[doulikefish]

Blah blah blah technology fault blah blah blah technology fault,betfair are carrying out an investigation blah blah blah full explanation will follow blah blah blah

[Akpo Sodje]

Did they refund the stakes people placed on the horse?

[doulikefish]

Akpo Sodje, on 29 December 2011 - 16:07, said:

Did they refund the stakes people placed on the horse?

hasnt been mentioned but if the bets void then they would have

[doulikefish]

Poor stuff that the whole market wasnt void

[fanny paddery]

Read online that aparently it is a company who have a sort of credit account with betfair, ie they can go into a negative balance hence why the exposure was so high. The number avaliable 2147483647 is The maximum signed 32 bit value. Largest 31 bit prime, hence it was obvious it was a technical error

[doulikefish]

fanny paddery, on 29 December 2011 - 17:05, said:

Read online that aparently it is a company who have a sort of credit account with betfair, ie they can go into a negative balance hence why the exposure was so high. The number avaliable 2147483647 is The maximum signed 32 bit value. Largest 31 bit prime, hence it was obvious it was a technical error

That was denied in the interview,"nobody can go into negative balance" He said that about 5 or 6 times

[blue4578]

Betfair offer credit accounts, I can tell you that for certain.

[doulikefish]

blue4578, on 29 December 2011 - 18:24, said:

Betfair offer credit accounts, I can tell you that for certain.

I believe you as ive been told the same

[H_B]

Yes, my issue is that betting a horse that physically can't win a race is also an "obvious error".

And yet the bots, as this was, clear up on mug punters who don't have fast pictures.

Ultimately, yes, you dont have to use BF (and I don't) but it just smells bad. Basically the "no lose" strategy of using a bot has backfired, and this is the consequence. They are so lacking in transparency about this.

[blue4578]

A lot of people look at bots at some sort of mystical, can't lose type of thing because they don't understand them and/or haven't seen them in action. I run bots myself for various stuff, and you can lose just as easily as if you're betting in the traditional way. It depends what you're telling your bot to do. You can have lots of complex algorithms, but if the statistics behind them are wrong, you can easily lose. All a bot is doing is carrying out transactions based on pre-set instructions.

With in-running horse racing, it comes down to people beating the time delay (as it does in other sports in-running). I good friend of mine runs an exchange shop. It is nominally a betting shop so he doesn't get into trouble for running an unlicensed betting operation, but he only takes about £100 in bets over the counter on a good week. There are about 25 PCs set up, each with a monitor and also a TV screen with the raw SIS feed for the horse racing, which is upto 8-10 seconds ahead of people watching on TV. There is lots of messing about and joking around inbetween races, but when racing starts the whole place falls quiet apart from the sound of the TVs. All of these people, pretty much all young men under 30, bet in-running on horse racing. They might use one click betting software, but no one is running automated bots. How would you get a bot to understand what is happening in the race and translate it to odds instantaneously? Of course in something like tennis, a scoreboard is very useful for something like that.....

This "super" Premium Charge was apparently set up to make more money from these in-running horse racing people. My account manager said 90% of the people paying it were in-running horse racing people (I don't believe the percentage is anywhere near that high). Apparently when the new charge was brought in, Betfair's horse racing volumes were unaffected. When I've visited this exchange shop, the number of Porsches and Ferraris parked outside indicates that some people are doing rather well out of beating the time delay. It looks like these people are happy to pay Betfair an extra 40%-60% of their winnings because they couldn't do what they do anywhere else.

[magic sign]

blue4578, on 29 December 2011 - 14:33, said:

Absolute nonsense.

Maybe this is true if you're a big bookmaker and are disappointed that Betfair process more bets than every other bookmaker in the UK combined. What is true is that Betfair need a serious competitor so that they can't be complacent, can't charge what they like and can't mess things up badly without their customers being able to leave and go and do the same thing elsewhere. I moan about Betfair here quite a lot but in the past decade, 99% of what they've been about has been hugely beneficial for punters.

