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07 Jun 20
19:56
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18 Feb 02
All betting slips are off as bookies return after coronavirus
Sabah Meddings
Sunday June 07 2020, 12.01am, The Sunday Times
Punters will not be offered a cup of tea when they walk back into betting shops next week. Nor will they be encouraged to use a betting slip to back their favoured horse at Royal Ascot.
Measures brought in to stop the spread of Covid-19 have driven Britain’s biggest gambling firms to overhaul how their shops operate.
“We’ll be bringing in ‘call-over’ betting, where you make your selection, go to the counter, speak your bet and collect your receipt,” said Nicola Frampton, head of retail at William Hill. Customers, 90% of whom bet with cash, will be pushed to use contactless payments.
Betting shops are on a list of non-essential retailers allowed to reopen in England on June 15. Shops in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will reopen later. Operators will enforce strict social distancing measures, limit the number of customers inside and remove furniture to stop punters sticking around to watch events.
It will be a reputational balancing act for Britain’s big names, including William Hill, Paddy Power owner Flutter Entertainment and GVC, the owner of Ladbrokes Coral.
While they want customers back for the return of sport, including the Premier League on June 17, they do not want to be accused of exploiting those stuck at home or off work due to Covid-19. All have agreed to pause TV and radio advertising during lockdown.
When William Hill reopens, initially there will be no promotions. Posters will be limited to “welcome back” greetings, and advice to stay at home if feeling unwell.
“There’s been a lot of voluntary action taken by the industry in response to concern about incomes and wellbeing . . . we felt it wasn’t appropriate at this moment to be having massive promotions in the windows,” said Frampton.
Betting operators still expect big losses in their 7,315 shops after reopening. They are already smarting from a crackdown on betting machines that allowed players to gamble up to £300 a minute. Last year, the maximum stake for one spin was slashed to £2, driving revenue from the machines down from £1.1bn to £624m between October 2018 and September 2019.
Shareholders suffered, too. Shares in William Hill have halved in two years, closing at 153.8p on Friday. Until recently, bookmakers had enjoyed rapid growth. Gross gambling yield — the amount kept after winnings — had risen from £8.4bn to £14.3bn over a decade, partly thanks to the 2005 Gambling Act, which allowed betting companies to advertise.
Moves to restrict ads, including a whistle-to-whistle ban during sports events, could threaten this. Bookies also face pressure on costs as staff come off state support. William Hill has 8,000 staff on furlough; GVC has 15,000.
Smaller operators with little or no online presence will be under particular strain. “We’d be happy with 50% [of usual trade] in the first few weeks,” said Greg Knight, managing director of Jenningsbet. He plans to install plastic screens between betting machines and have a staff member act as “social distancing ambassador”.
GVC plans a “one in, one out” system at peak times, using remote-controlled door locks. Flutter is to remove comfortable seating in its Paddy Power shops.
“We recognise it’s going to be a different world,” said Dan Taylor, Flutter’s chief executive for Europe. “I’m acutely aware of the broader political environment . . . It is critical that we create a safe environment.”
Racing
Sabah Meddings
Sunday June 07 2020, 12.01am, The Sunday Times
Punters will not be offered a cup of tea when they walk back into betting shops next week. Nor will they be encouraged to use a betting slip to back their favoured horse at Royal Ascot.
Measures brought in to stop the spread of Covid-19 have driven Britain’s biggest gambling firms to overhaul how their shops operate.
“We’ll be bringing in ‘call-over’ betting, where you make your selection, go to the counter, speak your bet and collect your receipt,” said Nicola Frampton, head of retail at William Hill. Customers, 90% of whom bet with cash, will be pushed to use contactless payments.
Betting shops are on a list of non-essential retailers allowed to reopen in England on June 15. Shops in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will reopen later. Operators will enforce strict social distancing measures, limit the number of customers inside and remove furniture to stop punters sticking around to watch events.
It will be a reputational balancing act for Britain’s big names, including William Hill, Paddy Power owner Flutter Entertainment and GVC, the owner of Ladbrokes Coral.
While they want customers back for the return of sport, including the Premier League on June 17, they do not want to be accused of exploiting those stuck at home or off work due to Covid-19. All have agreed to pause TV and radio advertising during lockdown.
When William Hill reopens, initially there will be no promotions. Posters will be limited to “welcome back” greetings, and advice to stay at home if feeling unwell.
“There’s been a lot of voluntary action taken by the industry in response to concern about incomes and wellbeing . . . we felt it wasn’t appropriate at this moment to be having massive promotions in the windows,” said Frampton.
Betting operators still expect big losses in their 7,315 shops after reopening. They are already smarting from a crackdown on betting machines that allowed players to gamble up to £300 a minute. Last year, the maximum stake for one spin was slashed to £2, driving revenue from the machines down from £1.1bn to £624m between October 2018 and September 2019.
