen a lot of changes...certainly with all the speed to move away from POGO. You’ve obviously seen potential new areas coming into online games,” he said.
He also cited the fact that with the exit of POGOs, “there is the realization that VIP is not what it was, but obviously, it is still a very exciting industry and it is changing, and it is an exciting place to be.”
COD Manila, Mr. Chapman was proud to boast, “is a great resort, and we have three lovely hotels at the City of Dreams as well.”
Gaming, he acknowledges “contributes to the lion’s share, but the hotel’s food and beverage still contribute to a significant, significant amount as well.”
Additionally, he highlighted the fact that the resort’s operation also contributes to job generation.
“You know it’s for leisure. It’s obviously a great place to be in and you know, with this sort of operation we offer various services – food and beverage, the hotels and the casino. There’s a lot of offerings and we have many, many...thousands of people working in that industry, both at our operation and for those of our competitors. So, it generates a lot of employment, which can only be a good thing in bringing, you know, sort of like wealth and prosperity to the Philippines,” Mr. Chapman explained.
COD Manila vice president for gaming operations Roger Lwin, for his part, emphasized on the group’s responsible gaming initiative.
“It’s very much part of our DNA over here. I mean, we’ve got what we call a responsible gaming implementation committee that deals with government... and even with other people... and also with other aged people, “ he said, adding that for COD Manila, the committee was put in place since 2014, “before we opened, we already have a responsible game steering committee which is chaired by our CEO and chairman Lawrence Ho... and then at the property level, we have our old steering committee and on top of it, we also have that with all the property head and all the executives. Then we have what we call an implementation committee.”
“The other part of responsible gaming is to recognize the problem gaming... problem gambling signs. And then how we can assist those customers as well. It’s not just a matter of, you know, not letting people in. Students cannot come in. There’s restricted entries, but there are those customers who can come in... 21-year-old, they are eligible to come by at times for gaming, but if it becomes not a leisure thing anymore... There are those that when it starts affecting their lives, we gotta try to help them as well. So, part of that is we make sure there are teams that can recognize those signs,” he acknowledges
The COD Manila gaming operations VP assured that “when that happens, in that case, we look at it ... observing gaming on the game floor. We’ve got what we call responsible gaming ambassadors. Those who are actually trained to assist customers.”
However, all these he assured are discreetly done. “So, that’s because one thing we don’t want to do is if we have like, you know, I’ a bouncer or like that, that might be intimidating to people, so what we do is we do have an RGA (a responsible gaming associate). We have to watch for them (problem gamers. So, we got a responsible gaming badge. So, it’s a little painful. So people recognize it, and even at the minimum, any of our customers, they can go up to any of our front of the house employees and say, ‘Look, I think I want to talk to somebody about responsible gaming.”
Lwin proudly assured that such measures have allowed COD Manila to guide back problem gamblers. “We have been able to guide them to the right people. We’ve got things like a 24 hour help desk where you can go up and ask for information.” In fact, he said, some people will ask if they want to ban themselves... self- exclusion, or even family exclusion. That means, like, if a parent can ban their child, if they feel that their child is having gambling problems, they can say ‘restrict them from entry.’”