The Financial Brutality of The Championship

Quoted from thornemariner

I managed betting shops decades ago. I'd never grin if I'd been cleaned out but wasn't able to pay out on some large bets on occasion which the punters accepted. I could always pay out more modest earnings and in the days where you had more people in the shop, you could carry on taking bets because you'd always be winning some of that.

I don't know what it's like now but you had a limited float in those days and banked excess funds in the morning after adjusting for any liabilities over a tenner. It made holding up a bookies less attractive. Having been on the receiving end of a few blags with sawn-offs in a short period of time I completely agree with that stance.  

I ran one place opposite a bank's sub-branch and spent one week relieving them of their high denomination notes by cashing reserve cheques as I was cleaned out day after day by heavy hitters. I actually ran well above target profit but got a right caning now and again. Exciting days but left the job to get Saturdays off again and watch Town. While the first eleven or twelve years were great, the last twenty plus have been awful!

Quoted from diehardmariner

20ish years ago I worked in a bookies and it hadn't changed much then.  

It's quite normal after the National, Derby, Gold Cup days et al. that you don't have enough cash in the shop to pay out everyone.  Few occasions it happened, like yourself, you make sure it's the big hitters who have to wait.  One pay out for them can wipe you out completely, whereas you can keep dozens and dozens of small winning punters happy for the same amount of cash.

Just to add to the tales around betting profits etc.  I never ever saw a day where the shop I was in ran at anything other than a profit.  Even when it was a case of the big favourites winning in the big races, it still ran at a profit.  Which makes me laugh when you see headlines that state the bookies have been taken to the cleaners by a short priced favourite.  Believe me, there's plenty of other bets that are placed to more than offset any 'loss' made.  The adage of you never see a poor bookie couldn't be more true.

I left around the time that Fixed Odds Terminals started to come in and dominate.  You always had guys (and girls) who would rinse themselves in the bookies and it was heartbreaking.  There was one occasion where a guy came in on a Friday afternoon with his pay packet in hand and bit by bit by bit ate away it and ended up chasing his money.  It didn't take that long for him to really get down to the bare bones of it.  In the end his last roll of the dice got him most of his money back and he was almost in tears watching each race.   But seeing people just put note after note after note into virtual racing and virtual roulette as it wasn't real money was scary stuff.  Racing and the Dogs to an extent was staggered enough so you had a break/time to cool off.  Fruit machines only accepted coins so you could, in theory, only lose so much at a certain rate.  But the Terminals just ate £10 notes, £20 notes, even £50 notes.  They, more than anything, made such a huge profit and were far more addictive than anything else.

Scary.

Yep I have worked in a couple of bookies and those machines are like crack.

I suppose it's only the same as online which is 24 hours a day and probably even more dangerous.

The bookies get away with murder around all of the "responsible" gambling and how they limit the accounts of people who try put bets on that they don't want to take.

Things have slightly improved but there is still loads more that could be done. Once you've been tempted in by the countless offers it is very easy to get into trouble.

Quoted from GrimPol

Yes it was pure escapism in the "old days" now its a toss-up between BP for a couple of hrs or manning The Samaritan's phones.  Depressing.

Quoted from diehardmariner

20ish years ago I worked in a bookies and it hadn't changed much then.  

It's quite normal after the National, Derby, Gold Cup days et al. that you don't have enough cash in the shop to pay out everyone.  Few occasions it happened, like yourself, you make sure it's the big hitters who have to wait.  One pay out for them can wipe you out completely, whereas you can keep dozens and dozens of small winning punters happy for the same amount of cash.

Just to add to the tales around betting profits etc.  I never ever saw a day where the shop I was in ran at anything other than a profit.  Even when it was a case of the big favourites winning in the big races, it still ran at a profit.  Which makes me laugh when you see headlines that state the bookies have been taken to the cleaners by a short priced favourite.  Believe me, there's plenty of other bets that are placed to more than offset any 'loss' made.  The adage of you never see a poor bookie couldn't be more true.

