A considered defence of the Betfair Premium Charge
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Posted by Pythia on 02 Oct at 09:57.
The original post is in “Why do you all need bet angel and one click before going to purp?” started by that irrepressible Aussie lippy.
I work for Betfair although am not an apologist for it. However, the claims being made that all Betfair is out to do is rip-off punters has to be challenged. As does the absurd claims that most winning punters are being asked to pay commission and then an arbitrary 20% ‘tax’ (as people have referred to it as) on top of that.
The people being asked to pay the premium charge are, on the whole, those guys who take more out of the exchange than it costs the company to bring in new customers to compete with them. Even assuming, as some folks on here seem to want, there was a mass migration to ****** or another exchange, that exchange would be faced with the same issues Betfair has a few years down the line.
The exchange eco system is a relatively new one and just because this company came up with a pricing structure a few years ago that has remianed pretty much unchanged, and also been adopted by other betting exchanges, it doesn’t mean that this structure shouldn’t evolve over time.
People can take a view about whether charging fewer than 500 winning customers out of more than 110,000 exchange punters, last week, is the right move for the overall health of the exchange. But to suggest that Betfair is intent on forever putting up prices and charging whatever it can get away with is risible.
It is in the best interest of the company to do what it thinks best for the overall benefit of all of its customers and using money raised from the premium or any other charges to reinvest in the product -and in marketing and offers to attract new and retain exisitng customers – is a business decision I, for one, think is right.
Where the company hasn’t done so well, imo, is in how it has communicated information on the new charge to some customers. Lots of people seem to think the day will come when they will be asked to pay the new charge even though there is no prospect of this happening. Some of the misinformation has been spread about by people with a vested interest in either pushing their own agenda or in damaging Betfair but it is fair to say that the company could have done a better job in explaining itself too.
Hi John,
Only just discovered the new site – looks great!
Nice to see you’re still posting.
All the best,
Mark
Hi Mark, great to see you here mate. I’m back thanks to a good pal of mine who manages the blog for more and he’s got loads of ideas. Stay tuned. I still follow yours mate. Good luck, as always.
[…] PC has caused a lot of hysterical comment in the Betfair forum but I published a copy of a defence here from a Betfair employee two weeks ago and I’m philosophical about it. If what Betfair says is […]