Atlassino Academy · How casinos work · Lesson 6

Who runs Chilean casinos and who checks them

One law and one regulator for the whole country: a company runs each casino under a permit, and the regulator grants it, keeps the catalogue of games and checks the room. Here is who does what, and where a wrong payout goes.

  • About 12 minutes
  • Illustrated hosts: Leo and Maya
  • Last checked 4 November 2026

You are at a casino in Chile and a payout at the table looks wrong. Who is in charge of that room, and who do you go to?

The short answer

One law and one regulator cover every casino in the country. Each casino is run by a company that holds an operating permit: a closed corporation incorporated in Chile, which the State authorises through the Superintendencia de Casinos de Juego (SCJ) for 15 years, and which has to run its games itself. The regulator grants and revokes the permits, keeps the catalogue of the games a casino may offer, and checks the games and the machines. If a payout looks wrong, ask the pit boss first; you may review the recording of the hand with the casino, put in a complaint to the casino, and take the casino’s answer to the regulator if you disagree with it.

Leo smiling, explaining with an open hand.

Leoformer dealer · rules and maths

Here the answer is short, because there is one of everything: one law, one regulator, one catalogue of games. The work is in knowing which part is the casino’s and which is the regulator’s.

One law and one regulator for the whole country

The regulator describes its own role in one sentence: to regulate and oversee the games of chance inside the casinos the law authorises. The casino law gives it the job of supervising and overseeing the rules for the installation, running and operation of every casino in the country.

The games are the regulator’s too. The law calls the catalogue of games the formal register of the games of chance a casino may run, drawn up and administered by the regulator, and only the games in it may be played. Operators may run only the games the law and its regulations authorise.

The regulator counts 22 casinos authorised under the law, and 3 municipal ones.

Who runs a casino: a company with a permit

A casino is run under an operating permit: the authorisation the State grants, through the regulator, to run a casino, with its gaming licences and its additional services. Only closed corporations incorporated in Chile may apply for one, and a permit is granted for 15 years.

The company runs its games itself. The games licensed to it have to be run by it directly, and any transfer, lease or handing over of their running to third parties is prohibited.

The three municipal casinos are run under a different arrangement: casinos that were already running under a municipal concession when the law came into force may go on under the conditions agreed with their municipality, and the regulator calls them concessionaires of municipal casinos. For the casinos already running when the law was published, the law kept their own legal and contract rules, and applied its rules on oversight and sanctions to them.

Who checks the room

The regulator grants, denies, renews and revokes the operating permits, and oversees the games under their rules, together with the correct working of the machines and the equipment used for them.

The bet limits show how the two share a table. The minimum and maximum bets are the ones the operating company set in its plan of bets, with the regulator’s approval beforehand, and they have to be posted in the gaming rooms for each game. A player has the right to know the plans of bets and the pay tables of every game, and to see a copy of the law, the regulations and the catalogue at the casino.

Leo raising one finger, thinking something through.

Leoformer dealer · rules and maths

The casino runs the table; the regulator approved the limits on its sign and wrote the catalogue its rules come from. When you read the sign, you are reading both.

Who does what

Put side by side, the law, the catalogue and the regulator’s page on players split the work like this. One line belongs to neither side: the regulator lists watching your own bet among the player’s duties.

Who does whatFrom the casino law, the national catalogue of games and the regulator’s page on the duties and rights of players.
The jobWhose job
Grants, renews and revokes the permit to run a casino.The regulator
Runs the games at the tables and the machines, without handing them to anyone else.The casino’s operator
Draws up and keeps the catalogue of the games a casino may offer.The regulator
Sets the minimum and maximum bets of each game, in its plan of bets.The casino’s operator
Checks how the games are run, and that the machines and the equipment work correctly.The regulator
Keeps the camera recordings for twenty-one days, and for three years once a complaint is filed.The casino’s operator
Answers a written complaint within ten working days.The casino’s operator
Reviews the casino’s answer to a complaint, when the player disagrees with it.The regulator
Watches the bet, checks it is playing where it was placed, and has an error corrected in time.The player

When a payout looks wrong

At the table, the first step is the pit boss. A player may consult the pit boss, or whoever stands in for them, about any disagreement over the rules of the game, and get an answer; at blackjack, a disagreement with the dealer’s decision is settled by the pit boss under the rules.

The tables are filmed. A player may review a recorded hand together with the operating company. The casino has to keep the recordings for 21 days, and once a complaint is filed, for 3 years.

A complaint goes to the casino first. A player may complain to the casino, as a first instance, about how the casino works and how its games are run, and get its answer within the time set. The procedure a casino posts for the public gives 6 months from what happened to complain, in person on a form at the casino, by post, by email, or through a web page or QR code, and 10 working days for the casino to answer.

If the answer does not satisfy you, the second instance is the regulator: a player may ask it to review what the casino’s letter said. The regulator’s own answers name 75 calendar days as its time to answer a complaint.

Maya with a hand on her chest, speaking gently and seriously.

Mayaformer floor supervisor · manners, money and breaks

A payout that was short is worth raising, and the steps above are how. What no complaint gets back is money lost on bets that were paid exactly as the table says. Set the limit for the evening before you go in, and keep to it whoever runs the casino.

If it stops feeling like a night out, read the box below: it says where self-exclusion and the regulator are reached.

If it stops being fun

If gambling stops being fun, the SCJ self-exclusion applies in every casino in the country. Minimum entry age: 18 (age of majority under Law 19.221; Law 19.995 bars minors from gaming rooms). The casino may ask for an official ID. More on responsible gaming.

