General Betting
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Why do they bother to have all these crazy 'concessions' if they take them away after a bet or two.
First bet with BetFred for almost a year. A losing account. Placed £150 at 7/2 on a horse for Saturday. Horse drifted to 9/2 SP and lost.
I did not beat the price. I am not an arber. I am a pure gambler. Today I got this:
Hi xxxxxxxx,
Following a review of your account we are no longer able to offer you the concession of "best odds guaranteed" or free bet related offers on any business conducted on your account.
We assure you that this decision has been taken after careful consideration and does not affect your ability to bet in any other way across our Sportsbook and other products.
If you have any further queries please feel free to contact us by one of the following methods.
Inside the UK: xxxxxxxxxxx
Rest of the world: xxxxxxxxxx
E-mail: xxxxxxxxxxxx
Kind regards,
Fred
I mean seriously is this any way to do business? If the BOG concession is uneconomic for a losing account that does not beat the price who is it for??
I really am surprised that bookmakers are allowed to offer prices and concessions and then pick and choose who gets them. But if we accept that is ok it still does not explain why they do it.
This account is making them money. It will very likely continue to make them money. This horse drifted to way bigger than 9/2 on Betfair anyway so 9/2 was a very skinny SP.
There must be a gap in the market for a bookmaker willing to operate as a bookmaker.
If you have had other messages from your bookie about this please post on here. Lets see how widespread this situation is of losing accounts being restricted.
First bet with BetFred for almost a year. A losing account. Placed £150 at 7/2 on a horse for Saturday. Horse drifted to 9/2 SP and lost.
I did not beat the price. I am not an arber. I am a pure gambler. Today I got this:
Hi xxxxxxxx,
Following a review of your account we are no longer able to offer you the concession of "best odds guaranteed" or free bet related offers on any business conducted on your account.
We assure you that this decision has been taken after careful consideration and does not affect your ability to bet in any other way across our Sportsbook and other products.
If you have any further queries please feel free to contact us by one of the following methods.
Inside the UK: xxxxxxxxxxx
Rest of the world: xxxxxxxxxx
E-mail: xxxxxxxxxxxx
Kind regards,
Fred
I mean seriously is this any way to do business? If the BOG concession is uneconomic for a losing account that does not beat the price who is it for??
I really am surprised that bookmakers are allowed to offer prices and concessions and then pick and choose who gets them. But if we accept that is ok it still does not explain why they do it.
This account is making them money. It will very likely continue to make them money. This horse drifted to way bigger than 9/2 on Betfair anyway so 9/2 was a very skinny SP.
There must be a gap in the market for a bookmaker willing to operate as a bookmaker.
If you have had other messages from your bookie about this please post on here. Lets see how widespread this situation is of losing accounts being restricted.
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You had one bet in a year and if it won it'd have triggered the BOG offer they don't want your type of business frog as it'll appear to them you're clued up qand in the long run will take money off them from your betting style. Both Chandlers and 365 have severely restricted or closed losing accounts of mine just because they can see the bets I was doing would eventually return a profit so it's nothing to do with the state of your account just what you're punting on or your style of play.
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'Style of play' - it was one bet on a race from Sandown on a Saturday afternoon. A race millions must have been turned over around the country.
Would they have preferred I had bet on a horse that went 7/2 to 7/4? |
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Insidertrader = frog2's other account.
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Agree that UK "bookmakers" are a disgrace. I fail to understand why any thinking punter would bother with them.
As for the "no way to run a business" comment. These guys make their $$ exploiting vulnerable and addicted mugs so needn`t worry about treating their customers (victims) with any decency |
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yeah and thanks for sending all your drop kick betting companies to Australia...........fck cnts they are
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The only conclusion frog is that it was to do with the stake
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Freds/Tote are scared to death of taking on money on horses full stop. Only advice I can give is if you do want to bet with them don't bet on the horses.