Shareholders suffered, too. Shares in William Hill have halved in two years, closing at 153.8p on Friday. Until recently, bookmakers had enjoyed rapid growth. Gross gambling yield — the amount kept after winnings — had risen from £8.4bn to £14.3bn over a decade, partly thanks to the 2005 Gambling Act, which allowed betting companies to advertise.
Moves to restrict ads, including a whistle-to-whistle ban during sports events, could threaten this. Bookies also face pressure on costs as staff come off state support. William Hill has 8,000 staff on furlough; GVC has 15,000.
Smaller operators with little or no online presence will be under particular strain. “We’d be happy with 50% [of usual trade] in the first few weeks,” said Greg Knight, managing director of Jenningsbet. He plans to install plastic screens between betting machines and have a staff member act as “social distancing ambassador”.
GVC plans a “one in, one out” system at peak times, using remote-controlled door locks. Flutter is to remove comfortable seating in its Paddy Power shops.
“We recognise it’s going to be a different world,” said Dan Taylor, Flutter’s chief executive for Europe. “I’m acutely aware of the broader political environment . . . It is critical that we create a safe environment.”
Racing
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Replies: 36
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"social distancing ambassador" you have to chuckle.
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Call out on a 10p e/w Goliath should be fun
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"Operators will enforce strict social distancing measures, limit the number of customers inside and remove furniture to stop punters sticking around to watch events."
Maybe they should take out TVs and just have a radio commentary.The commentator could be encouraged to give every horse a chance and have the last furlong last about a minute. |
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^ rapid late headway
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The commentator could be encouraged to give every horse a chance and have the last furlong last about a minute.
With the winner getting up on the line without a single previous mention in commentary. |
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contactless , thats a maximum of £ 30 isnt ?
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Contactless increased to £45
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do a few rapid ones of those in a bookies and bank will soon put stop on card - NAP
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do you know ive never used contactless, but my partner tells me you can only use it 3 times x45 so 135£, god i occassionly bet much more, eg i might have 3 or 4 £ 100 bets on freddies pushes etc, i sometimes put a grand on at 1/10
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They've got to be seen to do the right thing but can't see them refusing a nice wad of cash if it suits.
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Is contactless payout actually possible?
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Contactless payments in betting shops.....might just be a reality check for some punters when they see their bank statements.
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So instead of a slow count as the greyhounds are about to go off we will have a slow call over lol. Sounds like a Norman Collier sketch ffs.
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Imagine trying to get a price from the cashier on some of those Hamdan al Maktoum beasts.
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anyone asks to see a copy of your bank statement, umm .. ok. just ignore that 5k i spent in laddies on June 19th
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does anyone know if freds is opening on the 15th?
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Wasn't fred the first one out of the traps with the begging bowl signing up to the government 80% employee payment plan.
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government paid his staff £4 an hour & fred paid the remaining quid ...
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contactless? most of the older shop punters i know would not have a debit card ,cash only.
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true, and a lot write a bet on with as much as about 20 selections in all kind of perms, which would take ages for counter staff to input.
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my son manages a billies elis and some of the bets written on slips you wouldnt belive ,he takes pics of some of the more coulouful ones on his phone andon one betting slip he showed me were about 20 different bets all in tiny writting totaling about £6, i needed a magnifying glass to try and decipher it , he has some tales of incidents in shops ,i am not computer techy (old school) but i will see if i can get him to load a few pics up of some of the bets he has had to deal with .
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can imagine that guy calling his bet over ^^^^
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just to add the 20 odd bets were all multis/accas trebles etc . no singles .
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id say that 99.9% of people i see betting, pay cash , and a lot are the older brigade and there is no way theyll use a card
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and again, good call on love yesterday at 12/1
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thanks elis and good luck.yes elis and a lot of them wont want to be jumping through hoops trying to open bank accounts in order to get a debit card so can see the shops loosing a lot of those core customers .
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When oncourse books allowed to trade again CASH we be 100% welcomed with open arms....theres nothing wrong with it...media scaremongering lol
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It only says they are pushing contactless,they've got to be seen doing the right thing,they will know they couldn't survive without ca**** a PR exercise.
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Strange?
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same in retail................Banks have own agenda for pushing contactless .......but cash is perfectly safe and CANNOT be refused...
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sticking all your placepot perms on one slip was a treat for settlers on a busy bank holiday
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Most punters like their bets to be very confidential. Does not seem that way ,if you are calling your bets from 2 metres from the counter.If betting shops survive i will be amazed.
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there once was a bookie called dot
who tried to settle my place pot the bets were all writ on one betting slip so happy, she certainly was not |
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Back in the 1960s I had a holiday job in Raper's cavernous betting shop in Doncaster ;there were a number of us clerks at the counter and the punters told us their bets which we wrote down
,gave the punter the top copy and retained the duplicate. As a lad of 16 at the time I learned a lot of exotics which I'd previously not heard of. |
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Will we be allowed to remain in the shop for the quarter hour it takes for our bet to be rejected?
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a 10 x e/w permed super yankee
number 1 - 3 - 5 horse every punter in shop thinks your playing bingo |