Panorama investigation, Addicted to Gambling

Interesting programme on gambling just been on.

Concentrating mainly on the fact the bookies aren't interested in helping gamblers with a problem, in fact its the exact opposite.

One woman spent £600k online on Jackpot Joy in a few months. Rather than stopping her gambling, if she hadn't played for a while they would phone her up and give her a bonus to get her started again.

Another fella who spent millions he'd stolen with Ladbrokes was treated as a VIP punter and invited to sports events. He was never asked where he was getting the money. He'd kicked the habit for 5 months and Ladbrokes stuck £10k of free bets in his account to get him addicted again!

I know everybody has to take responsibility for their actions but the betting companies are supposed to be promoting responsible gambling.

78% of betting turnover is bet by 4% of the customers. Mug punters I think they're called.

Very rarely gamble because I am crap at it.

Don't mind the odd scratch or lottery card but if I buy a few once in a while and don't win I tend to think it of a waste of money.

It’s a dirty, seedy industry preying on human weakness, they’re as keen on promoting responsible gambling as tobacco firms are on printing photos of black lungs on fag packets.

I haven’t watched the program, I will do.

When I was addicted and gambling well over my means at 18 not once did anyone stop - this was a few years ago mind. When I self excluded I was still getting bombarded with marketing and texts. A few dodgy sites had other sites so you’d exclude from one and then you’d get inundated from their sister sites with free offers etc.

It’s a bit better now as you have Gamstop which will ban you from all UK online sites and the self exclude bookies scheme - but if you want to gamble you’ll a find a way to contravene them.

Bookies don’t care about people with gambling issues, they just want money. It needs an independent group.

I like a game of bingo now and again but don’t gamble on anything else, I was shit at it

Mullen103 wrote: I haven’t watched the program, I will do.

When I was addicted and gambling well over my means at 18 not once did anyone stop - this was a few years ago mind. When I self excluded I was still getting bombarded with marketing and texts. A few dodgy sites had other sites so you’d exclude from one and then you’d get inundated from their sister sites with free offers etc.

It’s a bit better now as you have Gamstop which will ban you from all UK online sites and the self exclude bookies scheme - but if you want to gamble you’ll a find a way to contravene them.

Bookies don’t care about people with gambling issues, they just want money. It needs an independent group.

I like a game of bingo now and again but don’t gamble on anything else, I was shit at it

Yeah Yeah - you say this but I seen you at the top of the predictocomp whilst I can only mane joint eighth

I'm not usually one to suggest the prohibition of anything, but I would ban the advertising of gambling of any kind.

I know one bloke who was divorced by his wife (who else?) because he was gambling hundreds of pounds regularly . In his case it was horse racing. Sometimes he won big, but his losses were even greater.

I also remember speaking to one chap who told me he couldn't watch a football match on TV without placing some kind of bet on it. For him, without a bet, the sport was pointless.

Gamblers always show you the winning slips but never the losing ones.

There are a lot of people out there with undiagnosed mental health issues, learning difficulties, disabilities eg Asperger's and those who's brain has been addled by alcohol.
These are the kind of folk who are inclined to blow hundreds online or on a machine and that is the problem I have with it.

munchymagic wrote:

Mullen103 wrote: I haven’t watched the program, I will do.

When I was addicted and gambling well over my means at 18 not once did anyone stop - this was a few years ago mind. When I self excluded I was still getting bombarded with marketing and texts. A few dodgy sites had other sites so you’d exclude from one and then you’d get inundated from their sister sites with free offers etc.

It’s a bit better now as you have Gamstop which will ban you from all UK online sites and the self exclude bookies scheme - but if you want to gamble you’ll a find a way to contravene them.

Bookies don’t care about people with gambling issues, they just want money. It needs an independent group.

I like a game of bingo now and again but don’t gamble on anything else, I was shit at it

Yeah Yeah - you say this but I seen you at the top of the predictocomp whilst I can only mane joint eighth

Ha ha - there’s money involved this year.

I haven't placed a bet in a long time and when I did it was pretty sporadic.

You only have to look at the money that these companies spend on advertising and free bet offers to know that they're very clearly on the winning side in all of this.

I've been to the horses before with my father in law who takes a keen interest in it. I have absolutely no interest in horse racing and my random selection of horses (based purely on funny names, of course) performed just the same as those that were carefully selected by trainer/jockey/form.

Iv just been past the Bet 365 HQ in Stoke A huge modern building I was thinking to myself there’s a few losers build that. I do like a football coupon on a Saturday myself

Rather than get hooked on Gambling, why not Heroin, its cheaper ?

