There was no notice about this, but it was a pleasant surprise. Harrah's Rincon in San Diego changed its weekend Visa Card giveaway promotion. Instead of giving Visa gift cards, cash was given for a like amount.

I asked the Total Rewards staff and they said there were too many complaints about the gift cards in the past and in previous promotions they actually ran out of cards and had to order more cards that would be given out to players on subsequent visits.

So, instead of more "gift card headaches" they elected just to give out green money instead.

The cash was given out to certain players just for showing up, and all players had a chance to earn additional cash based on their play during the weekend.

The cash paid out during the promotion is not supposed to impact other promotions including cash back and free play offers.

For every 400 tier points earned a player got $25 cash for slots, and for every 800 points earned a player got $25 for video poker. One tier point = $10 of coin in.

This really was a last minute change, because as recently as a couple of weeks ago I got a reminder in the mail about the Visa promotion, and hanging in the casino today (Sunday) were signs promoting the Visa giveaway.

Now I am wondering if the last minute change might also signal that they will not run a promotion like this in the future?