“My heart’s really not in it any more,” says Paul Fairhead, the internet campaigner for punters who has decided to bring that side of his working life to a halt. By his own estimate, he has helped punters recover more than £500,000 from bookmakers over the past seven years and The Guardian has sometimes reported on the outcomes of his cases but the work has got harder and he has begun to feel ground down.
“It’s far more frustrating than it ever was and a real different ball game,” adds Fairhead, who says the final straw was the failure of his appeal in the case of David Smith, a punter who cost himself £189,000 by writing Bailarico rather than Bialco. Fairhead felt Smith’s betting slip made it clear that Bialco was intended and had high hopes of an appeal to the Independent Betting Adjudication Service, but it was turned down.
“I felt I’d made really strong points, using the logic of a previous case. I couldn’t see that they could fail to give him at least half his money. I was just incredulous when I saw the result.
“I felt it was incredibly harsh and it hit me pretty hard. Since then, I’ve lost a lot of motivation.”
Another factor has been what Fairhead perceives as a culture change at the Gambling Commission since the departure of Sarah Harrison, the chief executive until early 2018, who had sought out the views of campaigners such as him and Brian Chappell at Justice For Punters. “We were getting into meetings and she was very open with us, wanted to hear from us. When she left, she said the industry should engage with groups like Justice For Punters and that never really happened.”
Fairhead has also noticed, and not enjoyed, a change in the cases he is asked to take on. “It was bets that hadn’t been settled properly or fairly, or people being deducted a Rule 4 when there shouldn’t have been, or Best Odds Guaranteed being withdrawn after a bet won.” He notices many fewer BOG cases now and hopes that firms have learned from past mistakes.
“In recent months, 90% of the emails I get are from people who have had their funds frozen or confiscated and are being asked for ‘source of wealth’ information. That’s a huge issue and the problem with it is, a lot of the time people have got third-party funding involved; say you send me £100 by bank transfer, I put it into a betting account, we have a winner at 33-1 and then they want to see my bank statements and maybe yours as well.”
Fairhead believes it has become common for punters, having been restricted by bookmakers for past successes, to use accounts in the names of others. But it is obviously a breach of any firm’s terms and conditions. His point is that bookmakers should make their background checks before accepting bets from a customer.
“Sometimes I think they may have suspicions of third-party betting but while you’re losing it’s not an issue. As soon as you back a winner and then you go to withdraw, they have all these questions about where the money came from. The time to ask is when the money’s deposited, before they take a bet. In simple terms, my view is if a firm accepts a bet, the bet should be honoured.”
Tips by Chris Cook
Wolverhampton
12.00 Hot Scoop 12.30 Griggy (nap) 1.00 Jojo Rabbit 1.30 Ruby Wonder 2.00 Awsaaf 2.30 The Blue Bower 3.00 Inductive 3.30 False ID (nb) 4.00 Power Home
Kempton
12.15 Becker 12.45 Live Stream 1.15 Theotherside 1.45 Conscious 2.15 Winter Thorn 2.45 Summit Reach 3.15 Light In The Sky 3.45 Dark Regard 4.15 Under Curfew
Newbury
4.55 Society Lion 5.25 Breath Of Air 5.55 Mackaar 6.25 Just The Man 7.00 City Code 7.30 Majd Al Arab 8.00 Alash Orda 8.30 Al Madhar 9.00 Jacksonian
Fairhead’s departure makes life harder for punters, though they can still seek support from Justice For Punters or the Horserace Bettors Forum. “I’ve spent a lot of time trying to help people and at the end of the day, I have other things to do. I feel like I’ve done my bit, it’s getting harder and harder to win these cases and when you get a case like Dave Smith’s, his only route is to go to court. Why should people have to do that?”