Premium Charge and Bots

[pugs]

I was at a sporting event recently and had a very interesting chat with a chap who has changed my opinion as to why some form of a premium charge is necessary.

He was not there in any official capacity and our conversation was off the record, so I am not quoting anything he said, but let’s just say this comes straight from the horses mouth from someone quite high in the food chain.

My interpretation of what he said, So, IN MY OPINION............A few years ago “they” realised the need for a data and transaction charge. This was because a small proportion of users, mainly bot, were disproportionally using huge amounts of their resources. But as soon as the charge was introduced many of these users evaded the charges by using multiple id’s/accounts. It was also noted that many of these high resource users were bots that took advantage of “no lose” situations and others with less than scrupulous methods. I had to ask what a less than scrupulous bot was lol, and was given a couple of examples.

Bot’s that attempt to move the market in a particular direction but not from the front of the bets queue. Bot’s that “piggy back” off other peoples price offers but never at the front of the bets queue.

Apparently these bots and others like it can be very resourcefully demanding, they have a very low bet to bet/match ratio and bring nothing to the table. They also get many complaints about these type of bots and regularly lose customers because of them.

The cost of tracking customers with multiple accounts and syndicates (users who pool their resource allowance to operate in many markets simultaneously using the same/similar bot but avoiding charges) was spiralling as more people tried to avoid the charges, therefore causing them more work in tracking and combining accounts. This and other factors, like replenishing lost customers made a charge necessary.

It was never their intention to penalise “genuine” punters, even though they knew a certain percentage of uncannily highly successful punters would be caught in the net, but as these punters were likely to be in-running punters with track or fast picture advantage, or any other form of advantage over the “average” punter, then they were considered eligible to pay a premium charge anyway.

The “60 week” caught more genuine punters than expected, that’s why it has now been changed to “lifetime” to catch less of these.
The regular £1000 pc allowance has been scrapped because they believe this would now only be beneficial to the punters the charge was aimed at.
The data and trans charges no longer offset the pc charge because the “no lose” bot operators used even more resources knowing they wouldn’t pay both charges.

I asked if there was any legitimate (or not lol) ways around paying the pc, and was told no, your total com paid needs to be above 20%. And they are continually looking at more diverse ways of tracking then linking multiple accounts and syndicates, not just account details and address’s but bot characteristics and betting patterns, even the funding of new accounts with large amounts of money, or drip fed up to large amounts are flagged.

I have always been totally against any extra charge for successful punters, and I still believe that no (so called) “genuine” punter should ever be caught in the net, but this chap spoke a lot of sense about the profile of the punter the charge was targeting, and he asked me how I would raise the extra revenue needed to maintain them, I replied “I don’t know, wouldn’t it just be easier and more open to just up the base rate of commission to 5.5%”? And he replied “certainly not. If your neighbour asked you to contribute towards their heating bill because they wanted to have all their windows and doors open all day, would you”? And I had to reply “no”

[Norwegian Would]

Excellent insight to the world of Bots, PC 'n Pirates

[Ian]

I suppose you are working on your own "less than scrupulous bot" now you what to do !!

[doris_day]

Two issues come out of this.

First, Betfair started with the wrong technology and this is why their bandwidth was compromised. If they used 'push' technology, the need to poll the site for (largely redundant) updates wouldn't be necessary and therefore the demand made on the Betfair servers wouldn't be so great.

Secondly, don't be fooled by your friend's arguments because, while some of it may be correct, much of what they're doing is to boost their bottom line to balance the losses they have incurred in their other areas, such as the disasterous foray into the poker market which has cost them millions.

They want to make their balance sheet look as impressive as possible prior to a float and because they knew they could get away with 'stealing' some of the profits from successful bettors/traders, that's exactly what they have done. The PC is nothing to do with bots.

[2020vision]

Still no fair way to treat the genuine and MANUAL user (NO BOTS) such as
myself! JUST A WAY TO RIP MORE MONEY OFF THE WINNERS!

NO EXCUSES - I feel very strongly about being ripped off. I pay PC every
week SIMPLY because I win - I DO NOT EXCEED PERMITTED RESOURCES,
and if I do the I incur a reasonable and understandable charge.

