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REVISITED : THE FAIRNESS OF INRUNNING BETTING

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Replies: 621
By:
Vital Spark
When: 18 Nov 09 15:33
artie,You have been on here since 2001,if you are as good as claim,when are you going to retire on all your winnings.
By:
artie
When: 18 Nov 09 15:35
Which claims are you talking about ???
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 18 Nov 09 15:45
The in running warnings displayed on each
market by Betfair
fulfill this requirement.


Thatcher's children right enough.
By:
Vital Spark
When: 18 Nov 09 15:47
artie,you say you only play in running occasionally,so what are you concerned about,should it be modified.
By:
artie
When: 18 Nov 09 16:15
I'm concerned that some misguided idiot on a mission, or some politician trying to make headlines will get the wrong end of the stick and end up banning it entirely. Leave well alone.
By:
Vital Spark
When: 18 Nov 09 16:24
artie,here is the latest clarification update,received on the 16th November.
Clear as mud



Dear Mr *********


Thank you for your email of 20 October 2009 and subsequent telephone call regarding proposed changes to Part 1, Paragraph 9 of the Gambling Act 2005 (the Act).

I note from your email that you have requested clarification as to the meaning of this particular piece of the Act, therefore I attach an extract below from the explanatory notes accompanying the Act:
Section 9: Betting: general
58. This section defines "betting" for the purposes of the Act. The present law contains no statutory definition of "betting" as an activity. In broad terms it is taken to mean the staking of money or other value on the outcome of a doubtful issue. Betting can be at fixed odds, by means of a spread, or by way of pool betting.
59. By virtue of this section (which is subject to the qualification in Section 10) betting covers making, accepting or negotiating a bet in relation to:
the outcome of any race, competition or event,
the likelihood of anything occurring or not occurring, or
whether something is true or not.
60. Subsections (2) and (3) extend the meaning of the term to include bets on races, competitions, or events that have occurred in the past.
In summing up, the Department has no plans to amend this part of the Act.

**** *********
Department for Culture, Media & Sport
Public Engagement & Recognition Unit
1st Floor, 2-4**spur Street
London. SW1Y 5DH.
Tel No: 020-7211-****
Fax No: 020-7211-****
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 18 Nov 09 16:24
I'm concerned that some misguided idiot on a mission, or some politician trying to make headlines will get the wrong end of the stick and end up banning betfair entirely.
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 18 Nov 09 16:26
Or just implement a tax on winners seeing as how there's so many of them.
By:
artie
When: 18 Nov 09 16:38
So don't make waves.
By:
artie
When: 18 Nov 09 16:42
And don't start threads about the fairness of IR or encourage the zealots and moral minority on here.
By:
frog2
When: 18 Nov 09 16:51
So the Gambling Commission, for whatever reason that is is pointless to speculate about, has decided that is FAIR for bets to not be voided even if one of the outcomes cannot win. Time to move on from their role in all this then I think.

The real issue is where Betfair stand in all this.

A press release 28th August 2008 Betfair stated when dicussing horseracing punters that use Betfair:

'Individual customers might win in a given year; but that over time, the overwhelming majority do not. The number who win two or three years in a row can be counted on your fingers'

Source:
http://corporate.betfair.com/everything-you-thought-you-knew-about-the-levy-and-perhaps-a-few-things-you-didnt.pdf

Soon after the press release Betfair brought in the Premium charge to stop the winners who win on Betfair too quickly. 0.5% of customers are said to be affected to a number of over 1000 individuals.

There is clearly a disparity here. Betfair are saying that 10 or less of the most sucessful gamblers win consistently on here on the horses leading up to August 2008 yet there are over 1000 people winning too quickly. So what are the other 990+ people doing so Betfair?

I dont think it would be wrong to suggest that most of these people are not traditional horseracing punters. The conisistent winners are ones with another 'edge' or bet purely on sports. If less than 10 people win consistently on horses then I cannot believe more than 10 win betting in a traditional sense on sports bets.

I would suggest that the vast majority of the hated premium charge customers are sports traders or people using some kind of time advantage. There is zero evidence they are form students given Betfairs statement above.