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Freds wont take bets on any sport. Utterly rancid company
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logroller,
Before the UK/Irish took over the Australian firms what size bets did the likes of sportsbet and iasbet take? Iasbet cut me to pennies after two winning win singles at odds on for Brazil to win in Confederation Cup matches last summer. Just seems odd behaviour given the amounts bet on the matches and the level of information available to everyone. I read in Alan Tripp's book that he cut winning players at his Vanuatu operation so I find it hard to believe his son did not do the same at Sportsbet. |
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Is tripp allowed to publically state that?
Would it not put him in breach of his license? |
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Can only quote from 'Beating the Odds' that was written about Alan Tripp by Nichola Garvey:
' 1998 Traditionally, on-course bookies controlled the flow of smarties' bets by balancing the odds against the amount of money laid against the horse. In other words, you could take a bet from a smartie and then manage your book so that your financial exposure was minimised. SP bookmakers had a different approach. They wanted to service the social punter and they didn't want him to bet elsewhere. Alan's mantra was to build loyalty, and he did that by not changing the odds he offered. Most bookies would shorten their odds, but Alan's approach was that if, occassionally, he had to reduce the liability he would bet back with another bookie and leave the price as it was. He didn't want the next client to have the disadvantage of shorter odds. His was a service provider's rather than a genuine bookie's mentality. The trouble was that the smarties regularly won and so had unbelievably favourable odds. Week after week the same clients were winning...... and the losses were costing Alan hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars a week. ..... Alan decided that he had had enough. There was no other option..... He started imposing limits - certain clients could only win certain amounts. With others, he started closing accounts, simply refusing the business of certain punters.' I guess the model of the service provider is different to that of a bookie. |
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You cannot have a winning horseracing account w/ any of the recreational books. I've been through well over 30, all the UK and most of the Oz firms, in every case never placing a bet if I could have had it better on an exchange.
For a while the phone lines were willing to 'buy' my info./judgement off me cheaply but even that came to an end. It's still a lot easier to beat bm s in the mornings than it is to win on bf, so for anyone with a serious interest placers are the way to go. |
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Frog
I was betting regularly with IAS, when it was owned and operated by Mark Read. I would have averaged winning $20k a year for four years or so, betting mainly on trifectas and quinellas. Never once was a bet queried. In fact, Read had a reputation for not barring punters. Three months after he sold out to Paddy Power, my account was closed. |
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frog..............late 90's before the UK invasion, between the 6-12 nationwide betting operators all privately owned you could get more than $100k on a head to head footy match, even when it was regarded so called "educated money", now Sportsbet on a footy game bet me up until the day of the game $25 on a line or single and maybe 800$ on game day, before paddy came along they might bet u 10k to 15k if it suited but always 5k.
Horse racing different kettle of fish. |
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The most annoying thing in all of this is that the bookies either don't take any bet off you at the odds, or give you a smaller stake, yet still maintain the price. I've always found this behaviour most strange and flies in the face of what bookmaking should be about.
Why not lay a bet to set amount? If "shrewdies" take the price, then clip the odds. If they keep taking the new price, clip the odds further. Strangely, Pinnacle seem to be running a very successful business on small margins operating in exactly the traditional way bookmaking was intended and apparently have the sharpist lines in the business. You always know in advance what they will give you at the price and if you have the limit on then the price changes and you can go in for more if you want. Why can't the likes of PP, VC, Fred and the other clown shoe wearers from the big top operate in the same way? |
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BM's started to change their behaviour towards horse players back in the 90's so this topic has been around since then at least.