I left around the time that Fixed Odds Terminals started to come in and dominate.  You always had guys (and girls) who would rinse themselves in the bookies and it was heartbreaking.  There was one occasion where a guy came in on a Friday afternoon with his pay packet in hand and bit by bit by bit ate away it and ended up chasing his money.  It didn't take that long for him to really get down to the bare bones of it.  In the end his last roll of the dice got him most of his money back and he was almost in tears watching each race.   But seeing people just put note after note after note into virtual racing and virtual roulette as it wasn't real money was scary stuff.  Racing and the Dogs to an extent was staggered enough so you had a break/time to cool off.  Fruit machines only accepted coins so you could, in theory, only lose so much at a certain rate.  But the Terminals just ate £10 notes, £20 notes, even £50 notes.  They, more than anything, made such a huge profit and were far more addictive than anything else.

Scary.

Quoted from CSLM

Yep I have worked in a couple of bookies and those machines are like crack.

I suppose it's only the same as online which is 24 hours a day and probably even more dangerous.

The bookies get away with murder around all of the "responsible" gambling and how they limit the accounts of people who try put bets on that they don't want to take.

Things have slightly improved but there is still loads more that could be done. Once you've been tempted in by the countless offers it is very easy to get into trouble.

Quoted from diehardmariner

20ish years ago I worked in a bookies and it hadn't changed much then.  

It's quite normal after the National, Derby, Gold Cup days et al. that you don't have enough cash in the shop to pay out everyone.  Few occasions it happened, like yourself, you make sure it's the big hitters who have to wait.  One pay out for them can wipe you out completely, whereas you can keep dozens and dozens of small winning punters happy for the same amount of cash.

Just to add to the tales around betting profits etc.  I never ever saw a day where the shop I was in ran at anything other than a profit.  Even when it was a case of the big favourites winning in the big races, it still ran at a profit.  Which makes me laugh when you see headlines that state the bookies have been taken to the cleaners by a short priced favourite.  Believe me, there's plenty of other bets that are placed to more than offset any 'loss' made.  The adage of you never see a poor bookie couldn't be more true.

I left around the time that Fixed Odds Terminals started to come in and dominate.  You always had guys (and girls) who would rinse themselves in the bookies and it was heartbreaking.  There was one occasion where a guy came in on a Friday afternoon with his pay packet in hand and bit by bit by bit ate away it and ended up chasing his money.  It didn't take that long for him to really get down to the bare bones of it.  In the end his last roll of the dice got him most of his money back and he was almost in tears watching each race.   But seeing people just put note after note after note into virtual racing and virtual roulette as it wasn't real money was scary stuff.  Racing and the Dogs to an extent was staggered enough so you had a break/time to cool off.  Fruit machines only accepted coins so you could, in theory, only lose so much at a certain rate.  But the Terminals just ate £10 notes, £20 notes, even £50 notes.  They, more than anything, made such a huge profit and were far more addictive than anything else.

Scary.

Quoted from Lost in Lincoln

They're only interested in limiting accounts of the few people that win money.

I'll assume you've heard of 'matched betting', I used to make a few quid doing that, but as soon as you are regularly winning, they dont want to take your bets.

All this 'responsible gambling' nonsense they spout is just because they have to.

Radio stations like TalkSPORT on EVERY show have at least one feature from betting companies.  The Premier League is awash with adverts from betting companies, yet a player dares to have a bet and they get banned.

It's all hypocritical tosh that they spout whilst lining their pockets from people's misery.

Quoted from CSLM

It's not even necessarily winning bets. If you place a couple of large singles they will soon limit the account even if you lose them all.

The main aim nowadays is to get you hooked on the casino side of things. That's where they want you gambling.

Quoted from louth_in_the_south

This is 💯 correct. The whole aim of stirring up the fight against affordability checks in sports betting, mainly that in horse racing where the betting companies know the clientele have persuasive powers towards the government, is so that there are no affordability checks down the line in casino betting where they make the vast majority of their profit. I’m not against betting btw , just the sly , pernicious way they manipulate .