Astonishing Letter From TAB to loyal customer

[PWJ]

I am enclosing a post by Manawatu-based Stu Shirriffs (who I'm sure many of you will know) to Brian de Lore's latest installment of The Optimist. It is quite a story but the most remarkable thing is the letter the TAB wrote to his friend. Quite frankly it is beyond the pale. It illustrates perfectly how out of touch the NZ TAB is with actual, real customers and racing fans. Your comments please:

Stu Shirriffs says:

April 4, 2020 at 8:53 pm

Brian de Lore ( The Optimist )
I can’t fathom why this would happen , but it looks like the TAB is doing its best to prove why outsourcing should have gone ahead long ago when we would have been on the front foot in negotiations , instead of pigheadedly going alone to reinvent the betting platform wheel and creating a $50m hole that consumed potential racing stakes that all participants have been begging for.

Below is an abstract from a genuine TAB e-mail received today ( 3rd April ; not an April Fool’s Day joke ) by a friend of mine .
He is retired and has been betting ( mostly each way , doubles quinellas, place 6 etc ) for the last 55 years ; his betting is mostly in the $10-$20 range. As well as horse racing , he likes to bet on rugby , rugby league , cricket & tennis and in retirement has plenty of time on his hands to pore over everything on offer.
Since the cricket world cup six’s promotion , he , like many others , got enthralled by the promotions on offer and since then has been following closely everything that comes up on “Punters Lounge” and , remembering well the TAB slogan “You know the odds, now beat them” ( no doubt dreamed up by some dude earning more than a Sydney Saturday race stake ) , over the last few months he’s been punting virtually every day ( horses , dogs , trotters , sports ) with a focus on the first couple of races that they put up as “ Bonus Back” races ( sometimes at 3 or 4 meetings ). The J Mac races are another favourite.
He puts in the study and at the moment , has probably better than average success.
In the last few months , he has made occasional withdrawals in amounts of about $200-$300 and , over the recent period he would be “ beating the odds”( by backing a few winners or quite often getting Bonus Bets when the chosen runner finishes 2nd ; 3rd or 4th ). I know that a lot of people wouldn’t normally even bother betting on the first two races at some meetings( before bonus-back came along )

I find it unfathomable that the TAB , at a time when they should be fighting for every customer that they can hang onto , would send such a ridiculous letter to any punter , let alone one who might have just got his nose in front over the last few months.
Regards
Stu Shirriffs

The TAB must be called to account for this!!
As I said , this is the guts of a genuine e-mail I have seen tonight ; it was addressed personally to the punter ( his name is not shown here , mainly for “ wife might find out reasons” ).
You will note that , while addressing the punter personally , the writer didn’t even have the balls to put their own name to the e-mail , obviously realising how pathetic and stupid it was.

Hi ———— ,

The TAB offers a wide range of promotional offers and options all year round on your favourite racing and sports events. These are designed for occasional and safe use so that our loyal customers can have a bit more fun alongside their normal betting. It is our way of ensuring that your wagering is enjoyable and thanking you for choosing to bet with the TAB.

It’s great to see that you are enjoying these promotional offers, however a recent review of your betting history indicates that the majority of your betting is skewed towards these promotional options. While we are happy to continue to offer you these promotional options at this point in time, we do ask that you maintain a more balanced diet of your betting habits in the future. If your current activity continues then, regrettably, we may have to consider removing your eligibility for promotional offers and options.

Your account remains unchanged at this point. We hope you understand and can continue to enjoy our full range of betting options in a more balanced way.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact our TAB Customer Services team, helpdesk@tab.co.nz

Thanks,
The TAB Team

[Hesi]

The TAB Help Desk, Call Centre, call it what you will, are now all set up, working from home, so perhaps the lack of a cohesive message because of the circumstances could be to blame, but it is a line that is hard to understand

I don't have an account Peter, so have a whole lot of TAB tickets about to timeout, that the help desk have, via emailed scans, are paying into my bank account.  This has involved an interchange of maybe 4-5 emails, each time the response has been about a day in between.

They have even rang me and attempted to set up an account over the phone, not quite there yet as I cannot do the ID thing as I do not have a camera on my desktop

Perhaps best, just doing what I normally do, visit the TAB(when it reopens), and place bets manually

 

[pete]

That email is bloody unbelievable. Surely if they give you promos you're going to use them. I don't understand what 'the majority of your betting is skewed towards these options' is trying to prove. That makes no sense at all.

[Maximus]

Translation from the TAB BS to Truth-Speak

You aren't losing as much or as often as we require. Start losing or we'll close your account.

