Matched betting - who's done it and who's good at it? (No Referrals)

Associate
Joined
17 Dec 2009
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2,008
I used to use an automated program that layed down bets for me; I'd log on with bookmakers credentials and it would just run 24/7 laying bets down for me. Made thousands from it gaining a few pence per race, using around 15-20 different bookmakers I'd make roughly £10-£20 a day depending on what i set my stakes to.

I eventually got banned from 90% of the bookmakers - obviously got picked up for automation. Not illegal but also not encouraged by bookmakers so they stop allowing me to win.

What I generally found was my betfair account used to lose all its money and the other bookmakers id gain from. Ideally you want it the other way around so effectively you are giving bookmakers money and keeping them happy whilst taking from Betfair.
Is this a similar sort of process?
How much can you lay down per day and gain in profit without arousing suspicion of bookmakers?
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Aug 2011
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Norfolk
I made about £300 in 2 weeks just doing it after work for an hour or two.

If you're doing it full time I can see how £300+ a week is doable.

The starting offers (bet £20 get £20 free bet) are the money makers. When it starts getting to bet £50 x 5 get £50 free bet it becomes pretty tedious.

As for the reloads, these tend to be on things happening during the day when most folk are at work (Cricket/Golf/Tennis etc) so I think it's only really worth following after the initial starting offers if you are part-time or unemployed. The reload offers are pretty poor, bet £20 on Open winner get £5 free bet etc; means you make about £4...

Are there any decent sites other than PA? Not sure I want to pay £17.99 a month if I'm going to make £20-£30 a week.

I'll probably go through this list I guess:
https://www.freebets.com/

Has anyone here done the PA bingo offers?

Just following up from this. 3 years and about 3 months later I've made nearly £140,000, whilst working full time.
£3500 per month tax free whilst in my underwear cruising the interwebz anyway.

Those who think it's a con or gambling are stupid.

Sure it's harder to make money now than before (reduced ACCAs and bet X get Y) but the best offer ever seen in MB is still here - 2up/10up or 14up with B365/Paddy.
 
Soldato
Joined
10 Mar 2013
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Location
Rotherham
Just following up from this. 3 years and about 3 months later I've made nearly £140,000, whilst working full time.
£3500 per month tax free whilst in my underwear cruising the interwebz anyway.

Those who think it's a con or gambling are stupid.

Sure it's harder to make money now than before (reduced ACCAs and bet X get Y) but the best offer ever seen in MB is still here - 2up/10up or 14up with B365/Paddy.
What's the 10up 14up. Congrats on those figures very impressive, I wish I still wasn't gubbed on everything. Would return within a heartbeat. It's well worth doing.
 
Caporegime
Joined
29 Jan 2008
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58,912
I eventually got banned from 90% of the bookmakers - obviously got picked up for automation. Not illegal but also not encouraged by bookmakers so they stop allowing me to win.

What I generally found was my betfair account used to lose all its money and the other bookmakers id gain from. Ideally you want it the other way around so effectively you are giving bookmakers money and keeping them happy whilst taking from Betfair.
Is this a similar sort of process?

In a rather broad sense yes. Essentially it sounds like you were just automating straight arbs between betfair and the respective bookmakers, it is possible they detected your use of a bot but it is also quite possible that they banned you because you're inevitably catching them out whenever they've posted bad prices - betfair is generally going to be more efficient when it comes to pricing for obvious reasons ergo anything you set up to compare bookies vs betfair is just going to catch out the bookies when they've been a bit slow, might be subtler sometimes but you'll also likely catch the blatant bad prices too and that would definitely draw attention to yourself.

Of course you don't really need to lay at betfair to take advantage of bad prices, just bet using the bad prices. (higher variance but more profitable).

What matched betting does is to use the fact that the free bet (or similar) offer gives you a positive expected value overall on what would otherwise be two or more -EV bets. This again means that because your edge comes from the bookies your laying at betfair is inherently -EV leading to you accumulating losses in your exchange account... So you could also decided not to lay on betfair at all when taking advantage of bookie offers and this should again be more profitable albeit with higher variance.

How much can you lay down per day and gain in profit without arousing suspicion of bookmakers?

You're limited by the offers they provide you. Some people advocate "mug betting", that is deliberately chucking a few quid on a -EV bet on some football team in order to try and appear like a mug punter and not a bonus abuser to the bookies.
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
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5,153
Location
Riding my bike
Well did quite well on some 2up offers this evening.

backed Barcelona, PSG, Napoli, Tottenham and Borussia, £100 on each

First 3 came in with a 2 up bet settle. PSV then did me a favour and scored as did Liverpool. Ended up £75 quid up on the evening.

What I've learnt is that in order to make a decent return you really need teh following to happen:

1) Don't bet on a team that are major favourites. Napoli were 1.16 to win meaning that a) they were very likely to, b) less chance their opponents would make a come back and c) if they did the market would have very little liquidity in it to back your lay to lock in any profit.

2) Teams really need to pull one back asap or the odds aren't as good. For example I made £50 on PSG (Liverpool goal in 43rd), but only £12 on Barca (PSV goal in 82nd min) and made a qualifying loss of £3 on the Napoli game as I could never get the back bet down to make a profit.

So in conclusion - I reckon I will be a bit more selective.

Only pick up matches with a 1.5 to 2.5 odds range, put more money down and only when the qualifying loss is less than 4%. All whilst tyring not to get my account gubbed.

Any other tips?
 
Caporegime
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
28,088
Location
London
Yeah I liked to lump on between 1.5-2.5, then dial it back a bit for 3.0-10.

Not sure if there are free ones but I think the main three all have free trials. Lots of Europa games tonight :).
 
Soldato
Joined
19 Jun 2009
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5,967
Location
London
£210 made last night on the 2up for PSG, including £50 free in play from B365 (extracted £35 at HT).

I don't touch anything of odds less than 1.7, unless I have massive stakes going down, it's just not worthwhile otherwise.
 
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