Timing of the close!
 

Has anyone noticed that the synchronisation of the clocks, for the race bets close time when using bots on Betfair, is out? I set my bot to fire within one to five seconds before the advertised close but occasionally miss a race because it's already started. I've struck this sometimes with USA tracks and the other day with an AUS track.
Is it because the race starter's watch is slightly out or at Betfair's end?
RP

From my experience, watching prices, processing data etc, even since the old teletext days, there will be a out-of-sync issue occasionally.
So I make "mechanical" allowances for this type error.

Probably your own computer clock. For my bot it checks the time in the header record compared to my computer clock every 15 races (which is about every 20mins to hour as I include greyhounds in my races).

It then adjusts the times to the difference in my pc and betfair. I have found that over time my computer clock slows down and I lose time. So the gap between betfairs header time and my computer gets higher and higher. It took me a while to find this and code in the solution.

The US races sometimes start early but usually they are way behind to the advertised starting time.

It is very rare for any race to start before the scheduled race time, and I can't even remember missing a race in recent memory due to it starting early.

For example I just restarted my bot and it showed this:
Betfair Header Time is 2013-04-03:21:35:42
Computer Time is 2013-04-03:21:35:39

So as you can see even before I started my bot my pc was 3 seconds slower. It will adjust for that now.

I actually just manually adjust my computer clock every now and again (when I remember) so that it is a few seconds ahead of the "ACTUAL TIME" that I've found on a world time web site. I then know that my bot (using my computer time) will be slightly ahead of the Betfair time.

I know there was one race in Tassie (I think) the other week that loaded really quickly and they let them go before time but that is highly unusual.

Forget setting a bot for US races. I've seen them go between 20 minutes earlier and 50 minutes later than BF starting times.

I agree with you there Mark, and the reason why I've given them away. Also it takes an eternity to post results via BF. I've had a crack at them about it , but they just blame 3rd party providers! I got around it by getting up early and watching each race but soon tired off it. In this age of communication if BF Aus can't post results as quick as the races are run, they don't deserve my money.
Cheers RP

I had this problem sometime back & it was my pc clock which was losing time for whatever reason, so setup a task to update the clock daily, using something like this with no probs since

http://www.pretentiousname.com/timesync/

Thanks so much stugots!!

Synchronise Time
 

Here is a little utility that is supposed to do it for you.
Just make sure you have Windows Time in you services on automatic.
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_inet_time.htm

Thanks Surround, overwhelmed by the offers of assistance.
Cheers RP

If your pc is consistently losing time, it is most likely the little CMOS battery.
Most computers use a CR2032 battery available at supermarkets and any good battery sellers.



Make sure pc is turned off and unplugged prior to replacement.

Thanks CP for your interest and advice.
Cheers RP