blonde poker forum

May not amount to anything but it appears to have some momentum.

There is an online petition to lobby for punters who just want to get sane levels of legitimate bets on with bookmakers - a subject which touches just about all of us.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/125456

If Tighty or Tikay feel inappropriate, please feel free to delete.

No probs with the link, Adz.

Can't see any petition making a dot of difference personally, but no harm in trying.

Bookies are commercial entities, & if they don't want to accept certain bets, that's their perfect right, or so it seems to me.

Market forces will do their thing, as always. 1 firm, struggling for business perhaps, may agree, & others may follow, but if they get exploited by the sharps - & they will - it'll not last long.    

Good luck with it though.

It might be easier to emigrate to Australia where the bookies have to lay the advertised prices up to a certain amount.

FWIW, I believe bookmakers should have to stand a bet from any legally aged person to an absolute minimum at advertised prices or they should forfeit their licenses.   

I don't bet much, but when I do it's well researched or selections come from sources I trust, I have had 2 accounts closed and one account restricted.   Why should a bookmaker be allowed to take little action from me but take plenty from people who know very little?  I find it heartbreaking when I occasionally pop into a shop for an early price and see men/woman with learning disabilities or who are absolutely skint and rely on state benefits being allowed to bet on cartoons and roulette machines yet I can't get £50 on a dog running at Hove or a horse running at Hamilton.   

I have signed and will encourage others to do so.   

Ladbrokes failed to make a profit without this. If they introduce this every pro sports bettor can reopen the 50 beard accounts he has and clean up.

In which case they should tighten up on security and make it compulsory for customers to provide ID for all accounts.   

If modern day online bookmakers were run like proper businesses it would be quite possible to do this.  There are several reasons why they can't.

1 - pricing in any business is critical. You don't see the cleaners and receptions in multi billion pound banks making crucial trading decisions.  Banks pay senior skilled traders fortunes to make these decisions for them.  Betting companies could also do this and be in a much stronger position to take on the vast majority of winning accounts and beat them longer term.  However they choose to pay peanuts and take monkeys whilst the guys who they should be employing in huge salaries continue to beat them up from the other side of the counter without the said firms even knowing it is them beating them up.  The firms still effectively pay their wages but get nothing in return skill and knowledge wise.

2 - the obsession that the bet fair market is always correct in the modern day world.  Bet fair is a market like all others, it has points and stages where it is out of equilibrium and inefficient like any market in the world,  the more skilled people around understand this and know how and why this is happening for whatever reason.  I appreciate it is highly likely to be a decent guide however people talk about it like it is totally unbeatable when it clearly isn't.  99.9% of the general public couldn't beat the for ex markets in the city so why are people surprised the same percentage of people can't beat the bet fair markets.  Doesn't mean there are not people out there who can.

3 - firms being tied to out of date trading policies which are suicidal mathematically but they are all scared to change them to actually make some money in a race to the bottom to try and keep up with the bet365 juggernaut.

4 - offering prices on anything that moves that no one has a clue about in the office for the same reason as above.

5 - offering over broke markets on the week they should be shelling peas taking on all the wagons and free bet offers that you can't possibly make pay long term, again all scared to lose market share to the 365 machine.  Bottom line is you still lose market share as your website/product is still inferior but your margins from wagons who would bet with you anyway falls through the floor as well.

Punters have never had it so good.  If you can't make a second income as a part time punter nowadays betting to pony's you really should give the game up.  The problem with that is that if you want to bet more than a pony on most stuff bookmakers, quite righty imo, have no interest in taking you on if you have any idea what you are doing.  They are all chasing their tail trying to stay afloat.  Without FOBT earnings the big four shop bookmakers in the uk literally wouldn't be a viable business.  It really is that obvious.  If the fobt's were banned the vast majority of that turnover wouldn't go back over the counter like people think.  FOBT punters are totally different animals to the vast majority of betting punters.  They would simply not go into a betting shop anymore the vast majority of these punters, esp the high staking degen FOBT types who really churn through the turnover on these machines.  Also a punter who bets £100 a spin every 30 seconds over two hours on a fobt would need to turnover £24000 over the counter to replace that business.  Appreciate the shop hold is probably 4 times higher around 12% than the fobt 3% however gl being able to turn over £6k in two hours in a betting shop over the counter in order for the firm to make the same returns out of you than sitting quietly in the corner punting your tits off on a machine.

