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Bayes.
12 Aug 12 21:31
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Date Joined: 13 Sep 05
| Topic/replies: 718 | Blogger: Bayes.'s blog
Not after sympathy. I'm a big winner and I can afford it. But surely there should be something that stops someone making a bet that loses 90% of big money because of a misclick.


Semi Final Matches / Safarova v Li / Match Odds   
Na Li    Back    21491071440    12-Aug-12
20:07         1.04    32,543.96        2.53    12-Aug-12 20:07

I meant to back Safarova at 1.04 ( I had he 1.034) I go matched on average at 2.53 but essentially lost 30k of my 32.5k instantaneously. Surely BF can have something that prevents this kind of error.

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Replies: 56
By:
Bayes.
When: 12 Aug 12 21:34
Badly worded, I got matched on Na Li at 2.53 when she should've been 33
By:
U.A.
When: 12 Aug 12 21:57
That's juicy, and not in a good way.

Just playing devil's advocate, but wouldn't you have had to have committed more errors than just one click. You would have had to change the price (which would have meant deleting the first price which would have meant missing that the price said 34 rather than 1.04.) Then clicked in "place bets" before checking that you were happy with the bet and then clicking "confirm" before you had given a final check that you were happy with it.

Sorry i'm not trying to criticise (although your probably saying "yeah right" having read my above paragraph) as I have done exactly the same before and yes it is annoying. Fortunately for me it wasn't to the tune of £30,000 or my wife may have removed various important appendages with a rusty farm implement, but what would be your suggestion to improving the situation whilst still allowing people to place their bets as quickly as humanly possible while events are in-play(assuming your mistake was in-play).
By:
catflappo
When: 12 Aug 12 22:00
Perhaps mrs Bayes on hand nearby with a deliberately blunted scythe would sharpen the mind?
By:
Bayes.
When: 12 Aug 12 22:08
Mrs Bayes was typically ambivalent as I miraculously ended up winning on the match (and she is obviously myopically results based) I made the mistake because I hadn't had a bet for a while and 15 minutes before Na Li was favourite.

What I'm after is something that stops your bet if it is more than x% out from the last price matched. Safarova had been sub 1.2 for a while and it is absolutely absurd to allow a bet of 32k liability at 26 at this point
By:
U.A.
When: 12 Aug 12 22:22
Ah yes but there are problems with this. Firstly, it requires more work from betfair to implement this and unfortunately this work doesn't really generate any profit for them.

Also you have the problem that some people actually like putting in a price significantly lower so they may get annoyed with this.

Say for example Na Li was 1.8 and the price was moving around quite a lot and i just wanted to get a bet matched there and then. The best way and quickest way for me to do it is put in 1.1 and I know it will get matched (and not at that price but at a price somewhere around 1.8ish subject to liquidity). If I put in 1.78 it may have dropped to 1.76 by the time that's gone through then I have to repeat the process again which I may find annoying.

Of course having functionality that allows users to decide and set that they can have this option and set the x% figure to whatever figure they wanted would be good but how much work would that be for them.
By:
henok
When: 12 Aug 12 22:39
Not after sympathy. I'm a big winner and I can afford it.

Cool
By:
CLYDEBANK29
When: 13 Aug 12 00:13
You only lost 18k Bayes.  Betfair lost the other 12k
By:
CLYDEBANK29
When: 13 Aug 12 00:18
it is staggering how much gets matched on a non descript tennis match
By:
Just Checking
When: 13 Aug 12 00:24
I personally would like to see us able to set adjustable non delayed limits on e.g.
- losses on a market
- losses on a single bet
- a settable limit on losses for "today" independent of the one that takes like 7 days to come into effect.
JUST to help stop a silly mistake costing us a large whack of our bank.
- ability to move money that's still ours into a safety bank that's still ours that can easily be transferred back to the bettable account, but is a surefire protected from "mistakes" as requires an extra 15 seconds of clicking to get it out to the bettable balance.

