Blackjack Insurance-What Is It?
By: BPS
In the world of Blackjack, there is likely no bigger argument than whether a player should buy Blackjack Insurance. When a dealer turns an Ace as their upcard, the dealer will ask players if they would like to ‘insure’ their hands. If the player accepts the insurance, they must place half of their bet before any action is taken on their hand. If the blackjack insurance wager wins, which means the dealer has Blackjack; the wager pays two to one.
When a player is dealt blackjack, and the dealer is showing an Ace, there is a need felt by the player to protect his or her hand. The logic used for blackjack insurance is that the blackjack is a bonus hand, which pays three to two. There are not too many blackjacks dealt by the dealer, so players feel the need to get something out of that hand. If the dealer also has blackjack, the hand is a tie, and they would simply get their bet back.
When placing a blackjack insurance bet, a player is assuming that they will always end up with a profit. This is logical thinking, but flawed. There are 16 cards with a value of ten in the deck. This leaves 36 cards that are not valued ten in a 52-card deck. When a player is faced with a situation in which they have blackjack, and the dealer is showing an Ace, there are now only 15 cards with a value of ten, and 34 cards that do not have a value of ten. Since insurance only pays two to one, you’re getting the worst of it.
Lets’ take four different situations that could occur, and their results. Assume that the player’s bet is $10, and that the player has been dealt blackjack, and the dealer is showing an Ace.
The four possible situations are:
1. You take insurance, and the dealer has blackjack
2. You take insurance and the dealer doesn’t have blackjack
3. You do not take insurance and the dealer has blackjack
4. You do not take insurance and the dealer doesn’t have blackjack
In the first two situations, the player would win ten dollars. In the first case, the original ten-dollar bet is a push, and the insurance bet ($5) is paid two to one. In the second case, the dealer doesn’t have blackjack, so the player wins $15 from the original bet, but loses the insurance bet. Both have a ten-dollar profit.
In the third situation, the player has tied the dealer, and without the insurance bet, the player keeps their original bet. In the last case, the player beats the dealer, and wins $15. It’s easy to see that in three of those cases, you make money, and in one, you don’t win anything, but you don’t lose either.
As it was explained before, if the player has blackjack, and the dealer is showing an ace, there is only a little over a 30% chance that the dealer has blackjack, and more than a 69% chance that the dealer does not have blackjack.