 

NZ TAB, you are a disgrace. Perhaps one of the upsides of Covid is that we may have to accept much less racing in NZ and get used to relying on overseas racing esp Oz - in which case outsourcing our TAB is bloody good. 

[Hesi]

Surely common sense tells you the TAB needs to look at the big picture, as to whether these promotions are working, whether they are profitable by adding to increased churn and therefore turnover, not looking at individual cases......crazy

If the promotions are not profitable or meet the desired profit margin, then withdraw them, that is the whole point of them in the first place

A business will promote its products with a view to increasing sales, if the increase in sales does not outweigh the loss of revenue in the longer term, then why would any business continue with them.  Businesses, indulging in this technique to increase sales will now EXACTLY how much it works, eg selling Coke 2 for $5 etc etc.  It certainly would never say to the retail outlet, you can only allow a customer to limit it to 2 purchases because it is costing us too much, for instance, unless of course that is specifically pointed out at the point of sale, and that is usually done for other reasons

 

[Hesi]

Punter fumes at TAB muzzle

Barry Lichter05:00, Aug 24 2014

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TAB odds-makers lure in punters with the promo slogan: "You know the odds, now beat them".

But less than three months before New Zealand's biggest betting day - the November 4 running of the Melbourne Cup - they have cracked down on a Kiwi punter who has excelled at doing just that.

TAB executive general manager Glenn Patrick recently wrote to Christchurch man Graham Beirne that the betting agency was losing "a significant amount of money" on his fixed odds betting, so it had to adjust the amount of money he could win.

In a move which the 67-year-old hit out at, he can now not win any more than $2000 on a win or place bet, and cannot win any more than $2000 even on a combination multi. He must also place all his bets by 9.30am on respective race days.

 

"It's more like, ‘You know the odds, now beat them. But if you do, we'll cut you'," a fuming Beirne said. "On the one hand they're complaining about leakage - don't bet overseas, they say, but you can only back losers in New Zealand - ‘You can play in our sand pit but only if you lose'."

Beirne owned Kate's First when it won the 1997 Auckland Cup.

He has been a passionate supporter of harness racing for more than 50 years.

But the TAB's stance had him questioning his future support for the industry in New Zealand.

"I put $1 million into the industry every year through 25 racehorses, plus broodmares and sponsorship, but I'm at the point of thinking of selling the lot and going and playing bridge," he said.

He added in a written response to Patrick and the TAB: "The owners that continue to race horses are supplying the product for your customers to generate turnover. Have you also considered that while my past betting has cost you money on fixed odds, every time I line up a horse in a race it is making you money on the tote?

"No doubt you also have other large winning customers but how many of these people contribute product for your customers to be on to the degree that I do? I would suggest none."

Beirne had offered a compromise over betting limits, but the TAB had rejected it, he said.

Patrick told the Sunday Star-Times it was standard practice around the world for corporate bookmakers to restrict winning punters. He believed the way the TAB was treating Beirne was fair and reasonable. He would not confirm how many other punters had similar restrictions.

"One of our objectives under the Racing Act is to maintain a profitable wagering system and we need to take that obligation seriously," he said.

"There will be clients who have better information than us, or who are better than us, that we will need to put limits on."

 

Sunday Star Times

[Hesi]

Those last 2 lines, are it, in a nutshell

[mardigras]

The issue is - they should never have been a 'bookmaker', as I have stated previously. It is only when you carry the risk, that you need to manage that risk. Just anther reason why NZ totally cocked up the landscape. Stay as a tote operator, risk free money. Let others start up and take the risks (for a fee). A no brainer but the idiots in NZ racing couldn't work that out. 

And as a monopoly agency - the decision is even worse. By introducing fixed odds and ultimately cannibalising the tote pools, you end up with a punter having no available options through the monopoly provider in NZ. A reflection on absolute stupidity. Seriously, these people are thick. Put stupid people in charge and what do you get. You get the NZRB annual report, that's what you get.

[Hesi]

Don't forget the huge increase in fixed and variable costs that this also added, including the $50 mil FO platform and ongoing licence fees

[curious]

5 hours ago, Hesi said:

Don't forget the huge increase in fixed and variable costs that this also added, including the $50 mil FO platform and ongoing licence fees

There's no doubt in my mind that the FO business has been an unmitigated disaster for the reasons that you and mardi have pointed out and if I wanted to point the finger at a single thing at the wagering level that has f&*cked NZ Racing, that is it. I latched on to mardi's point about this and have been saying it for must be a decade but they just wouldn't let go and then spent what you say plus started paying out distributions in excess of earnings on the basis that the new platform would save the day. Worse, we now have RITA saying they won't do anything about that for a few years because of the investment they have in the platform. All we've heard from them lately is silence and gobbledeygook. Sadly, the only way out is to write off the platform and do what mardi suggested. Probably too late and will probably take a statutory manager to do it.