I don't believe for one second it would be at all hard never mind impossible to add the above. A days or two work for an average competence programmer?

The fact the might make more money out of our mistakes might .. well you finish that sentence :(

We all make mistakes. I just did one today when I bet on wrong team for reasons best known to my own stupidity, and again (bad day, heatstroke? :)) caught myself half second before clicking a bet with 1 digit too many in it ...
By:
Trevh
When: 13 Aug 12 02:01
Those things wouldn't help in the case of a mistake like this though JC, but some people use the Aus wallet to hold funds, and use simple software to set a liability per click.

Hard luck there Bayes, but do I remember that you narrowly avoided losing around 100k some time ago on a nearly identical mistake, then had some code added to your software to prevent a similar occurrence?
By:
JLivermore
When: 13 Aug 12 09:31
On stock exchanges etc they'll often cancel trades like this (calling them 'busted trades') and notify you hours later, but I do think the dramatically greater price changes and hedging/liability management (among other reasons) make that almost impossible on BF.

I guess I would just ask... why bet through the website and not custom software which has whatever functionality you would like?
By:
ShaneESP
When: 13 Aug 12 09:52
You don't need my advice Bayes but if I ever see Safarova at 1.03/1.04 I put my hands in my pockets just in case.
By:
Deltâ
When: 13 Aug 12 10:38
the x matching nicking bot is in clover...
By:
Marxist-Leninist
When: 13 Aug 12 11:59
Had the kids running wild here last week and instead of laying £50 @ 10 I...well i'm sure you know the rest...
By:
SIR_Bond
When: 13 Aug 12 12:37
I'm confused Na Li won the match no?
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 13 Aug 12 12:45
It would be fairly easy for them to add a client side warning that you were requesting odds way out of line with the most recent matched prices on that outcome. Certainly that would be the case pre-ir but I suppose it wouldn't be so clear cut ir where the odds can fluctuate wildly. The warning could be optional and turned off if not wanted. Bayes is still here but if it happened to a loser he'd probably be lost forever, a fact that doesn't seem to bother betfair.


You only lost 18k Bayes.  Betfair lost the other 12k

Fair point clydebank but I wonder how much of it the no. 1 top trapper (their x-matcher) got of it.
By:
smithy91
When: 13 Aug 12 12:50
I'm seriously considering moving funds over to aussie wallet due to this thread. Thing is if this happened to me I wouldn't be coming back
By:
ShaneESP
When: 13 Aug 12 13:06
SIR_Bond     Joined: 14 Nov 07
Replies: 4369 13 Aug 12 12:37 
I'm confused Na Li won the match no?

Yes and as Bayes pointed out "I miraculously ended up winning on the match" but 9/10 times she probably wouldn't have done, well ok maybe not 9/10 times it was Safarova and she can't be trusted even at 5/1 up. But Bayes point remains the same.
By:
Mr Magoo
When: 13 Aug 12 14:57
All these suggestions have been put to Betfair before and they have ignored them. THEY DO NOT CARE.
By:
DStyle
When: 13 Aug 12 15:17
Bayes

Having done similar many moons ago, (it was a match involving George Bastl to give you an idea) i made changes to my software to prevent my doing the very same thing, it warns when anything is too far away from "a correct price".

incidentally, i would like to touch on another point here which i raised some weeks ago: in the Safarova - Li market, like most markets, inverse prices were being rendered  in the UI. i.e. if you submitted a back at 1.1 on Safarova and it was unmatched, it would appear in the UI as being available as a lay on Safarova at 1.1 and also as an unmatched back on Li for 11.

However if cross matching is switched off on the market, this inverse rendering is bluster and misleading. if you fired in a back on Li at 1.03 by mistake it would touch any of the UI rendered inverse odds and instead be matched solely against the "real" lays on Li.