So why take the rest up to 20%? I am not in any way trying or doing anything
underhand or attempting in any way to avoid normal charges. NOT FAIR.
If I offer/take 5's or whatever odds I expect that to honoured as a
gentlemans agreement - NOT for Betfair to step in and help themselves to 20%!

THERE SHOULD BE A FAIR AND OVERALL CHARGE THAT WE *ALL* PAY.
If others are "screwing" the system then take measures against the
individuals, NOT ALL WINNERS!

If your neighbour asked you to contribute towards their heating
bill because they wanted to have all their windows and doors open all
day, would you?

Well it appears I am doing the equivalent of EXACTLY this!

That's my two pence worth and the way I have to function. I know some may
say at least you are a winner but it's like winning the lottery or pools and
the company running it keeps 20% because the feel like it?

Thanks for reading, all the best - Michael

P.S. When I rang up and asked why the Premium Charge, I am not using
any more resources than most others I was told:
"We need this money to replace the losers that I was taking money from
because they drop out. It costs a lot of money to advertise and bring in
more punters from which I can carry on winning from". Also they needed
it to maintain their ever expanding company and workforce! Surely they
should let it all level itself out, punters, resources and staff wise - not just
make their winners the sponsors, wagepayers and subsidisers of themselves?

[pugs]

Ian, I wish i was that cleaver

Plus I was not given any details of anything I wasn’t already at least partly aware of. I did stupidly say ban the bots, but was reminded that the majority of bots brought liquidity and increased turnover. Even the “no lose” bots that we are all aware of, like backing or laying the whole field in overounds serve a good purpose, and of course make their operators money, but they do require a very high refresh rate to be successful, so if their operators want to monitor say 20 markets 24/7 to optimize their chances of getting more matched bets, thus using hundreds of thousands of times more resource than the average punter, then I guess they should pay more, and not just open another 20 accounts.

And it “will always remain an option”, not just to ban the unscrupulous bots or warn users who attempt to avoid charges, but to close their accounts. “They” do see it as being defrauded of revenue. And this WAS NOT said to me, but I guess they reserve the right to withhold any funds they can prove owing to them.

Could someone write a bot for me please

2020vision (Michael) I agree with everything you say, that’s why I said “some form of premium charge” and NO “genuine” user should be caught in the net. He did seem 100% honest when he said it was never their intention to catch “genuine” (for want of a better word) punters, So they should consider others options but I couldn’t think of many, and the couple I did he reeled off 10 reasons why they couldn’t happen, so I guess they consider the small percentage of “genuine” punters that are caught in the net as acceptable. He did say that compared to the outcry on the forum, only a small percentage of these actually phoned to discuss it

[2020vision]

Hi pugs

I was actually one of the few that did ring up and try to get some kind of
satisfactory or reasonable explanation but even though I was polite and
well spoken the operator on the other end got pretty irate eventually.

Possibly this is because he was not able to efficiently counteract my
reasoning or maybe it was because he knew I was right? At the end of the
day he just said basically if you don't like it, don't use our service!

Also how would it be if innocent people caught in a crowd of wrongdoers
were simply sentenced to the same punishment as the offenders simply
because they were there? Hope you get my point?

To hit EVERYONE who happens to be astute enough to consistently win in
my opinion stinks - as do some of the bots. My opinion about bots in general
has also been posted on this forum a couple of weeks ago - but that's
quite another subject, eh?

Enough for now, all the best - Michael

P.S. I wish there was an alternative to Betfair - roll on Betdaq Assistant.
The Betfair principle is brilliant - it's just that those who run it are greedy.

[doris_day]

Hi pugs


P.S. I wish there was an alternative to Betfair - roll on Betdaq Assistant.
The Betfair principle is brilliant - it's just that those who run it are greedy.

Yes, they are greedy and have made numerous mistakes, like the poker, which means people like you and I are having to bolster their bottom line in the run up to floatation.

Hopefully Virgin will eventually buy one of the other exchanges and give Betfair a run for their money.