Following on from this I would expect Betfair to take measures to reduce every seedy edge they can from their markets. If people are taking the money too quickley its bad for Betfair. They have already started knocking out the overbroke book merchants and I imagine they have their sites on the clockbeaters. Even if the GC say its ok to bet after the result is known Betfair getting a 20/80 split on the proceeds of it is hardly going to satisfy them long term.

The real problem they face is inrunning betting is one of their main unique selling points despite all its unfairness problems.
By:
Vital Spark
When: 18 Nov 09 16:54
artie,When Betfair were promoting their in running advertising,intrigued i placed a £100 win on a 10/1 shot, in running.
My bet was taken the said horse was in 3rd position at the time.
The odds i received were 999/1, a hell of sight more than 20% better odds,another slogan.
Alas 3to4 seconds later the horse fell.
No one ,not even you ,will tell me not to rock the boat.
By:
artie
When: 18 Nov 09 17:08
i.e. Pocket talking.
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 18 Nov 09 17:14
He was defrauded artie. Just like we all were by the bankers. I suppose you being a thatcherite cnut you'd defend them to the hilt as well.
By:
Vital Spark
When: 18 Nov 09 17:16
Principle, something you no little about,going by your ramblings.
You can trawl through all my previous posts ,you will not find any mention of any wagers i have made.
By:
The Magician (100)
When: 18 Nov 09 20:55
Vital Spark 18 Nov 16:16


Here is the position of the GC,i received this from a Mr Ingram.

There are 2 main
points to consider here.
Firstly the legal position regarding bets placed after the
result is known and
secondly the issue of whether the product being offered
here by Betfair is fair
and open.




Section 9 of the
Gambling Act 2005 states
that a transaction may be a bet despite the fact that the
event has already
occurred i.e. in this case that the horse has fallen and
one party to the
transaction knows that the event has already occurred or
failed to occur. This
means that bets on fallers will still be considered as
legal betting contracts
post Nov 2nd despite the change in the BHA
rules.




The secondary issue
relates to the
fairness of this in respect of the product offered by
Betfair. All operators
have a duty to display warnings to customers where there is
reasonable belief
that they may be relying on 3rd party broadcast
feeds to assist with
their betting. The in running warnings displayed on each
market by Betfair
fulfill this requirement.



Vital

I think Mr Ingram either

a) does not understand the Act he is selectively quoting
b) he is deliberatly selectively quoting


1) true - in thier wisdom, the goverment allowed a legal contract to stand on an event that has concluded even when one particpant KNOWS the result.

2) Betfair do have an obligation for tranparency

And both of these clauses allow a bet on an IR faller to stand.

but what he has deliberatly or incompitantly left out is that the LAW states bets must bet fair - irregardless of the above to clauses, that he has quoted to you.

so write back to him, he has painted himslef in the corner.

anyway - this will not be resolved until tested - and I think it is high time that is done.
By:
againstthecrowd
When: 18 Nov 09 21:23
Yawn........
By:
arthur daley
When: 18 Nov 09 21:36
in running is simple on the horses you know there is fast pic players don't bet in running and stop bleeting about it.
By:
againstthecrowd
When: 18 Nov 09 21:42
'incompitantly '

sums it up really....
By:
Moon Light
When: 18 Nov 09 21:59
It seems the Act is internally inconsistent. 'fair' is vague and catch-all in comparison with the more specific clauses quoted by the Bookies Front Commission.
Best of luck Magician, you'll need it.
By:
Joel
When: 19 Nov 09 00:56
Wouldn't people betting on fallers lose their money anyway whether they have fast pics or not ?:|
By:
askari1
When: 19 Nov 09 01:01
I can accept that Mr Ingram is interpreting the rules he has been given and finds IR betting w/ an advantage i.e. laying fallers fair within the terms of the act.

But I cannot believe that the Mr Ingrams of the world will have the ultimate say on these matters in perpetuity. Someone higher up than the GC will outlaw or give a regulator the power to void bets where the outcome cd be known at the time the bet was struck.