Look about these days, when was the last time you watched TV and didn’t see a Bet365, BetFred, 888, Ladbrokes, Betfair advert..?
Every 2nd ad during football coverage is Ray Winston or Kriss Akabusi now.
Look at club strips, how many have gambling companies as main sponsor?
Cricket games, boxing, or worse the run up to a big race meeting like Cheltenham or Ascot, it’s everywhere!!
It’s subliminal brainwashing.

I like a weekend £5 on an accumulator.
I won’t bet any other time, I won’t bet any more that my £5 either...during the week my smart watch constantly vibrates with Betfair offers on everything going, I’m sure they’d send me offers on two flies crawling up a wall somewhere if they thought they could tempt me to bet another £5.

It’s an absolute epidemic that needs curbed at least.

I can speak from personal experience as I was a founder and director of Netplay which runs Supercasino on the TV.We sold the business about 3 years ago.

The problem for the industry is tax-gambling is seen as low hanging fruit by all governments and the latest point of consumption tax really hit all the official sites very hard.Worth noting there is a rampant ‘grey market’ in gambling which totally ignores the rules.It cut our recurring profit by 75pc overnight.

Anyway, the new tax meant that gambling companies had to spend more on marketing to ‘land grab’ customers-our marketing cost leapt to £2m per month, mainly TV adverts.So in reality, customer acquisition costs went through the roof just to hold market share.Big problem for companies is customers are not loyal and churn runs very high, pushing the companies to milk customers before they move on.This increased spend saw a splurge on TV advertising.

It was a big learning experience for me but not a sector I felt entirely comfortable with. Our business was mainly roulette so essentially fixed odds-sometimes we made 6pc margin on a night, sometimes lost money, but over a period of time, the house always returned something over 3pc margin.We were taking bets of over £150m a month at one point.

Anyway, gambling companies are going to have to consolidate into a smaller group as legislation and tax means there are too many gaming companies in the market.

Should have mentioned it’s how I met Andy Bell-one of the ‘investors’ who changed his mind after speaking to JN

I won 6k from £40 start once on Supercasino, there were some hot girls on there playing with the balls, gave it all and more to 32 red. Probably why you haven't got a pot and they can get Rooney joke!

There's a lot of gambling companies set up in Isle of Man and Gibraltar. Curacao seems to be a new one as they have lax gambling laws and can accept UK based gamblers without having a license - dodgy.

I always thought Supercasino/Netplay played on the vulnerable a bit by having their night shows on channel 5 through the night and chatty hosts. On the flip side its a good business to go into as you'll make money from "Fools", "Desperate" and "Addicts" but not good morally - just my opinion of course.

Laffy wrote: Big problem for companies is customers are not loyal

I don't think they can expect customers to be loyal. If another company can offer a better deal or a better price, isn't it common sense that customers would go to them instead?

I personally don't like gambling, the bookie always wins in the long run. If customers are actually profiting rather than losing money, many bookies eventually limit how much they can bet, or shut their account altogether. It doesn't seem fair.

No wonder you got addicted with some ' hot girls on there playing with the balls'

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tommycoleman1 wrote: No wonder you got addicted with some ' hot girls on there playing with the balls'

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They had great technique!

I wonder if they lost viewers/money when they changed dealer to a bloke.

Kessler wrote:

Laffy wrote: Big problem for companies is customers are not loyal

I don't think they can expect customers to be loyal. If another company can offer a better deal or a better price, isn't it common sense that customers would go to them instead?

I personally don't like gambling, the bookie always wins in the long run. If customers are actually profiting rather than losing money, many bookies eventually limit how much they can bet, or shut their account altogether. It doesn't seem fair.

Bingo clubs and possibly casinos there are loyal customers as its a social thing, but online not so.

I presume the way I did things was, if I won big at an online site i'd go to another as I was sure that they'd make me lose it or if I lost i'd go to another thinking it was fixed. There was that many to choose from.

You're right though they is only ever one winner - the house/bookie.

I remember waking up on the couch and that roulette betting show was on, stayed up for the next hour guessing what the next number was going to be, never tempted to ring up though - there used to be one where you had to guess the words and it was ace as it was like a game show where you could ring up and win money although tempted never rang them either.

Each to your own with gambling, I only bet what I can afford to lose but still understand that the thrill of it some folk get and also see that they will bet what they cannot afford to spend to win back what they have lost which is the cruel side of gambling.

Seems to be luck anyhow apart from those who play poker where yes it is gambling but you can win using skill if you are any good.