[mardigras]

28 minutes ago, curious said:

There's no doubt in my mind that the FO business has been an unmitigated disaster for the reasons that you and mardi have pointed out and if I wanted to point the finger at a single thing at the wagering level that has f&*cked NZ Racing, that is it. I latched on to mardi's point about this and have been saying it for must be a decade but they just wouldn't let go and then spent what you say plus started paying out distributions in excess of earnings on the basis that the new platform would save the day. Worse, we now have RITA saying they won't do anything about that for a few years because of the investment they have in the platform. All we've heard from them lately is silence and gobbledeygook. Sadly, the only way out is to write off the platform and do what mardi suggested. Probably too late and will probably take a statutory manager to do it.

It's what you get when you have people that aren't capable of admitting they got things wrong. So they persist with the wrong on the basis that doing otherwise would highlight their mistakes. Very sad.

I well remember one of my early days at Microsoft when I had a discussion with the practice manager at the time and conceded that I had made a mistake in the direction I had taken with a client (a big client at that). But the result was it was better to admit that then, than try and continue with something that was a) against Microsoft guidelines and b) highly likely to fail anyway. Costs of bad decisions are generally far less early than they are late - the same with most things.

[Hesi]

Seems to be prevalent today,  people refusing to admit they got something wrong,  but not only that, people refusing to take on board knowledge from people who have it, interpreting it as trying to tell them what to do.

My mantra is simple listen to everything, treat it as knowledge being put on the table, then decide whether you want to take it on board from there, but don't close your mind to it

I think  you have mentioned it before, but weren't Curious and Mardi asked to make an input by the powers that be in the past 

[mardigras]

24 minutes ago, Hesi said:

I think  you have mentioned it before, but weren't Curious and Mardi asked to make an input by the powers that be in the past 

Curious provided input to NZTR - I helped out where I could with that. Curious can answer to that better than I, but I think they pretty much did nothing with what was provided.

I was offered an opportunity to meet with a representative from the TAB. A one time offer it seemed, that I couldn't make. I offered an alternative, they equally said they couldn't make that. And no further discussion was had.

[VC!]

1.11.3. Sportsbet reserves the right at any time to refuse any bet or part of a bet without providing a reason or advance notification. The circumstances in which we may refuse a Member's bet include but are not limited to:

e) a Member's proposed bet would present an unacceptable liability risk to our business. Whether there is an unacceptable liability risk to us for the purpose of this Rule is at Sportsbet's

1.10.9. Sportsbet products and bet types are intended for bona fide Members, that is, those Members who act in good faith, sincerely, without fraud, and who place a bet with Sportsbet for the purpose of Recreation and entertainment.

 

 

Anyone who bets with the TAB or Corporates in this day and age, putting it bluntly you will never come out as a professional they will simply not allow it, but trust me quite a few of you on here will read this and you will try and you will try again and again until you have completed the process until you have completed that process you will then understand when Mardi said on the other channel that he could guarantee he was the only professional on that site, he would’ve been 100 % correct, so in a nutshell that letter above doesn’t surprise me in the slightest 

I could image with Covid19 that quite a few traders have been laid off and the restrictions are going to come thick and fast for anyone making a consistent profit

[mardigras]

I think it is fair that a business acts in a manner designed to manage its risk. The industry is in a bit of flux - especially with things like increased taxes/POC etc. I don't see things improving in this arena for some time (and corporates will never change from what VC put up)

[Hesi]

39 minutes ago, VC! said:

1.11.3. Sportsbet reserves the right at any time to refuse any bet or part of a bet without providing a reason or advance notification. The circumstances in which we may refuse a Member's bet include but are not limited to:

e) a Member's proposed bet would present an unacceptable liability risk to our business. Whether there is an unacceptable liability risk to us for the purpose of this Rule is at Sportsbet's

1.10.9. Sportsbet products and bet types are intended for bona fide Members, that is, those Members who act in good faith, sincerely, without fraud, and who place a bet with Sportsbet for the purpose of Recreation and entertainment.

 

 

Anyone who bets with the TAB or Corporates in this day and age, putting it bluntly you will never come out as a professional they will simply not allow it, but trust me quite a few of you on here will read this and you will try and you will try again and again until you have completed the process until you have completed that process you will then understand when Mardi said on the other channel that he could guarantee he was the only professional on that site, he would’ve been 100 % correct, so in a nutshell that letter above doesn’t surprise me in the slightest 

I could image with Covid19 that quite a few traders have been laid off and the restrictions are going to come thick and fast for anyone making a consistent profit

Surely this is for anyone wanting to put 100,000 on a horse to collect a million.....that type of bet

Not the type of customer PJ has alluded to in his post, who bets for recreation and entertainment and may get lucky from time to time and take a few hundred off them

[VC!]

