The worlds worst bookie

Tanlic

Senior Jockey
Joined
Dec 6, 2011
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Bangkok Thailand
Has got to be Paddy Power..recently closed my account because they no longer cater for my account but I stopped using their service a long time ago.

What I am about to do I promise is completely random

Catterick 2.55 Clear white light B365 2/1 W Hill 15/8 Paddy Power 7/4

Kempton 6.00 Winter Snowfall Everyone 2.00 Paddy Power 1.91

Catterick 2.25 Wichaphi Bet365 0/30 W Hill 7/2 Paddy Power 3/1

Almost every race they offer the lowest price and they never ever head the market.

I can only imagine they are steering customers towards the exchanges but why bother pricing up races as only an idiot would bet with them.

Has anyone come across a worst mainstream bookie?
 
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They are all as bad as each other. I have no accounts left after I did matched betting over a 3 year period 2016-2019.They didn't really know what was happening even though I caught the end of the wave not the start. Paddy were slow to change their odds and were a good target. SkyBet were useless. Hills were great and 365. Coral & Lads are penny arcades & useless. Betfair Sportsbook were worse than useless. Going into the swamps 10Bet were my worst, trying to steal over £1K from me. 888, Unibet etc were ok for a short while. Fred was fabulous for shop betting....£100 on the pushes in 5-7 local shops until I was flagged.....took 3 years though. Great times & such a buzz.
 
To this day Ido not understand why Boylesports will not let me bet with them. I don't recall backing a notable winner with them but they won't let me bet with them and won't give me a reason.

I am literally ££££s in front with Bet365 but they have never restricted me so I won't hear a word against them.
 
Bet 365 is the best.skybet is poor now.their free bet isn't worth bothering with really.and their prices are pretty crap.i like hills and ladbrokes super boost.
Years ago Paddy Power said I didn't have an account so I tried to open one and they said my debit card was already being used so I gave up.
 
I have issues with several of the mainstream ones.

Paddy Power have excluded me from their promotions including BOG without bothering to inform me. I only found out about the BOG thing when I took 50/1 about a horse that placed at a SP of 100/1. Queries were met with “it’s a decision taken by our traders”

SkyBet have imposed ridiculous restrictions. I hear of people getting £20 on their money back offers - I’m restricted to a fiver. Their free bet club was probably the sole reason to keep the account going but they’ve made that a bit sh1t now.

Bet365 also apply restrictions- I’m limited to £10 on their super boosts but I know others can get more on. However I’d agree overall that they’re a lot better than most (and they paid for the Viking family holiday last year [emoji1])

Hills BetVictor Lads and Coral all have awful apps/websites but I’ll give an honourable mention to Betway who haven’t pi$$ed me off (yet)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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I don't use traditional bookmakers anymore, but am interested to see the positive comments regarding bet365 as they used to be known, on this forum, as bet £3.65.

Which seems a bit of an improvement.
 
The difficulty with all bookmakers is not knowing exactly how far you can push it. If you play things safe you may end up restricted anyway if their algorithm doesn't like you and feel like you didn't make the most of the account. The best advice I can give is to get in and out with firms that have good offers but bad prices; perhaps passing on some of the 'thinner' boosts and offers to maybe prolong the life of the account by a few weeks.

Any site with generous price boosts (MGM, Unibet) will restrict you or ban you from offers if you show any competence. Again, passing on some thinner value could buy you a bit more time.

Those that you want to keep open I'd recommend heeding warning signs (bets referred, boosted prices being hidden) and easing off for a while. The best way to stay undetected is to not use the account much at first and then slowly increase your bet sizing and frequency while avoiding frequent and/or large withdrawals.

Also be wary of some outfits making you jump through hoops to 'verify' your account.
 
Not a candidate for WWB but today I got an email from Sky Bet telling me they were placing restrictions on my account. We'll see how that pans out.
 
Not a candidate for WWB but today I got an email from Sky Bet telling me they were placing restrictions on my account. We'll see how that pans out.
Hi Desert, i won about £400 with Skybet over a period of a year.
They then restricted my account to the extent where i can only get pennies on.
Hopefully you will be treated better than i was
They have removed all promotions from my account also.
Good Luck with all your bets 👍
 
I'm non grata with quite a few firms but find B365 outstanding.
Site a breeze to navigate,BOG from 8.00 am and no hassle gettiing on.
Having said that I do observe Slim's golden rules religously.
 
Hi Desert, i won about £400 with Skybet over a period of a year.
They then restricted my account to the extent where i can only get pennies on.
Hopefully you will be treated better than i was
They have removed all promotions from my account also.
Good Luck with all your bets 👍
Thanks, Desijo.

I suspect it's because recently I've manged to land a couple of bets taking SP with their extra places instead of the [reduced] fixed odds.

Probably serves me right :ROFLMAO:

Never had a problem with Bet365 and I've won a hell of a lot more with them than with any other bookie.
 
Skybet are getting to be a waste of time.i tried to back Sam Brown ew 7 places at SP and they wouldn't accept £5 ew.and their price was almost half the proper odds .and their bonus scheme is now a waste of time.
Bet 365 are the best but I'm enjoying Ladbrokes as well.when they boost the odds it's win and place unlike whill who are win part only.
 
Same here they wouldn’t accept a fifer each way at SP. No problem placing the same stake at the price quoted which was 3 or 4 points shorter than anyone else. Even the each way extra price at B365 was better than SkyBet
I’m sure you’re right DO but I’m a bit surprised you got an email - I never did but now seem to be subject to all sorts of restrictions
 
A brother, normal bet €2 trixie found today that his stake is restricted to 20c. He won 87.34 yesterday. Boylesports.
 