I think you will find that Bell let himself down in 2016-he let me down after his chat with JN in 2015.Not sure what was said but there you go.

I always found him ok but didn’t like his hairdresser Boxster.

As I also said, gambling is a fools game-house always wins eventually.The most important aspect is something called the ‘drop’.This is what is left in the tin after a night of trading.Gaming companies spend a lot of time trying to maximise the drop by persuading winners to leave their money with the house-if it left, you would probably never see it again.

Our tables were in Gibraltar and I recall one of our presenters saying something completely inappropriate a few hours after a plane had gone down.Unhelpful and stupid and OFWAT got involved.

We encountered all manner of cheating-credit card theft, identity theft, table spin cheating.Saw it all.

I would ban gambling if I was given the option-but too powerful a lobby and what would horse racing do without the levy?

Aye there was a quiz channel where you had to guess the number of circles in a picture or what was in a ladies handbag. It was always something obscure, I think it got banned in the end.

Mullen103 wrote: Aye there was a quiz channel where you had to guess the number of circles in a picture or what was in a ladies handbag. It was always something obscure, I think it got banned in the end.

Haha sounds about right, the list had say 'lipstick' as the £50 answer but nobody guessed the 10k answer 'a George Michael cd'

They were some odd things that happened on Supercasino AND MANY OTHERS, for instance, a ball was going into my number and the ball would miraculously speed up and jump out the circle and making a no spin. Defying the laws of physics and making it a no spin.

Aspers casino Newcastle, was another that it happened to me loads the ball would land in one of my numbers than suddenly speed up and jump of the table.

Whether it was fixed IT IS or not is irrelevant - the house always wins regardless.

It wasn’t fixed with us I can assure you.A lot of controls.

I know Damian Aspinall of Aspers-aspirational type business but ended up letting in anyone with a pair of jeans and selling chips.Went right down market.

I was in Croxfords in London a couple of years ago.Very high end-they put on jets to bring their clients in at the house expense.No limit tables.You would be amazed how many Tory grandees frequent the place.

Laffy wrote: As I also said, gambling is a fools game-house always wins eventually.

To be fair though, what kind of odds would you have given for me and you to be in complete agreement about something?

I did read up that Supercasino and smartlive needed extra controls due to being on TV. Smartlive went bust I think saying they had too many high rollers and weren't able to fix games?????

I'm 99.9% convinced that the aspers roulette tables were rigged - just rewrote the laws of physics some of the stuff that happened.

But as I say the house always wins.

There you go Kessler-I don’t send kids up chimneys after all.A capitalist with a conscience.

Further improvement may seevme offering you a position

Laffy wrote: There you go Kessler-I don’t send kids up chimneys after all.A capitalist with a conscience.

Further improvement may seevme offering you a position

Ironically Kes you would already be working for Laffy if the board hadn't shafted him and I bet you would already be on better terms and conditions and would have less to criticise

Yes-out with those ill fitting and uncomplimentary outfits for a start.Get Bumble back in for the photography and we are off to the races

FFS dont mention the races, you'll have that Bell fella trying to get in on the act again.

Tweeted about this earlier. It's too easy to gamble online. What's the point in a bookie giving you the ability to self-exclude yourself, when 2 minutes later you can create an account with another bookie?

There should be a centralised system, self-exclude from one, and you're self-excluded from the lot. Difficult to govern, I appreciate, given that many many bookies are based overseas, but surely somebody can think of a way of combating that, or at least making it a damn site harder.

I'm not addicted to gambling, fortunately I never have been, but I've got dozens and dozens of accounts that I've opened the years taking advantage of offers and the like. It should be harder to do this.

CCU wrote: GAMSTOP is being developed with this in mind:

www.gamstop.co.uk/

Obviously in its infancy, and not all are on it yet, but be interesting to see how it comes on...

A lot of the main UK players are in Gamstop now - not sky - so it's getting there. The problem is theres tonnes of sites about and a lot are setting up in Curacao where the gambling laws are very lax and they can accept UK based gamblers without having a uk gambling comission license so hence no gamstop.

Previously a lot of online sites had sister sites, so if you self excluded from one their sister site would bombared you with free offers etc to get you back - totally immoral.

The best self exclusion scheme is the casino one SENSE - www.nationalcasinoforum.co.uk/voluntary-self-exclusion-sense/

Easier to manage but well done

Another is the centralised bookies one self-exclusion.co.uk/ - again though has poor results as staff change and easy to contravene.

If you really want to gamble you'll find a way

The media know about a Scottish player who has just won and then lost six figures in the same week.