I don't think that anyone can argue that Betfair has changed things for the better for punters. Even punters that don't use Betfair have benefited as a result of the high street bookies having to at least try and stay semi-competitive.

The problem is that a lot of the people that used to rave about Betfair have become disillusioned over the last 2-3 years, and more importantly are worried about what Betfair are going to do in the future.

Two guys that have inside knowledge (and who are infinitely more knowledgeable than me) Scott Ferguson and Mark Davies have given slightly conflicting views recently.


Scott Ferguson
http://centrecourttr...t-ferguson.html

Mark Davies
http://www.markxdavies.com/

This post has been edited by magic sign: 29 December 2011 - 21:19

[H_B]

blue4578, on 29 December 2011 - 18:54, said:

A lot of people look at bots at some sort of mystical, can't lose type of thing because they don't understand them and/or haven't seen them in action. I run bots myself for various stuff, and you can lose just as easily as if you're betting in the traditional way. It depends what you're telling your bot to do. You can have lots of complex algorithms, but if the statistics behind them are wrong, you can easily lose. All a bot is doing is carrying out transactions based on pre-set instructions.

With in-running horse racing, it comes down to people beating the time delay (as it does in other sports in-running).

Well, yes. It's basically licensed theft. People are winning money without any form of risk. OK, they are pretty stupid to be betting in running with pictures on a 5 second time delay, but still.

[blue4578]

I completely disagree. No one is being forced to lose their money.

Yes the people with pictures several seconds ahead of TV have a massive advantage, but they can still lose if they're not good at what they do. They're competing against other people doing the same thing with the same advantages. As for the man sitting at home trying to bet on horse racing in-running by watching TV, well pretty quickly you'd become aware that some people have an advantage. If you still continue to gamble this way, then that's your own choice. Some people will use the in-running facility to hedge their bets, cover their stakes or whatever. Some people will not be bothered that they're giving a little bit of money away in this way.

One of Betfair's greatest strengths is that they offer in-running betting on virtually everything. Personally I think betting in-running on horse racing is madness unless you're one of the ones with the raw feeds. Most other sports have breaks in play, where it's safe to bet in-running even though some people may be 5-8 seconds, or even more, ahead. There can't be anyone who isn't aware that standard television sports coverage is going to be several seconds behind live. If people complain, Betfair have increased the time delay slightly on certain things. Spanish football was one, because Sky's pictures were way, way behind live, so the delay was increased to 8 seconds, probably more to give Betfair the chance to suspend in time by watching the Spanish TV feed. Baseball also had the time delay increased from 5 to 6 seconds because people from Canada had a massive advantage.

As for people laying things that have already lost, this isn't without its risks as well. Usually you're risking £999 for every £1 you're trying to win (laying 1000). A couple of times this has gone horribly wrong that I've seen, and I'm sure there have been hundreds of other occasions over the years. I've mentioned this here before, but one happened when Andy Roddick was playing (I think) a Spanish player in Rome three or four years ago. Roddick won the first set, and had match point on his serve at 6-5 in the second set tie break. He served what looked like an ace, umpire called game, set and match, opponent was then layed at 1000. However Roddick's opponent asked the umpire to check the mark, ball was called out, Roddick lost the second serve point, lost the set, and lost the final set and the match. Not good if you'd layed the winner at 999/1 is it? Same thing happened in an NFL game a couple of years ago. A team was taking a field goal at time ran out to try and tie the game and take it to overtime. Field goal was called wide on the field and the game was apparently over and that team was layed at 1000. Very unusually for a field goal attempt, the coach challenged the call a few moments later. Replays showed that the ball had passed above height of the posts, but also inside the post and the decision was reversed. I think on this occasion the team layed at 1000 ended up losing in overtime anyway, but it just shows what can happen.

