Gambler who kept winning could lose £650,000 jackpot

[gingerpaul]

Soovy said:

gingerpaul said:

Soovy said:

I imagine they'll be relying on some sort of manifest error argument.

For the nonlegal could you explain what this means please? Is it along the lines of not charging appropriately for the risk that is being taken on? If so I'm surprised that is a defense if they were in full control of the systems (ie hadn't been hacked or whatever).

As I said, it depends, and as tonker points out I have to be careful what I say for professional reasons, but a manifest error is basically something whcih woul db obvious to the punter - i.e. if you play an online fruit machine and keep winning every spin, then it's manifestly obvious that there is a problem and the bets should be voided (so the provider will say) if there is a provision in the terms which allows them to void bets when a manifest error occurs.

I see, thanks for that. I thought you were in oil so I'll leave related questions.

I can see from a gamblers point of view. If they felt they were on a winning streak they would keep playing to keep it going. You see it with fruit machines in pubs all the time, only they would run out of money before it got to this sort of scale.

I'm still surprised that someone didn't need to authorise or approve the wins he was getting as they happened. I bet they do now!

[hairykrishna]

He's lucky they're licensed somewhere where he even has a fighting chance of getting his money. From the information in the article it would seem it's fair to pay him. He seems like a genuine 'gambler' in that he was playing a game with a terrible EV and stopped after 3 hours essentially because he thought it was just a lucky streak. Anyone set on exploiting it would have carried on I think.

I'm surprised that this hasn't happened anywhere else to be honest. I think Sky were a re-skinned Coral site and ran Playtech software which is used by hundreds, if not thousands, of the online casinos.

[gingerpaul]

hairykrishna said:

I'm surprised that this hasn't happened anywhere else to be honest. I think Sky were a re-skinned Coral site and ran Playtech software which is used by hundreds, if not thousands, of the online casinos.

This is what I understood too. Interesting that this is from back in 2009 so it's clearly been ongoing for a while!

[MEC]

I wonder if they've tried to settle this out of court first by offering, say £250K? What will the guy's legal bill be if he loses?

[Chrisw666]

Soovy said:

but a manifest error is basically something whcih woul db obvious to the punter - i.e. if you play an online fruit machine and keep winning every spin,

So if that occurs you basically should just not get too greedy? A bit like if a cash machine has had the £10 drawer filled with £20s.

[tom2019]

isnt the code a completley random number generator anyway...haha

[Pesty]

The Wookie said:

After he claimed his winnings the (large and well known) betting house shut his account and banned him!! Talk about sore losers!

That is just silly.

Chances are a big gambler with a big win will increase the amounts he bets.

Which means they would slowly start getting their money back if he kept betting with them.

[Carfiend]

tom2019 said:

isnt the code a completley random number generator anyway...haha

Well even if it was written to not be stacked in the houses favour it would still not be random as it is impossible to generate genuine random numbers on a serial computer (the type you are posting on PH with right now). You generate a sequence of numbers based off of an unknown seed value. If you know that value then you can predict the sequence.

[wormburner]

Pesty said:

The Wookie said:

After he claimed his winnings the (large and well known) betting house shut his account and banned him!! Talk about sore losers!

That is just silly.

Chances are a big gambler with a big win will increase the amounts he bets.

Which means they would slowly start getting their money back if he kept betting with them.

That would depend on whether they believed he was good or lucky.

Sometimes they're happy to deal with the good as long as he wants to bet on the right side for the bookie's book to balance. If not, no deal.

[hairykrishna]

Yes, if he was spread betting they may have been worried he knew something they didn't. If he'd won it on blackjack or video poker or something they would have left his account open and probably raised his maximum bet level.

[DonkeyApple]

Soovy said:

I imagine they'll be relying on some sort of manifest error argument, but this would rely on them having tight terms and conditions which allow them to void a bet if there is an obvious problem or mistake/error in play (for exampl eif the punter keeps winning and winning without fail this would indicate that there is a manifest error).

It's an interesting one this, for sure. I it wasn't such a decent chunk of change I would have expected the company to let him keep it as good publicity.

But over half a bar? No.

Edited by Soovy on Friday 15th June 12:04

It will rest primarily on the arguement that he knew he was taking advantage of a flaw.

In addition the terms of each game will be laid out in the contract he agrees to abide by and if the game wasn't running to those terms it will be considered void.

He will also probably have been offered a deal which he should have taken and then there is the issue that most online casinos are 'skins' so the firm would not be in a position to claim the full winnings from the provider even though the provider had the software error.

If it was a bug that someone else found and he exploited then he won't have a leg to stand on. If he informed anyone of the bug then the same.

My guess is that it would be impossible for him to claim sufficient stupidity to have not realised he was profiting from a clear software error.