I tried to open an account with skybet last August not long after I got out of hospital.I found the whole experience intrusive and humiliating.I had to deal with someone who worked in compliance and had all the buzzwords.Personally I believe that all the bullshit I listened to was related to the fact that Powers shut me down years ago.
 
Boylesports shut me down in 2005 for having €150 each way on a Walsh/Nicholls novice hurdler at Taunton on a Thursday afternoon.In fairness they took decent bets along the way.
 
Sean Graham restricted me after 1 bet ,made it hard for me to withdraw my winnings and out of sheer frustration I managed to land a very decent forecast.
 
I think bet365 are the best by a country mile.I only bet at the big meetings with them and they have only ever refused onebet from me and that was in the not to be placed market.I don't get bet boosts from them.
 
When you consider that there are probably only three fraudsters (bookmakers) that do their own prices these days, (the rest just copy and paste).
And you also consider that they dont really want people with an opinion. And they would much rather take on university maths graduates than experienced traders and form people, i would think we are looking at a multiple dead heat.
And the days of "my word is my bond" and also of "Gentlemans agreements" and a handshake seals the deal are long, long, gone. I wouldnt trust any of them as far as i could throw them.
Years ago it was the punters trying to pull a fast one. Its the other way round these days.
 
Bet365 will definitely shut you down if you are flagged as an advantage bettor and you don't even have to win that much or hammer them on a single slow price update. If you often beat SP handily and cash out the exchange drifters to back on there instead then your time will be limited. It's an account best used for regular betting at the bigger meetings, but I agree it's the best account to have while you can get on.

I lost my Boylesports account due to backing a horse @ 20-1 for £40 when they were slow to update the night before. Next best at the time was 14's in one place which quickly went and I knew I was in trouble when it eventually went off at 9-2. But that's how small time even the bigger firms have become.
 
I think B3 shut me down for an AP bet on Soul Sister for the Oaks at 100-1, placed a few days before the Musidora. They closed the account before the Oaks was run, but still paid out (as you would expect). I say think, because that bet was made a few days before Heather's big 125-1 2YO winner at Newbury, so it could have been either that did the damage or both in combination. Painful, because we all know how good they are in general.

My own stupidity, should have spread them, but then again I think it was only 365 that made the rick on Soul Sister. Equally, it could just have been that the algorithm flagged the liability after the Musidora and they thought (mistakenly) this guy might know what he's doing, or (more correctly) this guy got lucky but let's not take the chance he'll do it again.

My vote will go to Ladbrokes. Memory is hazy, but I think they restricted me to a maximum win of £1000 on any bet some 15 years ago. I'm pretty sure that was on the back of a single 20-1 winner that didn't even go to 4 figures. A qualification, though, it was my first online bet with them, so you could argue I pretty much asked for it!!

ofc restrictions on winnings are commonplace now, anyway. BF Sportsbook is probably the worst right now for limiting (for me) but of course, the exchange offsets that on balance and in many cases.
 
They are all as bad as each other and as unscrupulous as each other. Gone are the days when a handshake sealed the bet and if the vast majority cant stop you getting a bet on, they will try all sorts to not pay you out. Having spent most of my working life in the industry, i cant think of anything worse than working for a "bookmaker" now.

Here is just one tale to show you what you are up against these days.
I had a bet one teatime and i was watching the prices the following morning watching it tumbling in price. As it was dropping, a few other prices were being pushed out. The horse just below mine was 12/1 and 14/1 with EVERY firm bar one. They were 11's. As i was sat watching, the 11/1 suddenly dropped to 9/1. And it was no more than 20 seconds later that the horse came thru as a non runner. So i knew exactly what they had done and i was fuming. They were now able to apply a 10p rule 4 instead of nothing because they, like the other firms at the time, were waiving 5p rule 4's.
Now i hadnt bet with them, i never have done, i just dont rate them and they are of no use to me. But i was fuming. So i got in touch with their "rep" on twitter and told him what i had seen and what they had done. And what a load of shite he came out with. He tried to tell me that a "face", a "shrewdie", who they were wary of, had come on for a big bet on it and they cut it straight away from 11's to 9's. So i told him that this bloke cant be that shrewd because he has (supposedly) taken your 11/1 when EVERY other firm is 12's and 14's. And the timing of it when i checked on their price cut on oddschecker was one minute AFTER the horse had been withdrawn. So not only had this "face", this "shrewdie" taken at least one point under the odds and with some firms three points under, he had also backed a horse when it was already a non runner. He must have thought we are all as daft as him.
So i told him he was talking absolute nonsense and that from now on i would be watching their prices closely when any non runners were announced.
I am not gonna name the firm on here for a couple of reasons. The first is that i'm only 99.999999% certain that is what they had done. Secondly, i have no doubt that it has been done by other firms. And third, i am 100% certain about it nearly happening with another firm. I know this for a fact because i was sat next to this trading manager this day when he suggested to me that we cut a horse from 10's to 8's when it came thru as a non runner. I just gave him a look and he didnt bother.

The two people involved are still in the game and as soon as i see them on telly i just think "arsehole". Thankfully, i have never had the sound on my tv switched on while watching racing for about 5 or 6 years now. I have no wish or desire to listen to any of them.

What a horrible game it is now. Totally unrecognisable from the days of "proper" bookmakers.

Have a good day all.
 
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