On stuff like tennis set betting, particularly at grand slams, people lay player X to win 2-0 or 3-0, and then if he loses a set, they'll back 2-0 or 3-0 @ 1000 just to free up their funds to bet elsewhere. They are knowingly backing something that they know can't win. If I'm watching a match, I'll often try to be first in the queue laying 1000 just to make an easy £20 or £50 over an hour or two as I've usually got plenty of spare funds to do so. Although obviously I make sure that the set winning point can't be challenged or overturned first like mentioned above.

[Stewartl]

blue4578, on 29 December 2011 - 18:24, said:

Betfair offer credit accounts, I can tell you that for certain.

I can confirm this is true

[fanny paddery]

It turns out betfair are now honouring all bets in that race which were placed before 'the technology failure' in both the win and to place market. Not a bad gesture really seen as the relevant gambling commision did not ask them to do that.

[Green&White Zebra]

I used to have accounts with Paddy Power, Ladbrokes, William Hill, Coral's and Blue Square. Still do obviously, but I've simply discarded them all now and only used Betfair. I am, it must be stressed, a recreational punter. 99% of my betting is on horse racing and I never bet in-play. For a small punter like myself, who only bets singles and places (trying to give up each way as I've only just worked out that it's bad value), Betfair is excellent. Put it this way, when a horse wins at an SP of 20/1 and you're on at 33's, it's because the it offers better value on value bets.

I'm not sure that BF needs competition, however. It looks like it needs regulated. If you have two betting exchanges in competition, then all things being equal, their prices will converge. Bookies surely use exchanges to offset or reinsure their risk. The way I see it, a betting exchange is going to virtually monopolise single betting in the future and if that's the case, I'd rather it was not in the hands of shareholders, but effectively held in trust - a bit like the Tote. Instead of commission a levy on the total funds invested in a market can be taken to cover admin costs and perhaps even used to fund the sport that being bet upon.

I completely agree that this premium charge is outrageous, but I suspect it's a game going on with some pissed off bookies in the background. Perhaps it would be fairer to put an upper limit on the amount staked per individual in an in-play market.

[clopotor]

hello,

i've been a trader for a few years now but i've been making money for about a year or so.as i started winning and my allowance ended i found myself having to pay the premium charge.was looking for hours and hours for ways to avoid paying it.only found two:arbing and betting on correlated markets. But :the 1st one is dangerous if one is already in that zone,plus if you're that good finding winners on another site,week after week,why not betting those selections and forget about arbing them?and why should i help betfair by arbing there for losses?how can we expect liquidity to go down when people do this and they're all looking for losses there?instead of trying to lower the liquidity they're only increasing it thus betdaq getting a huge blow.the 2nd one:you deal with the comission and you have to use substantially higher stakes than your aimed profit is,thus,you have to wait more for odds to move in the corresponding market so that you can close a position.it's far too risky for my liking.it would be ok doing it once or twice a week but i would have to do it on nearly every market i'm showing profits.it's time consuming,risky and offers little reward.

note,i'm not paying 40%-60% like some other users do but 20%.can't imagine how i would react if i were to be charged for 40-60%.they changed the rules twice,they will do it in the future,for the worse,i have no doubt.trying to find ways to LOSE on a site is ABSURD.that's what i've been thinking for about a week or so.

puzzle is:why isn't betdaq doing anything to capitalize on this?like blue said,they need more markets,a more stable API and a better advertizing campaign.i,for one,will start gambling on football (that's my sport),gonna put my money on reliable sites,which are honest!you know the game before you start.you know how much you win if you win,you know how much you lose if you lose.it's a huge difference.betfair is not to be trusted.i have 2 options:betdaq to grow or gambling,or both,why not?

i'm not gonna stop trading today but i'm gonna be trading much less than until now and i'm gonna try to find oportunities on betdaq.what i'm gonna do is to start betting on football with credible bookies who don't change the rules during the game.i know it's much riskier BUT if you do it right you can make fortunes there.