Late Surrender vs. Insurance

In some Colorado casinos, late surrender and insurance are both offered, but, oddly, you cannot employ both on a single hand.

So the question is this: if the dealer shows an ace and the high-low count warrants insurance (+3 or greater) and surrender, which option should be taken?

Certainly, some hands should never be surrendered, but what if the hand should be surrendered with a count of +3 or greater (hard 16, hard 15, hard 14 [at +6] etc.)?

The rules are 6D, S17, LS, RSA, and DS.

Professional Blackjack answers this question for early surrender vs. insurance, but not for late surrender. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Look up how much effect each rule has on the house advantage. Whichever one is more player friendly, go with that one. I don't have a book in front of me right now but most good bj books have a list of various rules and their effect on house advantage.

but, as pointed out in Professional Blackjack for early surrender vs. insurance, there are some counts where insurance is better (very high) and some where early surrender is better (moderately high).

Given that late surrender is less valuable than early surrender, it could be that insurance is always better than late surrender, but, intuitively, it's too close of a call to make.

Currently, I always take insurance when it's warranted, but I have a nagging feeling that at moderately high counts, late surrender might be better.

Thanks, JB, for the advice--it certainly is consistent with what I've been doing so far.

I would look at how close you are to the index number. Suppose for example the TC is 3. Here insurance is warranted, but it really a break-even play. Surrendering 16 v Ace is a BS play, and it gets stronger as the count increases. So if your close to 3, this is an easy decision.

15 v Ace is a bit harder. The index here is around 2. At a TC of 3, insurance is break even and 15 v Ace is a clear surrender, so go ahead and surrender.

Insurance is more volatile than surrender, so there will come a point where the insurance will catch up. However, insuring a stiff increases variance; surrendering it decreases variance. This is another reason to favor surrender in close plays.

Based on a sim, I am running now, it looks to me like 15v Ace is very close at a TC of +5. For RA reasons, I would surrender and not insure. At a TC of +6, insurance looks like it has higher EV. I think for 16 v Ace, you should always surrender. I would guess that for 14 and below insurance will be always preferred to surrender.

Personally, I would tend favor surrender for cover reasons. Insuring a stiff is a high-profile play which may raise red flags. I do not what the heat situation is there.

I really appreciate your careful analysis of this--everything you've said makes perfect sense. Thanks for considering the subtler RA and cover issues too.

For what it's worth, Colorado casinos don't believe their $5 fixed bet games can be beaten, so they're completely oblivious to counters. However, with an otherwise empty Triple Action table, a lone counter can vary his action from $5 to $105 per round with complete freedom. It's a beatable game, though with a pretty paltry expected win in the neighborhood of $10-$20/hr.

Thanks again for the well-reasoned advice.

Good post DS. Would the player take insurance and then surrender on the same hand, if offered? He would lose 100% of the original wager if dealer doesn't have a natural, which I guess is better than losing 150% of it by taking insurance and not surrendering, then losing. My point, really, is why not ignore the high profile insurance bet whether or not the casino offers both options on the same hand? So, Math Prof's response would seem to work in either case, ie, if both options are offered or if only one of the options is offered on a single hand, surrender. Correct? However, at high enough TC, then you would insure first, especially with a large wager....which would likely be the case since the count is high. Thank you.

I�m slightly confused. Since we are discussing LATE surrender, would we not insure if the TC =>3 and then, if the dealer does not have a Black Jack, we would then surrender according to the proper index? If the TC =>3 and we don�t insure, and the dealer produces a BJ, then surrender is no longer an option.

The opening sentence of this thread: In some Colorado casinos, late surrender and insurance are both offered, but, oddly, you cannot employ both on a single hand.

By the way, I have seen the same thing outside the US with conventional surrender and ENHC.

I have seen places where you can both insure and early surrender the same hand. It was a ENHC game as well.

I don't doubt that ES and insurance may both be taken at some casinos. I am also aware that when LS is offered, insurance may also be taken at most casinos.

Nevertheless, at some Colorado casinos, you may not take insurance and LS on the same hand. This is for Triple Action tables in which the dealer does not deal himself a hole card until after all player hands have been completed.

Really, I'm just looking for index numbers for when LS is preferable to insurance (and vice-versa), which MathProf has gone a long way towards providing.