In no special order,I will speculate that these have been the key changes & reasons why the situation has occred and will only get worse for genuine horse backers. 1. The withdrawal of credit.Credit accounts allowed players to leverage their banks especially with regard to A/P bets where settlement was after the event. A/P was deemed a PR success for BM's but at the price of more than a few successful winning accounts. Consequently, A/P markets are virtually dead - why have cash tied up for 6 months or more. Even worse for layers on exchanges where only a few - live - horses will be backed. The best marketing move that BF could make would be to provide credit facilities for larger players. 2. Closure of winning accounts.Using the Pareto theory, BM's identified those players who were taking money off them and decided that they could do without them. When exchanges came along this process accelerated so that anybody who who had accounts closed was forced to migrate to exchnges. 3. Closure of "live" moneyn extension of 2. Anyone seen to be backing "shorteners" got the same treatment. 4. "Off-Shore" Moves Continuation of focus on cost minimisation. 5. "Football & other Sports" growth Horse racing highly sensitive to insiders, therefore risk increased. Exchanges pulled SP's down, reduced profit. Football grew rapidly, less risk of inside money. Bm's could take larger amounts without being open to taking a caning. 6. "FOBTS"Labour Govt. helped turn High Street BM's into minin-casiinos, with low manpower costs, no risks, which took money away from more labour intensive, higher risk horseracing. 7. Systems Management/Central control Now possible for Bm's to monitor bets taken in real time, significantly improve risk management 8. Employment of Quants.Like investnent banks/hedgies, BM's have takken on high power maths graduates to improve odds setting, financial controls 9. Exchanges the perfect odds compiling source far superior for large scale market control than individual odds compilers who could always be more easily beaten by knowledgeable players. It's a brave new world now for sure.No surprise then even players with losing accounts may not be wanted. |
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Sandown,
Agree with all the various points but it still defies any logic. If you have all the bet controls and risk limits in place why would you be quicker than ever to close accounts? You can monitor far more effectively and use that information to your advantage. With the advent of all the algorithms/quants that are now used in conjunction with exchange prices it can lead me to only two conclusions; 1 - The odds compilers (Risk assessors) are now simply not fit for purpose. If they were any good they would go and work for themselves. Maybe the bookmakers realise this and hence so reliant on point 2. Can an odds compiler these days really get any job satisfaction from what they do? Having seen the odds compilers at close quarters at a company who would regard themselves as relevant I am not surprised the industry is in such a state. I do feel sorry for them though as so much of this comes from senior management who are just bean counters. 2 - The bookmakers are literally only interested in casino products/FOBTs. I did not realise that we were going to get mini casinos all around the UK. I am sure this was not the intention when they were originally brought in but is the way it has ended up. Lets hope that the government actually wakes up to this huge problem and restricts FOBTs appropriately. One further thing I would add is that bookmakers have created this situation. They would ban arbers and those taking the best prices. All it means is that they will open more accounts in others names and it is then a viscous circle to where we are at now where accounts get closed ridiculously quickly. I have no time specifically for arbers but given the resources available to bookmakers these days it is just really poor bookmaking from them that has them worried about it. They really should take a leaf out of Pinnacles book. If a bookmaker offers a price they should be willing to lay it without recourse. If they are not then don't offer the price. Its not that tough surely... |
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Tom
The logic behind this is that BM's have become financial institutions and are run more like investment banks/hedge funds than the old traditional BM model. |
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Incidently, contrary to the general view view re. barney Curleys latest coup, I doubt very much that the BM's loss ran into "millions". Their risk management systems are just too good to allow that to happen now. Certainly as far as the large B's are concerned . Still, the perception is good PR.
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What is interesting is alot of what the online bookie make is swallowed by marketing and technology costs. £100m a year on marketing and £60m+ a year on tech seems common place.