You could have set a tipping line up at cheltenham without having a scooby about horse racing and made 10% roi just on the basis that the vast majority of place books were overbroke in every race.  Literally told all your punters to back every horse in the race ew and make 10% risk free effectively.

As for the original question.  It is a great idea but needs to be based on take out and not stake.  Getting rejected asking for £30 on a 1/3 shot is pretty embarrassing but under these rules they could do this.  Equally you could get a pony on a 200/1 golfer to win £5k and the firm would have to stand it.  You could in a matter of seconds on line have a golfer for fortunes to a group of pro's you don't want to lay that business to.

This happens already and would make no difference in pro punters getting on.  When they pay their beards to open them account another condition they would have to agree to for the wages for putting on would be to provide the sufficient ID.

I don't really see a reason why bookies shouldn't have the power to limit certain customers if they're the ones who have to pay out, even if it is annoying to some of us. Nevertheless, I will sign the petition anyway.

The problem I have with bookies is when they "palp" bets. This is very wrong. If they make the error, they should suffer the consequences as is the case with other companies (for example O2 who randomly knocked £300 off my phone contract, and were forced to honour that).

Completely disagree Peter, I think the palp rule is the one rule which is fair for the punters and is massively misunderstood. What happens if someone puts a decimal point in the wrong place and prices up a 1.01 shot as a 101.00 shot and they then get filled in? People then lose their jobs due to a team bottom line hit due to an innocent error? Seems ridiculous to me.

Very much this.  The only reasonable issue punters have with 'palps' is when they trade down through the prices then claim palp after 5 or 6 price changes.  That just shows they are totally clueless and is totally out of order.  Any firm which uses palp in the right direction instantly is quite within their rights.  You couldn't walk into a garage and buy an Audi for £4,999 because the sticker in the window says that is the price if the right price should have been £49,999.  Quite rightly they would laugh at you and tell you to fuck off.

I would argue that the bookies systems should be programmed well enough to pick up and not allow an error of this magnitude.


Actually, I believe that according to trading standards, at least in the UK, if the Audi was advertised at £4,999, they would be legally obliged to sell at that price, even if it was a mistake.

The Audi example isn't legally an offer to sell it's an "invitation to treat" so audi can just pull out of the sale.

I have no issue with palps if they are genuine but as Arb says when it's a price change because originally priced wrong that gets in my craw.

Correct from my brief legal training!

One of my biggest frustrations is when you have a horse (or other selection, but usually a horse in my experience) chalked up at say 10s and you try to back it and if gets referred to the trader who offers you half at 10s, half at 8s or SP. and then doesn't move the price! Not bothered about being only stood half a stake but feel aggreivrd that others can still get on at the advertised price and I can't!

Should have to take the same amount on any bet as they are willing to take on the spin of a roulette wheel. By refusing to do this they prove they are a minicasino and not a bookmaker. Government clearly dont care as they just want their revenue.

Pretty funny, I'd be slightly embarrassed signing that plus makes no sense for a losing punter like me

Very fair policy.  They bet roulette to 2.75% and lay a bet to a monkey every spin (only because they are limited to a monkey as well - used to be £3500 in the early days of fobts).  Virtually every other product they bet to a much higher margin in the shops.  Would be very tough to argue against this if the government really wanted to drop the hammer on them.

Wouldn't it ultimately be self defeating - I mean wouldn't these guys just keep developing casino type ops and cut the wagering ops. Obv I know nothing but I assume they would

Yes you are probably right.