Or alternatively betting will fall liable to further sin taxes.

IR winners' situation doesn't seem to me sustainable in the long-term, and these people shd be looking for other ways to win.
By:
askari1
When: 19 Nov 09 01:05
They only need a slight rejigging of their rules to make betting mean e.g. 'wagering on an eventuality that both sides to the bet believe to be in the future or as yet undecided' and IR betting is on shaky ground.

They cd have other sections regulating the 'general knowledge games' of wagering on whether something happened or not i.e. liar's poker wd be the subject of something other than a 'bet'.
By:
Moon Light
When: 19 Nov 09 01:12
Joel, if everybody saw it fall at the same time, backers would have a fair chance to cancel unmatched bets.

It appears to me that this situation was foreseen by at least some of the people who drafted the Gambling Act, and they deliberately sought to legalise hoovering.
Perhaps HMG wanted to avoid getting involved in disputes over bets.
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 19 Nov 09 09:04
in running is simple on the horses you know there is fast pic players don't bet in running and stop bleeting about it.

Does everyone know that though? There's a tendency to think everyone on betfair reads the forum and knows the score but if that was the case ir would'vce died long ago. I'd take 1.01 there's still people out there betting ir on horses using cable and even fairly intelligent people have difficulty understanding the market maker advantage. In fact your average sports ir better probably believes the spinning clock is there to protect them. Never overestimate the intelligence of human beings. Some are so stupid that slightly less stupid people can make fortunes out of them.

The fact that betfair's warning to new clients unaware of the delays (some forever) amounts to a line of small print stating the speed of light is not infinite is a disgrace but entirely in keeping with their financial sector background. Does anyone outside of the forum even see the warning far less understand the extent of delays?

Since Thatcher gave respectibility to greed this country has being going down the pan. In the old days roofers charging pensioners 25K for replacing a missing slate would've been half kicked to death by the pensioner's neighbours. Now such people are 'entrepreneurs' or 'wealth creators' even. While not many of us have fallen foul of such barefaced fraud we've all had it well and truly stuffed up us by the financial sector and the crash hasn't even seen these cnuts stop for breath. This place mings of the same Thatcher ethos. You've got the gravy train racing reporters hanging on to their press room advantage by keeping stoom about the broadcasting delays, the trading shop boys whinging about the course trading shops and the now you see it now you don't mob crying about being charged less than everyone else. It would make you vomit.

What is it betfair get out of all this? It would be a simple task to point every new customer to a few videos showing the extent of delays and the dangers of being stuck behind the clock but it's as if they need these lambs to the slaughter. Yet they say they need the pc to replace the lambs the pc payers lose them, so are they just allowing customers to be **ed solely to keep liquidity flowing prior to the float? More Thatcherite greed. Passing on customer details to time share sc.um for a share of the profits wouldn't be any less unsavoury than what they're doing. Betfair have imported financial sector morals to everyday betting.
By:
Sandown
When: 19 Nov 09 09:41
Feck

I'm not sure that I would agree with every single word of your polemic, but I do share your sentiments.

There is a strange mix of ethics and business model tied up in this discussion, which I would like to address.

There is no better example of an ill-judged mix than that of commercial high street bankers. They make a goodly portion of their "income" from penalising customers who fail to manage (so saving the bank admin expense) their OWN account, so that should they unwittingly run into an "unauthorised" borrowing situation, the bank's T&C's allow them to take money out of the customers account (without debate or warning) as a penalty for so doing.

So, a "customer" can be charged say £75 for runing up an overdraft of less than £1 for a days borrowing. I myself have several examples which I am appealing against. The most recent was a 100% penalty on an "unauthorised overdraft" unknowingly borrowed for a week which works out at a simple rate of 5200% pa.

This is surely a stupid business model and is certainly dubious ethically.

Now take the BF and IR situation.

They are akin to being "tollgate holders" who stand at the entrance and exit to a very dark bridge. They have a tiny sign which says "Beware muggers" which allows them to plea caveat emptor.

