Premium Charge Avoidance

If you know a team wont win why would you bother backing them?

yep, it's possible.  I'd say football is the best way to go - matches with short, short favs are what you want.

It's not a viable strategy because short, short favourites sometimes don't win.

it's difficult

In my experience it's far harder to find a pc avoidance strategy than it is to find a winning betfair strategy.

The pc is revolting medicine to swallow but if you are consistently paying it you must be doing well.

^^^^ not true, you could be making peanuts in profit over a long period of time but get clobbered because you have a high strike rate!

What's the best way to avoid paying PC then?

Generally it's just not worth the bother of avoiding it- it's much easier just to make more money and swallow the PC.

After all, a successful PC avoidance strategy has to be profitable (if only marginally), so why not make it a bit more so? Your PC bill will go up, but overall you'll still be making more money.

Well the approach I take is to find (usually) football matches with short, short favs - less than 1.1 if possible.

Lay the fav on here and then back with purple or another bookmaker.  As has been said short favs do lose so my system would be this:

Lay three short favs on here (ABC)
Back short favs elsewhere.
Then to cover the risk of the fav losing - I do multiples on (AB, BC, AC) just in case two favs lose - should that happen I'd be quids in :-)

Even if it costs a few pounds I'd rather that money went ANYWHERE else than in bf's pocket.  The PC is just daylight robbery imo.

Surely that's going to end up costing more than just paying the PC.

You've got Com at Daq to pay, you're losing on a negative value Arb and you're throwing away a bundle on terrible value multiples.

I can't see how that can possibly be cheaper.

aye, a PC avoiding strategy does not have to be profitable. Anything that loses less than commission is profitable. Anything between 0% and commission merely passes on some of the PC to other punters.

What I love to know is. How many Premiun Charge payers now pay less commission to Betfair than they have in the past.

I know the commission I will pay this year will be the lowest for many a year and likewise last year.

While I have no s€xy Premiun Charge Avoidance scheme. Becuase I'm more a backer than a layer I would do a lot more betting now with the bookmakers than I've done for YEARS.

Which in turn means I not only now also avoid the Premiun Charge but also the 5% commission I was always paying them on my old winning bets.

I imagine there now must be 100s like me who just cut back betting here....as well as the ones who just left here altogether.

The biggest problem is you end up with money in accounts all over the place....Cheers

why wont what avocado said in the first place not work just lay something here and then cancel it out on ****.

daq.

Do not pay PC but if I did would look to bet across markets on the same event/outcome with enough profit margin to cover the commission charges or therabouts. e.g. lay 1+ goals at 1.08 (equivalent to backing no goals at 13.5) and lay 0-0 at 13 on correct score market. Many examples on other markets where the same outcome can be bet on.

May barely cover commission costs (the example wouldn't at 5%) and needs a considerable bank, but both reduces commission rate and will help to ensure that commission paid on overall winnings percentage increases to reduce PC. Will certainly be cheaper than the PC if the PC works as I understand it.

Least risky to do it pre-event of course but there are opportunities to do that.

the optimist, you must be an optimist, if you think you understand the premium charge, because the people at Betfair, who deal with the charge, don't understand it. (According to a friend of a friend who used to pay the charge)

the optimist is correct, there are ways and means.

I'm not convinced that a strategy that loses money can ever really be called a "PC avoidance strategy". Yes- losing money reduces your PC bill, but it's not quite the same thing. The aim is to reduce your PC bill without losing money, so your "avoidance" strategy has to at least be profitable enough to cover the normal commission that you pay on it.

If a strategy is profitable enough to cover the comm then there's no reason not to make it a bit more profitable, in which case it will usually increase your PC bill, that's the catch.

Cross market arbing on related markets(as suggested by the optimist) is possible but it's not easy, this kind of thing is already heavily botted and there is a lot of competition from PC payers to "churn" their money across different markets. You also run into the problem of liquidity on the quieter "cousin" markets. Personally I would have to churn far more than the quieter markets would bear to make this work, especially as I am on a relatively low comm rate. It would be awfully hard work and it would take me ages, frankly I've got better things to do with my time.

I am firmly of the belief that it's easier just to make more money the normal way, this inevitably also builds up your points which gets your normal Comm rate down. Although it increases your PC bill getting your normal comm down is by far the most effective way to reduce your total comm/charges paid, which is the goal after all. PC avoidance aside It's much better to pay low normal comm and then pay more PC than the other way round. It may not feel nice forking out on a Wednesday, but overall you keep more of your money that way.

With any calculation of charges you have to take EVERY charge into account, and remember that what matters is the total paid at the end of the the week/month/year, not whether you paid that total in a few big chunks of PC that you did notice or a lot of little chunks of normal comm that you didn't.

So basically there is no way of avoiding PC.

"The aim is to reduce your PC bill without losing money, so your "avoidance" strategy has to at least be profitable enough to cover the normal commission that you pay on it"

Completely and utterly untrue. If you found a way of playing across a couple of markets where you even lost two or three percent overall, this would have a huge bearing on reducing pc because of the implied commission on the losses as well as the actual commission on the wins. If you break more or less break even, you're laughing.

