The more I use Betfair, the more I realise that its odd little quirks all add up to it not being as profitable as one believes it may be.

I just had the pleasure of experiencing a deadheat on a place bet with Betfair.
My horse finished officially equal 3rd.
That means my bet for a place did not lose.
On every tote and sportsbook I either made a small profit or got my money back.
But not on Betfair.
For some amazing reason they have decided that in a deadheat you lose some of your money. Even though I did not lose my bet, the balance of my account was lower after the deadheat had been paid out.
I imagine some of you will explain how my bet is reduced and a "loss" for me because Betfair also have to take into account those who place lay bets.
I disagree.
Those who had a lay bet on my horse should have lost their bet as my horse came 3rd - it came equal 3rd.

Anyhow... I have had my gripe :-) but it is an interesting idea that one can lose on a winning bet.

Do you understand how the market is worked out. You get back half your stake (Essentially it only gets half the bet).

So had you bet a $10 place getter and you bet $100 on it it runs a dead heat you would get back $50 * $10 = $500 (Profitable).

But you bet on something under $2 (say $1.80) so the dead heat rules screws you. So it worked out to be $50 * $1.80 = $90 (Loss).

The full explanation and reasoning is below. Seems fair enough to me. Knowing the rules before you enter a market needs to be factored into what you do when working out if the odds are value or not.

https://en-betfair.custhelp.com/app...-a-dead-heat%3F

Your explanation is correct, BF's is ****. You do hand over your money as soon as you click OK to close the bet.

the **** stand for 'nonsense' in a different but in a normally exceptable way, what would the spaminator do if your name happened to be Bill Samuel and you wanted to shorten it to initials?.
No critisicm mods but one can take moderation just that little bit too far.

Hi, Every Topic. I presume you are talking about Ascot R4 no.4. I had $5 on it with Betfair SP to place and I lost $1.96. I wonder what would have been the result if I had backed it on Betfair exchange. SP had it at $1.22.

I don't get it. If it was at odds of 1.22 then shouldn't you get half the profit - in this case 11c on top of your stake or 1.11?

__________________
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Yes, Betfair shows the divvie at $1.23 but they actually paid out $0.61

I agree, you should not receive less than your one unit bet as you have won the bet.
It is absurd to be paid less than your investment.
Yes Michael, that is the race I am referring to. I don't think having the SP would have made a difference. My bet was matched at $1.23.

If they can't operate normally then the least they should do is throw their hands up in the air, say it is all too complicated and refund the bets to each punter involved.
But to pay someone LESS than their bet even when they win is absurd.
It also means every database that uses BF data in their results is wrong because they will show a divvie of $1.23 when in fact the punter only got half of that.
This might sound petty, but as someone who is betting on a short priced fave place system every 0.01 of a unit is critical.

On a side note.... I want to see the photo :-) I was sure my horse came third and was not in a dead heat lol