As travellers cross the bridge they are invariably "mugged" as they cross. BF then take 20% of the profits from the muggers.

This is a very dubious position morally and ethically for BF to be in. It also doen't make very good business sense because those travellers are much more numerous than the muggers yet they wont come back once they have been mugged and BF find themselves in the postion of having to drum up more unwary travellers and argue that the cost of so doing is the reason why they impose a PC on the muggers.

To my mind, betting on "outcomes" be they results or price movements, presupposes that one is betting on FUTURE events which by defintion are unknown to some degree. Where some people have prior knowledge of an outcome they are not betting fairly or squarely and BF are mistaken in supporting such people and encouraging the technology that they use to be in such a position.
By:
Sandown
When: 19 Nov 09 09:53
To my mind, betting on "outcomes" be they results or price movements, presupposes that one is betting on FUTURE events which by defintion are unknown to some degree. Where some people have prior knowledge of an outcome they are not betting fairly or squarely and BF are mistaken in supporting such people and encouraging the technology that they use to be in such a position.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And this is the raison d'etre of their INTEGRITY (sic) campaign against layers who have prior knowledge of non-triers.
By:
ewood
When: 19 Nov 09 10:16
Feck, i agree that many seem to think that everyone looks at these forums and is savvy regarding all the pitfalls of in running. I would imagine that would be overwhelmingly not the case. I have long advocated a pop up message whenever anyone logs in with warnings about in running and time delays etc. and users could tick a 'do not show me this message again today' box so they only see it once a day. Some will say this is nannying but i don't think the present warnings go far enough to highlight what is a serious disadvantage on particular tv channels(ATR for instance).
By:
Napoleone di Buonaparte
When: 19 Nov 09 10:23
It would be a simple task to point every new customer to a few videos showing the extent of delays and the dangers of being stuck behind the clock

Maybe they could get the Betfair Rapid demonstrator to star in this video!
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 19 Nov 09 10:25
ewood, I would prefer video type warnings. Even a message sent every new client (backdated) with links to videos telling them it was in their interests to watch them.

Exactly Sandown. Having a MOU and a betfair security team liasing with the BHA seems a bit stupid given betfair themselves are allowing mugging.
By:
Sandown
When: 19 Nov 09 10:31
I don't believe having a larger notice at the entrance to the bridge solves the moral and ethical dilemma. It's still "mugging" and BF are still profiting from it even though the travellers do so at their own risk.

The "muggers" should not only be discouraged, they should be apprehended, tried and banned. Are BF up for that I wonder?
By:
ewood
When: 19 Nov 09 10:34
Sandown , not saying the larger notice at the entrance is the answer and it's only a step but it's one in the right direction and certainly better than the present warnings which only do the minimum imho
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 19 Nov 09 10:38
I suspect genuine warnings would only alleviate the problem but would at least show betfair recognise there is unfairness. They haven't even implemented magician's suggesation to show pre-off and in-play p/l seperately.
By:
Sandown
When: 19 Nov 09 10:38
ewood

The unintended consequence of a larger notice is that it would deter even greater numbers to travel across which would lead to the death of IR. Given that there is a huge demand for IR and its a big money spinner, BF need to encourage travellers, don't they, by getting rid of the problem which is at the root of it all.
By:
Borrowed Time
When: 19 Nov 09 10:42
Feck / Frog / Magician .. et al

as champions for joe public, why dont u do something about this ..



On the 28th of October Giant Seqouia was returned at 4/9 when it was available at evens + on BF .. you may remember ? It was even mentioned on the Morning Line and there was a decent write up in the Post entitled ' Is this the worst SP in history '. Will Hill rep David Hood explained the extenuating circumstances ... PR bull ofcourse.

The story has been successfully buried by the PR teams of the big 3/4 who seem happy to rip off customers time and time again, especially it seems to me, on the all-weather tracks.

On saturday at Lingfield a horse called Ektimaal was returned at 2/1 that was freely available at 7/2 + on BF

Yesterday , again at Lingfiied a horse called Arhmaddy was returned at 6/4 , freely available on her at 2/1 and in the last race at Kempton,King of Defence was available on here at 3/1+ and was returned at an incredible 13/8 !!..