It's misleading and i'm increasingly feeling, grossly incorrect for inverse odds to be rendered when cross matching isn't on.
By:
DStyle
When: 13 Aug 12 15:23
*it wouldn't touch any of the UI rendered inverse odds and instead be matched solely against the "real" lays on Li.
By:
Bayes.
When: 13 Aug 12 15:31
Here's the full list of the carnage. I assume the on/off cross-matching lottery was turned to off at this point. The list seems to be in a peculiar order.

Na Li         1.38    10.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    3.80
Na Li         1.31    191.23         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    59.28
Na Li         1.1    2.60         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    0.26
Na Li         1.33    2.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    0.66
Na Li         1.1    43.87         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    4.39
Na Li         1.3    7.05         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    2.12
Na Li         1.77    3.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    2.31
Na Li         2.14    103.16         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    117.60
Na Li         5.2    2,357.04         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    9,899.57
Na Li         7.2    3,959.74         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    24,550.39
Na Li         1.52    22.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    11.44
Na Li         1.15    1.80         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    0.27
Na Li         1.26    1.64         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    0.43
Na Li         4.8    2.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    7.60
Na Li         1.09    2.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    0.18
Na Li         2.12    3.00         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    3.36
Na Li         1.15    4.10         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    0.62
Na Li         1.34    12.19         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    4.14
Na Li         1.25    574.53         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    143.63
Na Li         1.3    63.74         Back    12-Aug-12 20:07    12-Aug-12 20:07    19.12
By:
Bayes.
When: 13 Aug 12 15:32
Only lets me post 20 lines. Anyway here's a few more of the juicy ones. Can only laugh at some really. Fancy having 10k on to win 600 on something that I make 33/1


Na Li        1.1    99.99        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    10
Na Li        1.44    8.11        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    3.57
Na Li        4.4    7.18        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    24.41
Na Li        3.55    2.84        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    7.24
Na Li        1.55    4.46        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    2.45
Na Li        1.25    5.74        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    1.44
Na Li        1.2    1.64        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    0.33
Na Li        1.66    2.11        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    1.39
Na Li        1.29    3.13        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    0.91
Na Li        1.14    341.98        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    47.88
Na Li        1.5    2.55        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    1.28
Na Li        1.05    6,502.36        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    325.12
Na Li        1.06    10,000.00        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    600
Na Li        1.64    210.98        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    135.03
Na Li        4.2    300        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    960
Na Li        1.5    19.15        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    9.58
Na Li        1.69    3.19        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    2.2
Na Li        5.6    3.13        Back    12/08/2012 20:07    12/08/2012 20:07    14.4
By:
DStyle
When: 13 Aug 12 15:39
exactly, where are you getting matched at 34s and 26s which would have been safarova's inverse odds rendered in the UI.
By:
DStyle
When: 13 Aug 12 15:40
i would argue that you would have a strong case if this bet had gone against you and the inverse odds rendering was on.
By:
Ghetto Joe
When: 13 Aug 12 16:09
If I was sticking thru bets of £32K per click I think I'd be looking to commission someone to write me a bit of API software, you've been on here long enough to realise Betfair aren't going to do fa.
By:
Contrarian3
When: 13 Aug 12 18:36
Bayes,

You were using your own custom-built software before weren't you? As Trevh said, you made a similar mistake a while ago and then added some code to insure against rogue prices being entered.

Why are you going through the website now?
By:
the silverback
When: 13 Aug 12 19:32
What I'm after is something that stops your bet if it is more than x% out from the last price matched. Safarova had been sub 1.2 for a while and it is absolutely absurd to allow a bet of 32k liability at 26 at this point.

Do you mean betfair should have something that stops your bet? That really would be absurd.
By:
Bayes.
When: 13 Aug 12 21:43
Contrarian

My software was rewritten so that I can't change who I'm backing or laying. This is usually enough but last night the market flipflopped and I was inactive for a while. I got back involved but forgot that my software was set up to back lay Na Li only. I backed the 32.5k at 1.04 thinking I was backing Safarova when in fact I was backing Na Li.