Consider that you spend 100% of your available time earning an amount of which you get to keep 80%.

How much of your available time will you sacrifice in order to implement an avoidance strategy that saves 20%?

If you can do an avoidance strategy with a bot then it's probably worth doing, otherwise you may just be wasting your time and money to spite an entity which has no feelings.

Why should Betfair take 20 percent of people's profits? I hope the DAQ improves so that people don't have to be ripped off by Betfair.

I've been told countless times that Gambling is a mugs game and that punters never win. So if I've found a way to do something that most people think is impossible then I should be allowed to keep all the profits to myself.

Providing you are paying Betfair (in commission) a reasonable amount
for the use of their facility.

A  couple of months ago, on Greyhounds, there was over £7k matched very early in the morning, on several races.

This carried on, for at least 3 days, to my certain knowledge.

Someone was laying the field, at very low prices, which were then all matched.

It was pretty obvious that someone was laying, out of one account,
and immediately backing for a loss into the other to reduce PC.

Fred! pretty much sums it up. PC avoidance should be low priority unless it is something that can be implemented very easily. Turning up stakes to reduce ROI would be one example. A simple botted strategy that loses a tiny amounnt or even breaks even is another.

GOLF..........when looking at the USPGA market this morning I was very suprised to see that the amounts matched on Betfair and the daq were roughly the same,that struck me as unusual. This lead me to ask the question, are people beginning to vote with their feet over to the other exchange because of the premium charge?

No moves, the daq calculates the matched amount differently.  On here £2 matched at 1000 shows up as £4 matched, over there, it comes to £1002 (they add the backers stake and the layers liability.  On golf, with so many long odds runners, the daq's  total matched will appear much higher.

Sadly, there's just nothing like the same liquidity there, as the exchange industry could do with some decent competition.

Correction.... The over there figure would be £1001

turtleshead Joined: 01 Jan 05
Replies: 1898 09 Aug 10 21:43   

^^^^ not true, you could be making peanuts in profit over a long period of time but get clobbered because you have a high strike rate!

Is that true?

Don't profits have to be significant to pay PC?

Turtleshead (great name) is right, shrewdbury.  You could be winning peanuts and still pay, if you don't lose often enough to bump up your overall commission to 20% of your winnings (give or take).  I think the first £1000 is PC free.

It's not the first £1000 of profit that's free, rather your first £1000 of PC is waived. In most cases you'll need to win about £10,000 using normal betting or trading before you use up that allowance. If you have previous losses it'll be much more. If you never have any losses and you've bet in at least 250 markets you might start paying at 5k but there won't be many people in that position. I don't remember exactly but I think I won around 13k before I started paying.

I know a strategy to avoid the PC. It is work great but:
- soon or later you will be caught (no exceptions)
- you will not be allow to use betfair in the future
- Your account will be close forever and you will not see even a cent of the money in it
- other risks (i can not talk about it)
- it is quite open strategy and everyone can see it what is going on

And yes i have use it for 3 months. I have been caught. Ho do i know that you will be caught for sure. It is simple a lot of people are doing it. Someday some of you will screw my betting pattern and i in personal will ask Betfair to check the suspicious betting behavior.

Hardly bet here at all now, prices minus commision are rarely better and in most cases worse. Wont work for fast pic guys etc, but for someone who makes money betting.

Have trusted mates open accounts for you, use shops, have mug mates place bets on your account. Made profits consistently over last few years and find it far easier to outwit them than betfair P.C. Said from day one first time I am charged, im off.

Karakondjur, if you are cleverer enough to pay the PC, then, on top of that, you have such a brilliant strategy for avoiding the PC altogether, how come you can't write in coherent English?

.Marksman. ... "if you are cleverer enough"   

And you're criticising his English

It's probably not even his first language... How many languages do you speak?

I did not say a brilliant strategy for avoiding PC, it is quite simple. But is dangerous as i said because you are risking your business at all.
And there is no point - who can not speak English can not make money from betting. I do not care at all, i do not need other language to do what i do.
And one more thing - all the winning  strategies (betting, financial etc.) are based on a simple rule. Ever. Like arbitrage in the betting industries, like courtsiding in a tennis game. But they should be hard for realization.

Karakondjur1   
I apologize unreservedly,

1.01 Layer, after reading your comment, I think the answer is about one half.

Sure it was just a typo, mate.  You sound more literate than most of the posters on these forums.

I think a little mathematical skill is far more important than the ability to write good english.

We could always just use QADTEB (I've written it backwards). No Premium Charge there yet.

Well i thought you hada  nice healthy balance Avocado so why bother about the pc?

Because if they put PC on me then that is 20 percent of my profits gone each week.

