If you party on the Las Vegas club scene, chances are you’ve at least come close to getting tossed out of a Las Vegas nightclub. If not—if you’d like to add that to your nightlife resumé—here’s what you need to know as you go about your unholy quest.

First, since nightclubs are private property in the eyes of the law, know that any club employee can decide to kick you out for any reason, no matter how much you kick and scream about it. And while drug use, prostitution, over-consumption and fighting are some of the most common reasons, there are hundreds of other legitimate reasons a security guard might decide to give you the boot, up to and including simply looking at the bartender the wrong way.

For those who find themselves in a fight, 15-year nightclub security veteran Cory Ardizzone explains that “nine times out of 10, security will kick both parties out”—even if you were entirely innocent in the matter and subject to someone else’s drunken rage. It’s frustrating, but it’s done mostly to prevent further problems; security can never be entirely sure if aggressors remain in the club. The exception comes when someone involved is a paying VIP-table customer who was clearly innocent and doesn’t appear to pose a threat. Sometimes it pays to pay.

Those who get kicked out usually don’t go peacefully. “The most common things we hear them say are how they are going to have our job by morning, that we don’t know who they are, and how little we make compared to them,” Cory explains, “But usually nothing ever comes from it, because even if the person really was ‘someone,’ a club owner isn’t usually going to go against their own department’s decision just because someone was being drunk and causing problems.”

What happens to you next largely depends on what you did and the type of security the club uses. Every nightclub has a security team—either contract or in-house—but you probably won’t be able to tell the difference as they’re separating you from your cocktail and showing you to a less-decorated hallway than the one that brought you in. The major difference for you: how far you will be escorted.

Contracted security members’ jurisdiction ends at the nightclub’s ropes, forcing them to defer to the casino’s in-house security on whether or not to further 86 you from the entire property, or to call in the police department. Those who have their ID scanned by the casino and are added to “the book” are typically banned from that property for a year, two years or permanently.

Something to think about the next time someone steps on your foot in a club: At least you’re inside the club.