Ungrateful Ferengi *****

spot on Feck

I for one think Betfair took more notice of the fact there were several customers/forumites that supported the introduction of it and have kept on defending the charge up until yesteray.

I wd guess that internally half the company is in revolt.

Many have left b/c they believed in person-to-person betting. Some will disapprove of the changes but have stayed b/c they understand the necessity of appeasing the Stock Exchange, see no other way to swell the bottom line and hold bf shares.

Have the founders made any public comment on 60% commission?

askari they can increase the bottom line by making the base commission 5.5%  (10% increase in profits) Most punters are not that price sensitive.

If they continue to dive and get negative city feedback then I can see this slipping in next year.

Hazel, they considered that (and, I agree, quite possibly will implement it).

The change is about taking more from consistent winners or, better, driving them off the site and replicating their offers possibly at slightly worse odds.

Imv bf will do this slightly less well (for losing price-takers) and trigger some movement of recreational money towards their competitor.

eddie if you are aiming that at me... I whinged about the 20% for about a year maybe you werent on the forum then? Imo, stuff on here has no effect whatsoever.

At least these extra charges keep you happy and give you a chance to whittle on about hiding the queue to make things even more complicated for any new players, Feck.

A former big name on this forum has spent his time telling betfair to do away with winners, especially those with a high strike rate. There lies your scapegoat if you're looking for one...

Feck, I warned people repeatedly not to suggest ANY changes to Betfair's charging structure, as it always seems to be to the detriment of customers. I've been guilty of suggesting changes myself (mainly taking PC at time of withdrawal), but after I saw what happened when the early changes to the PC took place, I became more cautious.

Examples:

Implied Commission fixed at 3%. Ok it makes it more predictable, but also marginally more expensive, as it was possible to work out your average implied commission rate and mine was above 3% prior to this.

People complaining that it wasn't fair that transaction charges etc. shouldn't be used to offset PC. To paraphrase: "we've listened to our customers and are now charging them more as they requested."

People complaining about being over charged as big losses drop off etc. Obviously we are worse off now that it is over the lifetime of the account rather than getting an annual allowance.

The recent charge no doubt was partly inspired by continuous complaints about hooverers and trappers and cheaters not paying enough, look what happens though.

And of course the daddy of them all, DJSunset's orignally suggestions.

These are all legitimate concerns, but I feel that nothing Betfair does has helped to create a more level playing field, just to Betfair taking a larger slice of the overall profits.

I paid about 7x as much PC in 2009 as in 2010, despite making more in 2010. It seems obvious to me that if I'm pursuing marginally profitable strategies that I wasn't pursuing before, the people I'm cutting off from being able to profit at higher margins are your cherished gamblers, along with other traders of course.

I think it's time for Betfair's customers to come together and unilaterally condemn this move rather than taking little digs at each other.

Investor
The majority of BF's customer do not understand any of the ( very good) points you are making.
So the chances of any unilateral revolt or condemnation is zero.
If the Scandy outfit is happy and maybe a few others I don't know about, then the matter is closed, done and dusted.
Unfortunate, but that's the way big business works.

Sure FAFH, at least Betfair's vocal customers, which should include almost all the people paying it now and likely to pay in the future.

TheInvestor2 Joined: 28 May 11
Replies: 103 29 Jun 11 23:10 
Feck, I warned people repeatedly not to suggest ANY changes to Betfair's charging structure, as it always seems to be to the detriment of customers. I've been guilty of suggesting changes myself (mainly taking PC at time of withdrawal), but after I saw what happened when the early changes to the PC took place, I became more cautious.

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have to say I disagree with this. the 2009 change were partly a response to objections to the initial regime, and were overall a big improvement.

also, i can't remember anyone suggesting anything like what they've just brought in. which suggests our current influence is, um, limited.

If the Scandy outfit is happy and maybe a few others I don't know about, then the matter is closed, done and dusted.

Is this the hugely successful Scandy outfit that had a net income for the whole of 2011 of SEK 13.5m (1.32m GBP) and a net operating income for the first quarter of this year of SEK -10.7m (-1.04m GBP)?

They should have no problem keeping the whole show running

I sit at home in my pants and have better figures than that ffs.

viva el presidente!
Date Joined: 10 Jun 06
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When: 29 Jun 11 23:30
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TheInvestor2 Joined: 28 May 11
Replies: 103 29 Jun 11 23:10
Feck, I warned people repeatedly not to suggest ANY changes to Betfair's charging structure, as it always seems to be to the detriment of customers. I've been guilty of suggesting changes myself (mainly taking PC at time of withdrawal), but after I saw what happened when the early changes to the PC took place, I became more cautious.

----------------

have to say I disagree with this. the 2009 change were partly a response to objections to the initial regime, and were overall a big improvement.

also, i can't remember anyone suggesting anything like what they've just brought in. which suggests our current influence is, um, limited.


I find it astonishing that you can think the 2009 changes were an improvement. In what way exactly? All I know is that it lead to me being charged more. I rather pay less and have less transparency than pay more in exchange for greater transparency. There were some positive features, but overall it was not good I think.

I'm not suggesting that anyone suggested this exactly, but people do seem to have the tendency to think it's fair for 'the other guy' to pay more. They should realize that they too will be negatively affected.

investor - the key thing for me was the year zero measure of  resetting everyone's lifetime charges to 20%. this effectively uncrippled my account. it meant that commission over 20% I generated in any week was no longer effectively paying off a historic debt but creating headroom.

that massively outweighed everything else about that set of changes for me. although ironically at the time I didn't see it, and was primarily p!ssed off about the change from a rolling 1K allowance to a one-off.

These are all legitimate concerns, but I feel that nothing Betfair does has helped to create a more level playing field, just to Betfair taking a larger slice of the overall profits.

I think it's time for Betfair's customers to come together and unilaterally condemn this move rather than taking little digs at each other.

They made more in 2006.  I agree with your second post although I cant help feeling their move into providing their own fixed odds platform is an attempted move away from their complete reliance on being the number one p2p site.

and as such they feel less exposed about taking the risk of introducing this new charge

By the way, here's the original post.
http://community.betfair.com/general_betting/go/thread/view/94082/23539134/pythias-comment

By:

The Investor
When: 01 Oct 09 21:56
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Let's face facts, Betfair aren't voluntarily going to give up profits.
Any changes made to the Premium Charge now or in the future are likely to increase what we pay.

For that reason I don't think it is in anyone's benefit to complain about anything to do with PC to betfair, as in x months time, they will once again come out with 'having listened to our customers we have decided upon the following changes that will result in us receiving less...' (yeah right), blah blah.

Just stay quiet and hope things don't get worse. Betfair are treading a fine line between making as much money as possible and losing customers.

By the way, who are these 300 customers they spoke to? It doesn't even mention whether they are paying PC or not.

Sadly accurate prediction