Your profit is the difference between your winning markets and your losing markets - commission

PC is part of the commission so your profit is what you have left after pc is deducted. If you think otherwise then your aim is blurred ;)

catfloppo, I do not believe that your statement is correct.  Commission is deducted when each market is settled. PC is a further deduction, which is applied on the Wednesday of the following week.

if he hasnt yet been premium charged then its obvious he will lose 20% of his profits when it is applied.

.Marks,
Whether pc is part of commission depends how you look at it I guess but my point is that Avocado's profit is what is left after pc has been deducted.  That is irrefutable.

You guess.....How do you see the premium charge catfloppo?

As part of the commission structure.

20 percent commission is taking the p1ss.

I have paid 30.94% to date

catfloppo , I've paid something like 40 - 42 % when you include the 135 k I've paid in PC.
   I assume you haven't paid any PC ?
Why should you pay less than me and do you think that is fair ?

I've paid something like 40 - 42 % when you include the 135 k I've paid in PC.

Seriously Eddie- How on earth have you managed to pay so much Comm?

I can understand how a non PC payer can be in this position but if you're well into PC then it seems impossible unless you have colossal historic losses, in which case you won't have been paying any PC for the last year and won't be for a long time to come.

I'm interested to know how that has happened, Eddie. I thought the whole idea of the pc was that it evened out over time at around 20%?  You're right to assume that I have not paid any yet, when the pc was introduced I was running at just over 20% and I tweaked my strategy to boost the rate a little. My primary motive for doing this was because I realised that the 'efficiency' of my strategy was close to Betfair's limit and I wanted to improve my worth to them.  I make my living on here and have always taken the view that I want them to be happy with the relationship, what I am doing and what they are getting out of it.

In terms of fairness, my answer is no, it's not really fair. I have a friend who pays nearly 50% and I'm sure there are some paying even more. What it is though is fairer as the gap between the highest and lowest payers is smaller.

aye robot , I was well into PC last year when I was on an exeptional good run, but started this year with a long losing run so I will probably never have to pay PC ever again.
  The PC I paid though is long gone and I'll never see them again even if I'm well above the 20 % threshold.

catfloppo , I've made profit every year since I joined , but last year was exeptional and I kept increasing stakes as the winnings was piling up in my account. All that PC is paid during a couple of months last fall.
  The first half of this year was the total opposite and I kept losing money at the same rate as I won them last year.
   The whole PC thing is constructed in such a way that it will catch many traditinal punters on a good run if they are increasing their stakes during the good run.

I have known people make a lot of money on bf and dont pay the pc there accounts are well in profit whys that?

WBA , it's not based on how much profit you make. It's got more to do with your strike rate.
  In order to pay it you will have to have paid less than 20-23 % of your total profit in normal commission.

cheers for you reply eddie,

So what are saying you could be million in profit but that still does not mean you will pay pc?

Not necessarily , it all depends on your strike rate.  If your gross profit is one million you would have had to pay roughly 210 k of that in commission in order to not be charged PC.

Correct WBA.

I can see how that has happened Eddie but don't expect that it catches many traditional punters, it seems a very unusual case.

I'm not sure whether to congratulate you on your good luck or commiserate with you on your bad luck ?!?!

* would have had to pay at least roughly 210 k of that *

What about if i lost last year 500000 in losing bets but still came out on top, im sure then i would of generated enough commision so would that mean i was unlikely to pay it for a while.

Depends on how much you came out on top by.

My pl says maxium premium charge possibe next wk is £6247 the thought of paying that will make me sick any ways rd it?

Surely that means you are having a very successful week?

Yes m8 best wk ever so if i win the same or more is that what i will pay?

WBA , if you are close to paying PC and had 500k in losses you would incurre PC on any winnings above 582.500 (net profit 82.5 k) if you are on 3 % commission.  Slightly different numbers for other commission rates , but not that far away no matter.

WBA, does your lifetime rate qualify you for pc?  You may be liable based on your weekly figures but if you are over 20% overall you won't pay.

Just to clearify my post above ; the profit of 82.5 k would be before commission was deducted.  Your net profit after commission for the year would have to be above 66 k for you to incurre PC if you had total losses of 500 k during the year.

catfloppo i do pay it but nothing major had good couple wks im now on 20.1% so will have to pay big chunks from now on if maintain the winning run, i just dont fully understand how pc works and when i speak to successful players and they dont pay pc i just can`t get my head round it.

WBA , from what you are saying it may look as if they will take the £ 6247 this week.   If so they will be taken around this time.  Keep an eye on your balance.

oh no!!!! dont give me an heart attack m8

Where on the report does it say possible PC £ 6.247 ?
  Is it under the weekly report , life time report , or both ?

its under last wk side 9/8/10-15/8/10 i think im ok this wk

but what does it say at the bottom left side which is your lifetime profile ?

max possible pc 0.00, total charges 20.1%

Ok , you will be fine this week then

  But you will probably have to pay PC on this weeks winnings unless that winnings is made up by plenty of losses and winnings.

if wba is paying 6k a week pc i'll give him the munee myself [;)]

eddie the eagle thanks for the help..

Heynoodles im not joking..