At the other end of the market you had Betfair exchange (is it around 1.2% of total matched used to be gross profit). Much smaller advertising costs because of word of mouth and great PR from their disruptive technology. You also have Pinnacle (no figures available) and IBCBET with a reported 0.67% margin on $45bn turnover. IBCBET is all through agents without any advertsing as far as I can see. Both these firms tell you exactly what you can bet at the current price and its available to anyone. They try to make a market and balance the action as a proper bookmaker. ..... The question is which model is best? Is all the extra costs associated with live steaming and 1000s of football matches a week really worth it? Are the huge advertising budgets really going to carry on bringing in new punters? Is the money punters are losing just pooring into the coffers of tech companies making new games and advertising agencies (both of which are giving diminishing returns)? ..... From December 2014 it looks a near certainty that the 15% gross profits tax is coming in for UK punters. Also the firms will have to pay racing about 10% gross profits (on racing bets) if they come back to UK. This makes the issue of gross margin very interesting. A bookmaker using prices to attract business with a lower advertising/tech budget should be in a better position IF enough punters care about price. For example imagine a bookie with £3bn a year turnover and a gross margin of 10% for UK customers. Very good website. Lots of advertising. Lots of accounts restricted and banned.: Gross Win £300m Gross Profits Tax £45m Gross Profit racing £30m Gross Win After GPT £225m Marketing Costs £100m Tech Costs £60m Operational Costs £40m Profit £25m Second bookie runs at a lower margin as way to attract business. Very streamlined. No video. Simple website and mobile aps. £3bn turnover and gross margin of 2%. Gross Win £60m Gross Profits Tax £9m Gross Profit racing 6m Gross Win After GPT £45m Marketing Costs £2m Tech Costs £5m (including the trading algorithms for automated pricing) Operational Costs £2m Profit £36m |
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I guess the general point is that a gross profit tax regime encourages a low margin high turnover approach like the original betfair, IBC and pinny.
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I get the impression that Pinnacle feel they can run their model because they have the best compilers. They also use the information they get from winning accounts very shrewdly. By banning no clients they get the pick of that information.
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Everyone goes on about Pinnacle, Sbobet is just as good.
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Disagree Yomomma. If I wanted to get even £10k on a football match I can do so easily at Pinnacle. Might just be my account but really struggle at Sbobet. Obviously the limits vary throughout the week but that's my experience.
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They don't restrict accounts so limits are the same for everyone. They have higher max bets for the handicaps than for the match odds. The limits start fairly low when they first publish the odds and are biggest closest to kick off times.
Say for the Real Madrid match tonight v Atletico, the max bet Real Madrid -0.5 at the moment is £11,112(GBP). |
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Discussion of this subject on RUK now
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Nice to see something like this being aired in public on RUK
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I think the moral of this story is clear : There is only one real bookie out there.
Someone above asked why no-one else is doing it like Pinny and I too would like to know why. Why is it that in the whole flking world only one company will actually stand a real bet and trust their judgément the way bookies always did ? Internet changed the game? |
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I don't think the corp bookies mind standing a bet, on the contrary, its who that bet is from that is the main criteria
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Anyone able to summarise what was said on RUK about the subject?
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There were numerous emails in from various people (Hislop said it was the biggest response they had ever had) most of which talked about restrictions or getting knocked back both online and in shops.
Mellish himself recognised that he was only still able to get on most of the time due to his position in the media. He was not shocked to hear so many stories about people with closed accounts and admitted that he himself had resorted to friends bank accounts at times as a means to get on. Hislop also had a good email in from a woman who said it was more difficult if you were female to get on as you were seen as a "beard" ie just a front to a husband/boyfriend/friend who was obviously male. THe point being that no woman could ever be successful of her own back so the bets must be for somebody else. In summary it was recognised that the practice was widespread and was just not great customer service at any level and that BM's should have to lay to a set liability regardless of where the money came from. Hislop thought that might be tough seeing as some don't even have odds compliliers these days but Mellish thought given technology bookies should be on top of both online and shop liabilities and be able to adjust the book accordingly fairly automatically. I didn't listen intently to all the discussion as was having a few horse and dog bets myself at the time but the above is the jist of what I got out of the show. |
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Is it legal if a Bookmaker close your account if you have a losing account?