[hairykrishna]

DonkeyApple said:

My guess is that it would be impossible for him to claim sufficient stupidity to have not realised he was profiting from a clear software error.

Maybe. It appears the bug in question was one where they weren't removing the full amount staked from his balance. I think the game in question is one where there are lots of betting options at different values which run simultaneously and it could be that it's deliberately difficult to see exactly how much is being wagered on each 'spin'.

[DonkeyApple]

hairykrishna said:

Maybe. It appears the bug in question was one where they weren't removing the full amount staked from his balance. I think the game in question is one where there are lots of betting options at different values which run simultaneously and it could be that it's deliberately difficult to see exactly how much is being wagered on each 'spin'.

Maybe. The games are intended to mask the risk.

If he has been a long standing client then he will have a 'pattern' and even a 'pattern' for previous winning streaks.

If he suddenly deviated from these patterns and if the system logs highlight a sudden frenzy of trades, ie he was executing as fast as he humanly could then it was be taken as evidence that he was clearly aware of an error to his advantage.

There are clear data files dating back decades that show how gamblers respond to winning streaks versus error advantages and the differences are extremely stark and easy to differentiate.

He may not have a leg to stand on hence why the story has been supplied to the media in order to catalyse a settlement to avoid negative press.

[tubbystu]

hairykrishna said:

I think Sky were a re-skinned Coral site.

I think SkyBet was previously West Surrey Racing.

Not sure if related in any way to the well known motorsports team of the same name.

[wormburner]

Apropos of nothing, If a hypothetical punter spots a roulette wheel behaving in a non-random manner, and bets profitably on it, can the house claim back his winnings when they discover the problem.

And is there a difference between a punter who wins after spotting the dodgy wheel, and a punter who wins without spotting the dodgy wheel?

[gingerpaul]

wormburner said:

Apropos of nothing, If a hypothetical punter spots a roulette wheel behaving in a non-random manner, and bets profitably on it, can the house claim back his winnings when they discover the problem.

And is there a difference between a punter who wins after spotting the dodgy wheel, and a punter who wins without spotting the dodgy wheel?

The difference is that there is always someone manning the wheel and always someone keeping a close eye on the person manning the wheel in a proper casino. I'm amazed there isn't, or wasn't in this case, something similar in place to monitor the games, alert the company when someone is doing well and automatically stops the account if it starts getting out of hand.

[Ozzie Osmond]

What's really staggering isn't this bloke's excess winnings but the fact people are daft enough to gamble online at all, where there can be no certainty that whoever or whatever is running the casino isn't cheating. It's far to easy to skew the odds against punters.

For instance, an online roulette wheel can "know" what bets have been placed and manage the result of the spin accordingly.

[hairykrishna]

Ozzie Osmond said:

What's really staggering isn't this bloke's excess winnings but the fact people are daft enough to gamble online at all, where there can be no certainty that whoever or whatever is running the casino isn't cheating. It's far to easy to skew the odds against punters.

For instance, an online roulette wheel can "know" what bets have been placed and manage the result of the spin accordingly.

Provided you only play at casinos licensed somewhere sensible they're heavily regulated and audited. You're in no more danger of them cheating than if you were in a normal casino. In reality there's very little motive to cheat as all casino games are strongly biased against the punter anyway.

[DonkeyApple]

hairykrishna said:

Provided you only play at casinos licensed somewhere sensible they're heavily regulated and audited. You're in no more danger of them cheating than if you were in a normal casino. In reality there's very little motive to cheat as all casino games are strongly biased against the punter anyway.

And in some regards they self regulate because if you strip the punter of his stake too quickly he won't top up and give you more. It's a fine art to extract the maximum without messing with the 'hope' factor.

Never understood gambling with systems where the odds are against you or you have no edge but many gamblers aren't spending to win but to acquire the buzz that they might win.

Online poker is the one I don't get. It's the one game where you can control the odds but moving it online opens up huge risks. I guess that is regulated as online communities do communicate and would move instantly anything was discovered.

[iphonedyou]

DonkeyApple said:

And in some regards they self regulate because if you strip the punter of his stake too quickly he won't top up and give you more. It's a fine art to extract the maximum without messing with the 'hope' factor.

Never understood gambling with systems where the odds are against you or you have no edge but many gamblers aren't spending to win but to acquire the buzz that they might win.

Online poker is the one I don't get. It's the one game where you can control the odds but moving it online opens up huge risks. I guess that is regulated as online communities do communicate and would move instantly anything was discovered.

You're less likely to experience cheating online than in real life. Primarily because very effective anti collusion systems are in place, which rely on a computer to detect collusion, rather than the dealer or other players. Additionally, the cards themselves have a perfect shuffle on every occasion, and the dealer isn't subject to making human errors.

Your last sentence really hits the nail on the head. Hundreds of millions of dealt hands every day online, and virtually no negative press concerning cheating.