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I couldn’t be bothered to read the detail of the email or change in T&Cs and doubt it would affect me anyway but it’s tempted me to reactivate the betdaq account I’ve not used for yonks and betdaq have said they will cap commission at 2% for the next 3 months, though I gather they are doing this for anyone who asks.
I suspect betdaq will not be slow in trying to milk the knee-jerk reactions to the betfair change and this could knock on with betfair having to offer something else too, to stop people leaving – competition is good in that respect.
I’m used to getting emails with free offers, not emails saying we’re making our product less attractive so up yours customer…
TDK – I would have thought that it would be relatively easy enough for a competent punter to identify at least one horse a day which is significantly overpriced.
If any of us could identify one horse a day whom we knew with confidence was "significantly overpriced" we’d be millionaires. The best we can hope for in the real world is to identify horses we think are overpriced and be slightly more right than wrong.
Unless I’m missing something, this will affect anyone who likes to close their positions rather than leave them open (provided they show a profitof more than a grand per year).
If you take a profit (or indeed a loss) having taken a position in a market – whether that be as a layer, market maker, trader, or pure punter – you will put yourself in line for this tax. If you leave your position open you will probably not incur the charge as your commision on winners and implied commision on losers will always be much more substantial with an open position than a closed one.
BF may be trying to penalise the ‘aggressive bot’ users who target arb positions etc or perhaps the trackside in running player who is never wrong but they will hit absolutely every operator that puts liquidity into their site by being able to offer prices to the market knowing they can close their position and move on to the next race.
The biggest problem with this is that those who use exchanges to do what exchanges are good at – ie manage your liability take a profit or limit a loss – will be hit, whilst those who are happy to gamble won’t. It looks to me like a badly disguised effort to profit from those who have worked really hard over a long time to develop the strategies, techniques, software and betting banks required to operate successfully. People that you might call ‘sharp minds’. The taxman might want to look at those operators but for Betfair to do so is a dramatic shifting of that firm’s goalposts to punish the people who have helped build their business.
It is possible to avoid the charge simply by leaving all your positions open I’d have thought. Of course to do that you would need a bank probably at least 50 times bigger than the bank you need if you close your position.
The interesting thing now will be when (must be when rather than if) one of the other exchanges gets to grips with working with software providers to provide the automated interfaces that have been used to build BF’s liquidity. Once that happens it will be game on.agree totally Sean , it would appear to be a tax on those who have helped them to be the success they are
interesting thought if the others start the bot applications , then it will be war for sure , I just cannot understand this move , as the perceptional damage will be lasting , mostly by the players who wont be affected in any case
talk about shooting yourelf in the foot
Ricky
I think you’re right Ricky re the PR damage. No point being 20% better odds if they take 20% off your winnings! It’s not as simple as that of course but that’s how it could be spun. The key though is as you say other sites becoming ‘bot’ friendly. Once that happens it will open the door for competition in this field for the first time ever. As of now I think users will have to swallow the charge but would expect them to migrate once they can use their existing applications on other platforms and if the market makers and layers and traders go the liquidity should follow.
if only 0.5% will be affected, what number of punters exactly is that, 5, 50, 500, 5000.
whatever it must be seriously damaging their product to shoot themselves in the foot.
NOTHING is forever
davidbrady wrote:
TDK – I would have thought that it would be relatively easy enough for a competent punter to identify at least one horse a day which is significantly overpriced.
One a month would do me.
Looks just a cynical attempt to me to fatten the cat for flotation. There’s millions of pounds at stake here for the chaps in charge of Q&A session last night and they’re not going to let a few successful punters get in their way however unjust.
Why do they keep re-iterating it will only affect 0.5% of users, it’s getting quite boring and is irrelevant if it is unfair to some of those.
The whole affair has been shockingly handled by them and wreaks of desperation.Also if it affects so few people then to make it worthwhile doing then the sums for those people must be quite significant in order to raise any meaningful amount of money.
What a strange turn of events .. I thought Betfair encouraged Bot users?
It would simply seem to be a case of having two accounts on different IP addresses. I would have thought that someone with the brains to set up an API in the first place would find a way around this quite easily.
Also if it affects so few people then to make it worthwhile doing then the sums for those people must be quite significant in order to raise any meaningful amount of money.
That would be a good question to ask them Richard on air if any of them are interviewed, they must have some facts and figures based on their calculations although I suspect they would like to hide them.
Wouldn’t be at all surprised if the sums were very significant at 20% and even so if they were at 10%.
In the present economic climate maybe the top men are worried about their pay offs if floating and they are determined to get the profits up by hook or by crook.
Obviously by victimising just 0.5% of customers they were hoping to get it through with little opposition.The more i look at at this, the more i see an autistic decision taken by accountants
Quite unbelievable really
The idiot who put this forward, should be fired off from betfair immediately
The less people that understand the mechanics of this, the more people believe they will be affected
Not only that, there is understandbable irritation that time has to be taken out to find out exactly what this is all about
Only a near monopoly would treat its customers with such contempt
Cretins
Good point Clive.
Regardless of the fine detail, the confusion it has caused with punters not knowing whether they will be affected or not will surely drive a lot away.
A marketing nightmare that IMO could only be salvaged by a complete U-turn.
Lee
It became apparent during yesterday’s Q and A that in fact bots are not really being targeted as they can offset the data charges against the premium charge.
As was pointed out this would actually make it better for them to use the system more not less as they would be no worse off as whilst their data charges would increase their premium charge would fall by the same amount. Therefore the strain on the system would actually increase.Whatever sums the premium charge raises will be more than lost in terms of goodwill.
I actually suspect the uproar caused by this latest change to their commission structure will die down and everything will carry on much as before, as it eventually did following the hoo-hah in response to the last re-jigging from the 5/10/15…% discounts to 2/4/6…%
That said I’d agree this latest change is bad PR, smacks of monopolistic greed, is confusing, and has been explained badly.
Obviously no idea what number of markets the average BF punter plays in but for my part any profit I may make over a 60 week period will be safe from the surcharge as it is unlikely I will exceed the 250 market cut-in. There may well be 2 or 3 bets per market, but my – possibly flawed – understanding of the Terms is it’s 250 markets played, not 250 bets that determines the threshold.
Anyway, like many others it seems, I hope to be using my little-used Betdaq account more, assuming their markets have sufficient liquidity, particularly away from the front end
Clive , I feel exactly the same , heads should roll , as up to now the PR machine for Betfair has been faultless, in fact ultra smooth
I wonder if a complete u turn would manage to undo the damage , right now a lot of folks must be really confused and dissapointed
Cretins indeed
regards
Ricky
I’ve read through the new charges and it seems to me that anyone who wins more than £1000 over a 60 weeks period will be subject to this extra tax?
How they reckon it will only affect 0.5% of their customers is a bit of a mystery, it will effect everyone from time to time surely? Even your normal punter on a roll will get stiffed for it.
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