Still very easy to solve. Just have it check that the runner I'm backing is odds on at last refresh, if not no bet. Can't lose 30k like this laying. Took my coders 3 hours to sort it today and it won't happen again on my part. Still utterly bonkers that a) it can happen for this amount of money (and someone benefited for the same amount for zero effort or skill) and  b) it can still happen to someone else at any time from now on for possibly more than this
By:
U.A.
When: 13 Aug 12 22:20
Bayes just out of my own curiousity, after the match how did you feel.

On the one hand you must have been livid that the mistake was made and was allowed to happen. On the other hand if you hadn't made such a mistake and bet properly you would have been £30k down instead of in profit so you benefited from the mistake by over £30k (obviously subject to any further trading) which must feel rather quite pleasing.

So did you feel more annoyed or happy as the 2 lasses shook hands.
By:
Bayes.
When: 13 Aug 12 22:35
UA: As trite as it may sound I'm never really that interested in the actual result, I'm interested in the overall equity of my bets. Having a -30k trade in there is not entirely clever and that is what determines my mood. I had a really good day financially, but that kind of mistake is unforgivable, and comes straight off my bottom line. I was gutted, proper gutted. I reacted as all true pro's do and had an extra bottle of red!
By:
Northbouy
When: 14 Aug 12 15:08
why complain about betfairs system if you are using your own software, I dont get it?
By:
Rollo Tomasi
When: 15 Aug 12 19:00
I agree with Northbouy.

It was pilot error not changing player.
By:
Bayes.
When: 15 Aug 12 23:36
Pilot error, yes. My badly written software, yes. But should anyone be allowed to give away 30k so easily in a well formed market? It was 5-1 final set to Safarova. Laying her at 26.0 was quite obviously bonkers.
By:
Trevh
When: 16 Aug 12 03:07
I don't think you should legislate against stupidity though. You could say the whole system thrives on people doing bonkers things, I mean a few people win good money on BF because many people are prepared to take or give away bonkers prices. I do know what you mean though, your example is extreme bonkers, but where would you draw the line of allowable bonkerism? x + 50%, x + 100%?

Personally I prefer the idea of an exchange where all prices/offers are accepted, and we all know what a shark pool it can be, but we have to learn to look after ourselves :)
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 16 Aug 12 09:08
They could let you set your own level of bonkerism Trev.
By:
Feck N. Eejit
When: 16 Aug 12 09:11
I'm talking about the normal interface there as I think the checks should all be client side. Anyone using the api would have to code it into their own software or have their vendor do it for them.
By:
Boozle
When: 16 Aug 12 13:21

Aug 15, 2012 -- 11:36PM, Bayes. wrote:


Pilot error, yes. My badly written software, yes. But should anyone be allowed to give away 30k so easily in a well formed market? It was 5-1 final set to Safarova. Laying her at 26.0 was quite obviously bonkers.


Unless of course Safarova has just suffered a horrific injury, eg a broken leg, and you were trying to hoover everything in the market before everybody else.

By:
Andriy
When: 16 Aug 12 17:34
"What I'm after is something that stops your bet if it is more than x% out from the last price matched. Safarova had been sub 1.2 for a while and it is absolutely absurd to allow a bet of 32k liability at 26 at this point"

"do know what you mean though, your example is extreme bonkers, but where would you draw the line of allowable bonkerism? x + 50%, x + 100%? "

I don't see how you can include this in BF'S software, since cases arise like this aren't bonkers but are quite regular and occur every day in horseracing: a horses may be well clear trading very low and gradually lower, then ties up in an instant and another horse gains momentum rapidly. Some hores will then pick up again and go low again. Everyday there will be at least 1 case of a winner which has gone from sub 1.1 to big odds maybe 20+, and then back to sub 1.1, all occurring in a couple of seconds.
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