18 minutes ago, Hesi said:

Surely this is for anyone wanting to put 100,000 on a horse to collect a million.....that type of bet

Not the type of customer PJ has alluded to in his post, who bets for recreation and entertainment and may get lucky from time to time and take a few hundred off them

When I was closed down I actually demanded speaking to the trader, and he said the reason my account was closed was I had become a liability to the business 

I asked him in which way, to which he replied you have become a liability to our business consistently making a profit we have been through the history of your account and we have come to the decision that in the best interest of our company we close your account 

Edited April 7, 2020 by VC!

[Hesi]

A victim of your own success Ian

[VC!]

3 minutes ago, Hesi said:

A victim of your own success Ian

A victim of pursuing success Alan

[PWJ]

The overview of all this is that the NZ TAB simply doesn't employ odds setters (bookies) who are good enough at their trade. I have met Glenn Munsie twice. He is the odds guru for the NSW TAB and is a very intelligent guy with an unparalleled knowledge of racing current and past. He recommended two excellent books for me to read which pertain to chance, probability, human behaviour in gambling scenarios, etc. The man is a genius. These people exist but they come at a price. The NZ TAB simply need to employ people who can set odds and make more for their organisation. Take on the "Ians" of this world and beat them or at least hold them at bay. Less $$$ for paper shufflers at Petone and more for people who can turn a profit from which the industry would ultimately benefit.      

[mardigras]

9 minutes ago, PWJ said:

The overview of all this is that the NZ TAB simply doesn't employ odds setters (bookies) who are good enough at their trade. I have met Glenn Munsie twice. He is the odds guru for the NSW TAB and is a very intelligent guy with an unparalleled knowledge of racing current and past. He recommended two excellent books for me to read which pertain to chance, probability, human behaviour in gambling scenarios, etc. The man is a genius. These people exist but they come at a price. The NZ TAB simply need to employ people who can set odds and make more for their organisation. Take on the "Ians" of this world and beat them or at least hold them at bay. Less $$$ for paper shufflers at Petone and more for people who can turn a profit from which the industry would ultimately benefit.      

TABCORP will still limit punters. Have been doing so for years. Munsie may be smart - but there will always be punters with more information than him/them - and their risk modelling will want to curb those punters.

[Hesi]

1 hour ago, PWJ said:

The overview of all this is that the NZ TAB simply doesn't employ odds setters (bookies) who are good enough at their trade. I have met Glenn Munsie twice. He is the odds guru for the NSW TAB and is a very intelligent guy with an unparalleled knowledge of racing current and past. He recommended two excellent books for me to read which pertain to chance, probability, human behaviour in gambling scenarios, etc. The man is a genius. These people exist but they come at a price. The NZ TAB simply need to employ people who can set odds and make more for their organisation. Take on the "Ians" of this world and beat them or at least hold them at bay. Less $$$ for paper shufflers at Petone and more for people who can turn a profit from which the industry would ultimately benefit.      

Alternatively licence out the rights to an organisation who can, and in doing so get rid of a big part of the huge burden of costs that has stymied the industry

[VC!]

BetEasy sued for $1.2 million after punter landed monster multi-bet

By Damien Ractliffe

April 3, 2020 — 3.05pm

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Bookmaker BetEasy is being pursued for close to $1.2 million in unpaid winnings after it paid punter Renee Bell just $250,000 following a monster parlay win in May 2018.

In Supreme Court documents filed on Wednesday, Bell claims BetEasy, formerly CrownBet, was deceptive and misleading when it accepted $500 worth of multi-bets with a potential return of $1,443,695.90 before claiming it had a maximum payout limit of $250,000.
 

Yip well😎

This should be an interesting case.... under terms and conditions all corporates list their maximum payouts on all bet types, in this case with Bet Easy the maximum payout on a multi is $250k 

The problem I have is why do you accept someone’s bet for a potential payout of close to 1.5 million 

I would be surprised if more than 1% of people who join these corporate or even Tab account holders actually read the terms and conditions 

Edited April 7, 2020 by VC!

[Hesi]

Just what is the business strategy of these betting agencies including the TAB.

I recall reading somewhere that the biggest percentage of the TAB's business is with the bigger bettors, the 20/80 thing.

From what I am reading in this thread, they are hardly encompassing those 20% that make up 80% of the turnover, as the focus appears to be on the recreational and entertainment market

I don't understand

[mardigras]

Bigger bettors aren't necessarily winning bettors.