Show all regions
+56 2 2589 3000All regions · Superintendencia de Casinos de Juego — Central Telefónica

Practice: who does it, and what comes next

Level 1 gives a job and asks whose job it is: the casino’s operator, the regulator or the player. Level 2 gives where a disagreement over a payout has got to, and asks for the next step.

Nothing is bet here, and nothing is random. Each question is a set situation, and the answer comes from the texts quoted on this page.

The practice table needs JavaScript. Here is one question from it, with the answer.

Under the law and the regulator’s rules, whose job is this?

  • The casino’s operator The limits are the ones the operating company set in its plan of bets, with the regulator’s approval beforehand.
  • The regulator It is the operator’s job. The limits are the ones the operating company set in its plan of bets, with the regulator’s approval beforehand.
  • The player It is the operator’s job. The limits are the ones the operating company set in its plan of bets, with the regulator’s approval beforehand.

The company that holds the permit runs the room and answers for it; the regulator grants the permit, keeps the catalogue, approves and oversees; and a few things are the player’s own job.

What is the next step the rules give you?

  • Take it to the regulator A player who disagrees with the casino’s answer may ask the regulator to review it: the second instance.
  • Put in a complaint to the casino Not yet, or not this way. A player who disagrees with the casino’s answer may ask the regulator to review it: the second instance.
  • Accept it: a paid bet is settled Not yet, or not this way. A player who disagrees with the casino’s answer may ask the regulator to review it: the second instance.

The order the rules give is the pit boss at the table, the recording reviewed with the casino, a complaint to the casino, and the regulator as a second instance once the casino has answered.

Every question in the practice run is worked out the same way: the law and the regulator’s pages, as they are quoted on this page, decide the answer.

How the practice run works

Where the questions come from. Level 1 is the table of jobs above. Level 2 follows the steps of the section on a wrong payout, one situation at a time. The wrong answers are named mistakes: giving a job of the casino to the regulator or the other way round, going to the regulator before the casino has answered, and taking a paid bet as settled when the payout looked wrong.

One strip, and no rounds. Every square on the strip is one question of this lesson, and all of the squares are there from the start. Your first answer fills the square it belongs to; when the squares of one level are full, the next level begins by itself. Practising a question you got wrong turns its cross into “fixed in practice” and does not change the count, because only first answers count.

Your progress stays in this browser, and nothing is sent anywhere.

Check yourself

Maya with a finger raised and a knowing look.

Mayaformer floor supervisor · manners, money and breaks

Three quick ones. Pick an answer, then check it. No timer, no points: just whether it stuck.

A question marked “New situation” asks you to use the lesson on a case it did not show.

1Who gives a company the permit to run a casino in Chile?

Show the answer

Answer: The State, through the regulator. The permit comes from the State, through the regulator, for fifteen years.

  • Nobody: a company only has to register Only a closed corporation incorporated in Chile may apply for a permit, and the regulator may grant it, deny it or revoke it.
  • The State, through the regulator The law defines the operating permit as the authorisation the State grants, through the regulator, to run a casino.
  • The town where the casino stands A permit under the casino law is granted through the regulator; a concession from a municipality is how the three municipal casinos run.
2The casino has answered your complaint about a payout, and you disagree with the answer. Where does it go next?

Show the answer

Answer: To the regulator, as a second instance. First the casino, then the regulator.

  • Nowhere: the casino’s answer is final The casino is the first instance; the regulator is the second.
  • To the regulator, as a second instance A player may go to the regulator when the casino’s answer does not satisfy them.
  • Back to the dealer at the same table The table is where it started; after the casino’s written answer, the next step is the regulator.
3Could a casino’s operator hand the running of its roulette tables to another company? new situation

Show the answer

Answer: No: the operator has to run its licensed games itself. The operator runs its own games.

  • No: the operator has to run its licensed games itself The law prohibits any transfer, lease or handing over of the running of the games to third parties.
  • Yes: who runs the tables is up to the casino The law says otherwise: the games are run by the operator, in person, under its permit.
  • Yes, if the other company has a permit of its own The games licensed to an operator have to be run by that operator directly.

Back to the question we opened with. The company that holds the permit runs the room, and the regulator checks it. A wrong payout goes to the pit boss, then to a complaint to the casino, and then, if you disagree with its answer, to the regulator.

Where to go next, and further reading

18+ across Chile · Play responsibly · self-exclusion and the regulator are further up this page

Further reading

How it’s worked out

Rules, sources and hosts

Where the answers come from. Who runs a casino and what the regulator does are quoted from the casino law, Law 19.995, as the National Congress Library publishes it; how many casinos there are, and how long the regulator takes to answer, from the regulator’s own questions and answers; the player’s rights and duties from the regulator’s page on them; the bet limits from the national catalogue of games. The six months and the ten working days come from the complaint procedure an operator posts for the public, which speaks in the regulator’s voice; the twenty-one days of recordings are in that procedure and on a second operator’s complaint form. The publisher of each text is on its button, and the sentences are in Spanish.

What this page does not say. It does not name the companies behind particular casinos, or say which casino is open: those are facts about rooms, and the texts here are about the rules. The three municipal casinos are named by the regulator only as a number, and this page does not guess who runs each.

Our readings. We read “explotar” as running the games, and “primera instancia” and “segunda instancia” as the first and second steps of a complaint. The paraphrase of each text is ours; the sentence behind it is on its button.

What we are. This site is a reference book about casinos. It does not run one, is not a party to any of the arrangements described above, and is not registered, licensed or overseen by any of the bodies named on this page: every one of them is quoted here as a source, and none of them is quoted about us.

Hosts. Leo and Maya are illustrated characters. Their backstories, a former dealer and a former floor supervisor, are written for the course: neither is a real person, and neither speaks for any casino. The rules and numbers on this page come from the sources it cites, not from their experience.

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