EXCLUSIVE: TATTSBET FALSE ADVERTISING DISGRACE CONTINUES UNABATED AS EVERYONE CONVENIENTLY LOOKS THE OTHER WAY AS “FOR EVIL TO SUCCEED GOOD MEN MUST DO NOTHING” ROMPS IN AGAIN

06/10/14

Rails bookmaker, Lindsay Gallagher, didn’t field at the Gold Coast meeting last Saturday so his normal Monday column will be back next week.

So today there’s another exclusive story for website visitors to peruse and after you’ve finished reading it you will realize even more just how incestuous the world of thoroughbred racing truly is.

To that end, for some years now, I have exclusively been bringing to account, via articles displayed on this website, random audits on various betting agencies, to compare fixed odds prices.

Tattsbet, which is the “home TAB” in each of Queensland, South Australia, the Northern Territory and Tasmania banner advertises on websites, including the website of the governing body of racing in this State – Racing Queensland, as per the associated picture with this story, that “For the best fixed prices more often, go to Tattsbet.com”.

So is that a statement of fact or fiction? Given the huge size of the business that is Tattsbet, and given the fact that Racing Queensland, as governing body of the three codes of racing in this State, would be reasonably expected to “lead by example,” given they don’t allow any licensees any latitude regarding “bringing racing into disrepute,” I thought I’d randomly audit the fixed odds prices that were on public display on four main Melbourne Spring Carnival features last Thursday about 7pm. Obviously I could have used numerous outlets for the comparison, so it’s quite possible – in fact it’s what I would deem “highly probable” that even better prices than these listed below were available at the same time, but I didn’t need to audit more than three opposition outlets of Tattsbet to come up with an answer to my question.

In the undermentioned comparison, I lined up the Tattsbet prices with those available at the same time at Centrebet (herein after called C/BET), Sportsbet and Luxbet.

Here’s what my research revealed:

RACE: CAULFIELD CUP

HORSE

TATTSBET

(3 places)

C/BET

(3 places)

SPORTSBET

(4 places)

LUXBET

(4 places)

Dear Demi

11

10

15

10

Bande

12

11

11

11

Lucia Valentina

13

10

10

10

Admire Rakti

16

15

17

18

Spillway

16

16

15

15

The Offer

16

18

17

18

Rising Romance

17

15

11

15

Dandino

21

26

26

21

Stipulate

21

23

21

21

Who Shot Thebarman

21

17

15

18

 

CONCLUSION: Tattsbet offer the best price on only four of the 10 horses in the market up to 20/1 inclusive – Bande, Lucia Valentina, Rising Romance and Who Shot Thebarman – so that’s conclusive proof that in this instance, Tattsbet only offers the “best fixed odds price” less often – just 40% of the time. Both Sportsbet and Luxbet offer four place dividends.

 

RACE: CAULFIELD GUINEAS

 

HORSE

TATTSBET

C/BET

SPORTSBET

LUXBET

Rich Enuff

3.10

3

3

3

Almalad

4.40

5

5

5

Looks Like The Cat

5

5

5

5

Shooting To Win

8.50

9.50

7.50

9

Chivalry

11

11

11

11

Our Vespa

14

15

15

15

Zebulon

15

16

15

15

Kumaon

16

15

15

16

Merion

16

17

17

15

 

CONCLUSION: Tattsbet offer the “best fixed odd price” on just one of the nine horses in the market up to and including 15/1 (Rich Enuff) and that equates to 11.11% of the time. Since when does 11.11% represent “more often”? I would have reasonably thought that to be “more often” at offering better prices that you would have to offer a better price at least 50.1% of the time.

 

RACE: COX PLATE

 

HORSE

TATTSBET

(3 places)

C/BET

(3 places)

SPORTSBET

(3 places)

LUXBET

(4 places)

Fawkner

9

8

9

9

Dissident

10

13

13

13

Sacred Falls

10

7

8

9

Happy Trails

13

13

13

13

Adelaide

14

13

13

12

Silent Achiever

15

14

11

13

Foreteller

17

17

17

15

Almalad

19

13

17

16

Dan Excel

21

28

34

17

The Cleaner

21

26

26

21

 

CONCLUSION: Tattsbet offer the “best fixed odds” on four of the 10 horses up to and including 20/1 – Sacred Falls, Adelaide, Silent Achiever and Almalad – so yet again that’s only 40%. On these prices, Luxbet offers four place dividends – the others three.

 

RACE: MELBOURNE CUP

 

HORSE

TATTSBET

(3 places)

C/BET

(3 places)

SPORTSBET

(4 places)

LUXBET

(4 places)

The Offer

11

12

12

11

Bande

14

13

12

13

Admire Rakti

17

13

17

14

Fawkner

19

17

21

18

Silent Achiever

19

26

26

18

Lucia Valentina

20

21

21

18

Dandino

26

26

26

21

Who Shot Thebarman

26

23

21

26

Pale Mimosa

26

26

Not listed

21

Protectionist

26

17

26

21

Cavalryman

26

35

34

21

 

CONCLUSION: Tattsbet offer the “best fixed prices” on just one of the 11 horses up to and including 25/1 in the Melbourne Cup fixed odds market (Bande), so their advertising slogan “for the best fixed prices more often” is correct just 9.09% of the time, meaning conversely that it’s what I would call a “grossly false and misleading” statement an incredible 90.91% of the time.

 

So across those four feature Group 1 races of the Melbourne Spring Carnival, cumulatively 40 horses (Caulfield Cup – 10, Caulfield Guineas – 9, Cox Plate – 10 and Melbourne Cup – 11) were priced by the four entities and Tattsbet offered the “best fixed prices” on 10 horses, which equates to 25% of the time.

 

I want to know how the hell is it possible then in Australia for a huge entity like Tattsbet to falsely advertise their goods and services without any government watchdog department – whose charter it must surely be to look after the interests of the consumer – taking legal action against them? As reported across mainstream media as recently as a week ago, supermarket giant Coles were found guilty of “false advertising” by The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and have been banned for three years from advertising that their bread is baked fresh daily, with the Federal Court still to rule whether they will fine Coles “up to $3 million” over the breach. Yet in racing this Tattsbet false advertising crap has gone on without so much as one question being asked – except here – for years.

 

Today on www.brisbaneracing.com.au 16 photos taken last Thursday night to confirm the prices I have put up publicly in the aforesaid article were in fact those on offer at the time. Plus there’s The Courier Mail photo from today’s edition, whereby they advise their readers that they are “committed to accurate, fair and fearless publication of news and commentary”. On www.sydneyracing.com.au there’s the story on the big Canola Cup final today at Eugowra as well as the big two Sundays happening at Mt Panorama, whilst on www.melbourneracing.com.au Matt Nicholls has his popular Monday Musings article.

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