Or is there something you can do against it? |
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bestchamp---yes it is legal
And billyhill will stop you withdrawing your winnings but will still let you bet,my pal has had his account ran this way for nearly 6 mounths now.So really its a case of you can lose,but if you win you can not withdraw.when he speaks to them all he gets is ,you are under investigation.we will let you know when the investigation is complete.6 mounths now with over 5 grand sat in account,how long would you think it will take. |
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I cannot think of any practices that are illegal with regards to paying up, not restricting accounts, not taking a bet etc.
I get the feeling that in the next decade or so things will change dramatically. You only have to look at online forex and stock trading to see where things will head in terms of margin. Betfair almost got there but lost their nerve at the last minute. 8%-10% gross win on online bets is not going to happen long term. Anyone that follows the industry can see that real sports betting is the driver of all these firms with games and casinos added on. The poker fade is dying. In the end it comes back to sports betting. Dynamic new uncertain events occurring on a daily basis. |
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I don't see how you can force a BM to take a bet to a set limit, certainly not to any given price, unless that limit is practically meaningless. In practice, price is the only mechanism that can control supply and demand, and market forces control the extent to which BM's are competitive.
By closing accounts directly or indirectly by limiting stakes to pence, BM's can manage their risks. Horse racing is just not an attractive sport compared to those where inside information is negligible, or chance is dominant. BM's have found more lucrative ways to profit than through betting on horses a. Horse racing is now primarily the shop window, the glamorous way still to attract business and to gain relatively cheap PR. The name of the game is to persuade punters attracted by racing to migrate to other more profitable, less risky bets. Exchanges and pari-mutel models work but both need massive liquidity to offer a slick product. The original BF concept was truly revolutionary and but for the desire to go public (understandable for Black et al to "cash out") BF might have carried all before them. It might have been possible for BF to have become the biggest player in the horse/sports betting market instead of being stuck below the 10% threshold. |
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of course you can force a bookie to take a bet to a set limit
the fact is racing does not need bookies. Hong Kong racing works fine without a bookie in sight If bookies don't want to play fair you get rid of them. They won't be missed |
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of course you can force a bookie to take a bet to a set limit
You can make it part of the licence as in Australia for on-course BM's but the UK is dominated by off-course BM's. Any limit would have to be very low. If bookies don't want to play fair you get rid of them. How? They are legal corporate entities. Hong Kong racing works fine without a bookie in sight Exactly. |
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Sandown,
What you can do is incentivise them to take a bet as part of their licence and re FOBTS. Ie If you are willing to allow people to play an FOBT machine for £50 a spin then you have to be obliged to lay a stake of £50. If the bookies are worried about the prices they offer then they can change them... Just because they are legal entities does not mean that they should be allowed to keep their bookmaking licences if they employ some of the underhand practices that we all know about. Yes bookmakers can restrict anyone they like but I am not sure when they were given their licences that it was anticipated that it would be such a widescale crackdown. Why not just introduce a rule that says accounts that are losing cannot be restricted/closed...or something similar. It needs the Gambling Commission to actually stand up and be counted. Given who funds it lets not hold our breath. |
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Tom
If the powers that be can't force banks to lend money then I can't see any reason why/how BM's can be made to lay a bet that they don't want too offer. It's always been a bookmaking practice to lay bets to people not just to prices eg Top of the card punters who they know play big and are guessers.They have always just taken part of the bet if they wish. It's just now that with players being identified through the BM's can always claim links between accounts. In truth, I have no ideas to offer other than hoping that BF come to their senses and allow big players to continue to play at a level that generates liquidity by not threatening the PC. The people that they are after are really the big traders/bot players yet they have sought to encourage exactly this kind of a plyaer over the years so strategically tBF are all over the place. Maybe Laddies/Quack might ride tio the rescue. If there was no BF/Quack then I couldn't have a bet other than on the course and there must be hundreds if not thousands just like me, so all hope lies with the exchanges. |