All horses were running in the last race of the meeting ..... hmmmmm, make of that what you will. Remember, we are not talking about half a point here. A 1 point difference on any favourite x 2000 shops is BIG £.

This is not a recent phenominum. I fully realise that Betfair is different and by our nature, i.e the users, we understand this and bet here accordingly. However, we also know that a 'true' favourite's Sp has a much closer match to the betfair SP.

It's a shocking reflection of how bookmakers care little for the betting shop punter.They are simply operating a cartel and does anyone seem to care ? What are the gamblin commission doing about it ? what is Millington doing? One has to question the relationship that these organisations have with the bookmakers.. it stinks wrotten.

Big Mac has his critics ( and I am one) but he has been a lonely voice in this business who consistanly questions how SP's are returned.He needs help. John calls for people to ' Come racing'....... you have to question why many would given the nature of this thievery.
By:
Vital Spark
When: 19 Nov 09 10:46
I noticed that bets were still being placed well into the race on Pearly Star,who fell at the 1st.


Fakenham Result
17 Nov 2009
1:00 » WENSUM VALLEY SELLING HANDICAP HURDLE
(Class 5) (0-95, 4yo+) 2m4f Good 9 hdles 2 omitted
£2,740.40, £798.80, £399.60

« F Pearly Star 15/8F 8 11-8 b Jim Best 89 * *
A P McCoy

Led until fell 1st (op 13-8)

10 ran TIME 5m 12.50s (slow by 26.50s) Total SP 110%
1st OWNER: N J Catterwell BRED: Palm Tree Thoroughbreds TRAINER: N B King
2nd OWNER: Yen Hall Farm Racing
3rd OWNER: Mrs Jean M O'Connor
TOTE toteswingers:1&2:£3.00, 2&3:£12.30, 1&3:£12.10 WIN £7.30 PL £1.50, £1.80, £3.90; Ex £31.90; CSF £35.05; TRICAST £460.99
The winner was bought in for 3,200gns.
By:
ewood
When: 19 Nov 09 11:00
Sandown, i'm sure tobacco companies would have been equally reluctant to put messages about the increasing likelihood of lung cancer on their cigarette boxes. Seem to remember they were forced to increase the size of this message on the boxes too and that is what i'm suggesting here. Personally, i make my living through in running betting and wouldn't want to see it diminish but i would rather run the risk of losing some liquidity in the markets and be sure that everyone playing knew the deck was marked. Having said that, it has become clear in the last 18 months that fairness and integrity are higher priorities to many of us on here than Betfair itself.
By:
artie
When: 19 Nov 09 11:03
UnVital spark-so you noticed bets being placed etc. Have you ever noticed bets being placed on withdrawn horses well into a race. How do you explain that ?
By:
Sandown
When: 19 Nov 09 11:04
Borrowed Time

Your point is about oranges when the debate here is about apples.

If a punter goes into a restaurant for the first time, orders a steak at £25 and a bottle of wine for £25 and receives a 2oz steak with little else plus a bottle of wine that he could buy elsewhere for less than a fiver, he can rightly say that he was ripped off. If he then chooses to go back to the same restaurant and re-orders exactly the same he knows what he is getting and has only himself to blame. Betting with High Street BM's is no different. They can set their own prices and are legally entitled to do so.If you choose to bet there, you deserve what you get.You have a choice.

Now put yourself in the place of a punter who when he steps outside the place he is immediately mugged and his wallet stolen.

That's bad enough, but suppose that the restaurant owner knows about the muggers, indeed encourages them to operate and even takes a percentage of the proceeds. He is in the position of being the de facto supplier of victims to the muggers and is as guilty as the muggers themselves. Good sense suggests that once mugged never again.

Apples and oranges.
By:
Sandown
When: 19 Nov 09 11:09
ewood

I don't see why the IR market shouldn't flourish under fair rules even more than under the current set-up. That's my point really, its in the interests of IR players to seek a level playing field.
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