Bet£3.65 fails to defend ASA complaint

I expect there will be full coverage of this adjudication in the Racing Post.

how did they know about the exchange on no3

Response
...
Bet£3.65 stated that the third viewer also made selective bets and suspected they used a betting exchange. They believed the viewer backed horses each way, effectively giving them a bet on the horse both to win and lose, and they were unlikely to lose any money, which was "bad business". Bet£3.65 said their terms and conditions made clear that promotional offers were only available for recreational players and explained they would only take the step of excluding a customer from the offer after a full investigation of their account and historic betting activity. Bet£3.65 said only 2.5% of customers on their database were deemed to be non-recreational and were excluded from offers.


hello? is that bet £3.65 - i'd like to back a horse to win and lose please. i think the term is "each way"

it's more likely money saving arbers trying to make £4 to post on their matched betting thread

as if a professional gambler sits there trying to filch a snickers bar off them playing arbs for toy money

"it matters more when there's money on it"

(but you can't get any money on it anyway, so it doesn't matter)

:^0

Well done to the three people who took the trouble to complain to the ASA

exactly artie, not only do they not want you to win with them they don't want you to win AT ALL

*only complete mugs need apply should be added to their special offers

What would be deemed as "suspicious betting patterns?"

Possible Response: "they kept picking horses to lose but kept calling back giggling like winners"

Possible Response: "Um, most people when they lose chase and increase their stakes, thus making them profitable, er, I mean non-suspicious clients. These punters didn't do that. We concluded that they were 'sharp minds'.

artie, they are accepting that the punters were getting value w/ the Bet3penny bets. The exchange price is the correct price; they were over the odds w/ their odds compilers' line.

Slightly off-topic, but if we had no morning exchange odds but a series of auctions then better linemakers than Bet£3.65's wd stand more chance of winning

Looking forward to the industry's definition of 'non-recreational'...

bet 36 halfpenny are so tight with their odds that they hardly offer any value at all in their horse racing prices.
If they GAVE me a free £50 and I had to use it at their odds, 1/100 that the odds I got could be bettered at other bookies, LET ALONE bet fair. Plus you would just let the bet run anyway!

indeed FBS,i dont know anyone whos not restricted to a max take out of a tenner online and banned from placing bets over the fone.

What about this 'non-recreational' arber?

Let's say that he loses 5% of his exchange stake to comm. and consistently gets about one bookies' point below the bet3halfpenny price on all his arbs. (You wdn't get the 50GBP bethalfpenny stake on current arbs anyway; perhaps 25GBP on a non-limited account). Suppose his average bet3halfpenny price is 6-1 and he lays off on bf at 6.6 to a liability of 300GBP.

On losing halfpenny bets:
Lose 50
Lay to lose 300 - accepts stakes of 53.57 pre-comm., returns 51.02 @ 5% comm.
Profit on losers - 1.02 (on implied turnover of 350, profit 0.29%)

Let's suppose that 6.6 is the correct odds and that 15.15% of his selections win

On winning halfpenny bets:
Win 300
Lose 300
Value of free bet (supposing bf comm. on fair odds): 47.50
Profit on winners - 47.5 (on 350, profit 13.57%)

On a notional 100 bets:
15.15 * 47.50 = 719.62
84.85 * 1.02 = 86.55
Return: 806.175
Turnover: 35,000
Profit margin: 2.3%

The actual margin will be lower (nearer 2%) as after beating halfpenny you have to bet on the next Channel 4 race into a settled over-round book, meaning you will lose more to comm. and poor value than 5%. Supposing further that there is on average one Channel 4 / BetHalfp arb a week, the arber's strategy at best nets around 400GBP a yr on around 2% profit on turnover.

And this is 'non-recreational'?! At some stage the industry shd bite the bullet and just say it doesn't want winners, full stop.

They put the prices up early and say, hey if the sp is bigger..etc..etc..of course the sp is going to be bigger with an overound of 38% on a 10 runner race.

I 'phoned the RP to ask if they would be writing about this adjudication . They said they knew nothing about it it. I gave them the link so they do now. Interesting to see if they do an article about it.

Terms of a Recreational Player. To lose £millions. To win £3000 to £5000 Barred

i would be very happy (and a lot richer) if bet365 let their marked accounts take 4k out of them, it's closer to 1.5k i think, and often they freeze accounts that are losing money

if someone told me i had to pick one firm to disappear overnight...then i would struggle to pick just one. but bet365 would make my top 3, they are unbelievably pointless

unbelievably mean behaviour

makes me sick

thanks for the posting

artie, as a generality the exchange price is more likely to be the correct price at any moment in time.

This is based on a 'wisdom of crowds'-type argument. The more people, or more knowledge, implicit in a market at any one time, the more accurate the market is likely to be.

For early odds lines, the market represents the knowledge of the RP spotlight writer, some other oddsmakers and sometimes the opinions of bms' traders. Later markets represent the opinion of a greater number of insiders.

Someone w/ better judgment (in some sets of circs.) than a few line-makers are more able to beat the morning odds than the odds just pre-off. I wd be v. pleased only to bet 10am lines at any bookmaker--none of that fiddly bookmaking or trading!

But of course bet365 ban anyone consistently winning on PW's or anyone else's selections.