One of my players mentioned to another player that you cannot refuse to chop blinds if you have been chopping blinds. He said that the floor person would back him up with a ruling. I thought this was interesting so I asked the shift supervisor. He said that they will occasionally enforce blind chopping, Players are not allowed to chop sometimes and not at other times, if they agreed to chop blinds they must chop blinds.
Does a floor person have a right to enforce this kind of ruling?
The floor has the right to enforce any rule they like... whether or not the house continues to have a regular poker game, however, may be directly related to the fairness of that enforcement.
It is considered bad etiquette to chop blinds in one rotation and then refuse to chop in another, but in every house I have come into contact with, a player can choose to have poor etiquette in these situations and refuse to chop after previously chopping. That being said, house rules, as is their nature, are different every where you go. Occasionally you run into some pretty bazaar rulings based on circumstance.
As it is the floors job to insure games continue to run smoothly, it would be easy to imagine a scenario arising in which players were getting into a disproportionate number of arguments over blind chopping and the house decided to take a concrete stance on the issue. This would be an unusual ruling, but very much reasonable for a floor person to enforce.
I am going to say no the floor person does not have a right to do so, they should not ever get involved with a player agreement which may only be implied, and which technically may be breaking law.
The house by getting involved here is getting onto a very slippery slope. A blind is a bet, a second blind is a call. You have a bet and a call you have a pot. Unless the game is a hi-lo game, you are never allowed to split a pot. This is not a rule this is typically law written in code in most gaming agencies. And while we all chop blinds from time to time it does not change that it is splitting a pot and simply not allowed under law. If a house wants to get involved here, and someone wants to make an issue out of it, the house has no win so to speak. They can't enforce a ruling that has no basis in the rules, and forces a player to act not an accordance with law.
If you were to go in front of a judge, saying this guy chopped a blind with me and then he had a hand and didn't chop, I lost money I want it back. The only defense needed was to point out that chopping pots is illegal. The blind chopper has no case. By the same token the house should simply not let floor people mediate a blind chopping dispute between players other then to simply say that blind chopping is technically not allowed and I can never force a player to chop.
