LAY trigger problem

[TheGoldenVision]

I run a spreadsheet which has a couple of IF AND's... one them checks for the horse ranking and the other checks that the LAY odds are 4 or bigger. I'm only test running at the moment but see that one bet triggered on the US markets @ 3.86. Is this a problem with bet delays or some other glitch? Did the trigger fire when the market stood at >=4 but then the bet was taken when it had dropped to 3.86?

[doris_day]

If your trigger is a Lay, then you'll always be matched at the lowest price available, so I assume the available price must have changed. Similarly, if your trigger is a Back, then you'll be matched at the highest price available. Both subject to your requested price of course.

[Castillo]

Just a thought...

I usually find odds which are not of the usual increments like 3.85, 3.95 etc are when there is a Non Runner after the bet is matched and then the odds on these bets are then adjusted to suit. This could be why your bet is showing odds of 3.86

[TheGoldenVision]

Thanks Doris... I should have said that the trigger is set to fire 30 seconds before the scheduled "off" time. I assumed that, at that precise time, the sheet would check the logic statements ie

Ranked higher than 1 and
SP bigger than 4

if either of these is FALSE then the trigger wouldn't fire. It has obviously fired when both were TRUE because the bet was taken/matched so I was surprised when my account shows 3.86 (the damn thing won)....... I know it seems strange to want to LAY at bigger odds than those available but that is my particular system at the moment. Most of my unsuccessful lays happen when the odds are less than 4 hence my filter price.

So what you're saying is that although the trigger fired at 4, it arrived when the price had altered and so was automatically matched cos it was a lower price. Problem is I didn't want the lower price, I wanted the race to be ignored cos my requirements weren't met.

Any thoughts on how the trigger can be changed to achieve this? I hope you can work out what I'm after.

[TheGoldenVision]

Just thought... I suppose I should alter the trigger from >=4 to something like >=4.2 and hope that the price doesn't reduce more .2 in the interim.

[doris_day]

Because there will always be a measurable amount of time between firing the bet into Betfair and the actual moment of being matched, there is no way to guarantee a matched price. If the price available is lower than requested for a Lay it will automatically be matched at that price.
If the criteria are met by the trigger then a bet will be fired and you can only do better, not worse when it comes to being matched.
The fact that your system doesn't work so well under certain circumstances is not relevant to the price the bet is matched at but it should be based on the price the bet was triggered at.

[Ian]

If you only want to lay at a certain price or bigger, you should also check in your formula that the back side is at one tick lower than the price you are trying to lay at.

[TheGoldenVision]

Thanks everyone... I'll do some more work on the trigger. Castillo, I notice that there were 4 non-runners in the race in question so your view may be correct.