[Spike]

What is it about betting manually that makes you a "genuine" user when a bot user isn't?

Trading/betting manually using Gruss or another API product requires exactly the same resources as most bots- so there's no difference there.

PC is there because Betfair don't make much money from people who withdraw- they make money from people who break even before comission thereby passing money around amongst themselves untill it's all whittled away by comission and they have to deposit again.

If you're consistently profitable then betfair can manage without you, what's more they know that you will continue to bet with them for as long as you're making money so they can charge you what they like.

The biggest problem with PC is that it's putting off people who will never pay it, the problem is that betfair can't really say "don't worry you'll never pay it because you're never going to win" even though that's the truth because it's hardly a good PR line.

[2020vision]

By "genuine" all I meant was that I am human and sit at my computer
looking at a screen and physically clicking all my bets.

Have a nice day - Michael

[pugs]

Hi ya Spike, “genuine” is definitely the wrong word to use, sorry.

Michael used it because I did, and I used it because that’s the word that was said to me in conversation. Other terms that were used were “uncannily high strike rate”. So just to try any clarify what was meant by “genuine” in context of the conversation.....

......”genuine punter”= A punter who pays a large overall percentage in commission whether or not he/she is a trader/bot operator/punter.

Non “genuine punter”= A punter that has an uncannily high strike rate therefore it is believed he/she must have some form of edge over other users. These can also be traders/bot operators/punters.

The point Michael was making to me is although he has an “uncannily high strike rate” he considers himself a “genuine” punter.

Sorry both

[milfor]

Non “genuine punter”= A punter that has an uncannily high strike rate therefore it is believed he/she must have some form of edge over other users.

I thought everyone on Betfair tries to find an edge of one kind or another. So according to that definition of "genuine" everyone tries to be a non genuine punter and only those who fail remain genuine.

[pugs]

Yes. In context of the conversation in which the word was used.

I know i’m not eloquent enough (if that’s the right word lol) to explain myself properly here, but there was absolutely nothing detrimental meant by it. And it was ME who used the term “non genuine” in our conversation. This was because I couldn’t think of a better word or term that was opposite to “genuine”

Plus of course there are many successful punters that have found an edge that still pay well over 20% commission, therefore they remain “punters who do not have an uncannily high strike rate” (genuine lol)

[Spike]

Pugs- I appreciate that you don't mean anything pejorative by the term "non genuine", it's just a form of words. Another form of words would be "successfull". A bettor with a very high strike rate who pays the minimum of comission is just a very successfull bettor, one who pays more comission is in some ways less successfull and one who loses overall is clearly unscusessfull.

Those who pay PC do have a high strike rate but there's nothing uncanny about it, they've just found good strategies. There are many of us who play in an etirely fair way (no insider information or raw feeds or anything else) and make a good go of it. These are the people who get stung by premium charges.

Many of us use bots but there's nothing wrong with that either, bots are not magic money printers, they have to be worked on and they win and loose like anyone else. There is no such thing as a "no risk" strategy on betfair as there is always a risk of your bets not matching, which can hit you very badly.

I understand why Betfair charge their most successfull customers a bit more, these are the customers who pay the least and make the most. Without top up charges betfair don't make much money from them so it's fair enough really. However I don't like the implication that those who pay premium charges are effectively paying as a punishment for doing something unfair.

Premium charges are not a charge for resource use either- we all use much the same in resources (bot operators take great pains to reduce requests and unmatched bets) and if you go over the allowances there are charges for that.

So let's keep it clear- premium charges are there to boost Betfair's profits, no other reason.

[doris_day]

Spike, glad you agree Betfair are using the PC just to bolster their bottom line rather than for anything else. However I'd like to disagree that they are taking only 'a bit more'. The jump from the max commission of 5% to the PC of 20% is rather more than 'a bit'.

In any other industry, with a proper regulator, Betfair's PC introduction would have been knocked on the head. Sadly they are poorly regulated and have complete market dominance so are free to do almost anything they wish. We can only hope that sooner, rather than later, a significant competitor will enter the market. Roll on Virgin and their exchange