Wouldnt be in their interests, majority ive seen playing is on roulette, if you match the amount to say the amount you can have on a single number, the bookie would still be much better off, as I can only have say 25 quid on a horse but you could still have three figures on a spin.

My policy was two fold aswell, if bookies were to try reduce the max bet by reducing FOBT stakes then it will slow the rate some poor sod can stuff notes into the machines.

Without going over old ground, I agree they have the right to make commercial decisions and not accept certain bets.

Its the way these organisations make shocking commercial decisions which are poorly thought through that frustrates.

Show the slightest intelligence and its goodbye to accepting almost any bet from a lot of these organisations.

And that policy seemingly is making them very little money. Crazy.

I think another factor is underrated esp in the ftse firms is the obsession with margins.  Hills latest report was banging on about margins falling.  Margins could fall through the floor if you allowed them to and you turn over a shed load more money and take more profit.  Given this obsession you are always going to have CEOs and Tds making decisions to protect their margins rather than max bottom line profits.  This means if you want to hold 8% on the sports book for the city book yes men you have to technically close all accounts you expect to win 5% from otherwise it becomes harder and harder to hit your margin target.   I have never understood the obsession with margins in a huge turnover high volume business like betting.  Sounds stupid but this is the way the game is going. If you don't lose at a fast enough rate they will sack you off.

The funny thing is you never hear about margin warnings in interim results in the city it is always bottom line absolute profit which causes the profit warnings which cause share price slumps which CEOs hate.

Really good point this and I hadn't really thought about it. In a private business we 're gonna care about cash flows in the main. The % return is something of an irrelevance.

As you say, PLCs actively turn down business because it doesn't reach certain returns criteria and the drive for specific % & year on year improving returns drives the desperate short termism that damages most UK and US businesses in the end.

I literally couldn't care less what my ROI is an a professional gambler.  If i have a 1% edge i take it.  It kills my ROI (if i cared about it) but for every £2k i have on i make £20 cash).  The more i turn my money over with any positive edge the more money i make.  I never understand why anyone in the gambling business cares about margins over how much cash they make (apart from to impress people that don't understand the game).    I could have a 25% roi if i wanted to.  It would look really impressive to people who have no idea about the game but i would only turn over £500 a month on probably 2 bets which i couldn't get on properly and make £125 profit.  ROI looks awesome but i am skint.  Try going into Aldi and paying for your shopping with a 25% roi but no cash.  'We don't take ROi as a form of payment' is the common response.  

Equally the boys in the city say 'we couldn't care what your margins are lolbrokes your trading profits are down year on year whatever your turnover is so we don't want your shares you are not making enough cash'yet constantly they focus on margin over profit.  The comical thing is all their profits nowadays come from their lowest margin, highest turnover product.  FOBT's.

Strongly with arbs here

I have run my own commodities trading company for 36 years and i simply don't give a toss about turnover or ROI

If a deal looks like it will make money no matter how big or small i am in

By the way YOY we have never shown a loss, so can't be a tooooooo bad a policy

I agree to an extent, but the issue comes when you have finite capital and can't take every profit making opportunity.  When they reject a project on margin aren't they basically saying that their available capital can be better deployed elsewhere?

I don't believe Online Gaming companies worry too much about that, very little upfront working capital is needed in that industry if we are talking about Sports Betting markets, & cash flow is not an issue either. Staff costs are the main variable.

That could be the case but it doesn't cost much more capital than processing the online payment (50p for a visa deposit) to take on a 2% losing customer in an online betting company.  You still make money long term out of them with zero marginal costs of doing business with them.

I appreciate in companies where capital is scarce you need to use it on the most profitable projects however this argument is impossible to apply to the online gambling industry.  All the capital expenditure is fixed and there are virtually no marginal costs of dealing with a 2% roi losing customer and no excuse at all why you shouldn't be taking his business (other than it hurts your 8% roi goals as discussed).

Yep agreed my logic doesn't apply to online gambling.

Then I stand corrected; although I don't really know what you mean by "invitation to treat" ..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invitation_to_treat

Thanks :)