Betfair closed my account, i can’t withdraw my money 18141$.

[Kai]

Very sorry to hear that guys and I hope you get it all back sooner rather than later, and without too much additional cost.

But Betfair accounts where the balance is entirely funded by exchange winnings should be safe/immune from this type of nonsense, no?

They only may make a fuss if people deposit larger amounts, right?

Bad timing to read something like this, I've been growing my balance by not withdrawing anything this month in order to cover more liabilities/opportunities and expand a bit, but seeing this type of stuff almost makes me think twice about that. I guess they can randomly ban my country whenever and seize the account in a similar way, seen it happen to neighboring countries and friends that live over there.

I should probably change the account to a UK address ASAP, if that makes the account more secure from their shenanigans. Irrational fears are irrational.

[Derek27]

William Hill got fined 2 or 3 million for allowing a compulsive gambler to deposit and lose £50K without carrying out the money laundering checks, which is probably why Betfair are heavy-handed about this. But expecting anyone to provide years of transactions and lifetime profits from 20 bookies, some of which may not even be in business is ridiculous. Even worse, losing betting slips! Who the fuck keeps all their losing betting slips??

[poklius]

Just yesterday got my account back after it being closed for 2 weeks. I did withdraw all funds during lockdown and then made deposits of total ~6k Eur, which I guess was enough to raise money laundering flags. Mind you, I'm full time bf trader, PC2, 10years+, so I guess my case was simple as it took "only" two weeks to get account back. Had to upload all statements, passport, cards, explain what I do, etc.. So yes, depositing money to bf atm is asking for trouble.

Btw, they don't give you any warnings, you just notice bets not going through, your whole account could be exposed, they don't give a damn.

Good luck to OP and Dannyboy1

[Kai]

Just yesterday got my account back after it being closed for 2 weeks. I did withdraw all funds during lockdown and then made deposits of total ~6k Eur, which I guess was enough to raise money laundering flags. Mind you, I'm full time bf trader, PC2, 10years+, so I guess my case was simple as it took "only" two weeks to get account back. Had to upload all statements, passport, cards, explain what I do, etc.. So yes, depositing money to bf atm is asking for trouble.

Btw, they don't give you any warnings, you just notice bets not going through, your whole account could be exposed, they don't give a damn.

Good luck to OP and Dannyboy1

Thanks for sharing that, must have been rough losing who knows how much money by not being able to trade for weeks.

I did something similar 13 months ago when I withdrew most of my trading bank as a precautionary measure when my ISP DNS-blocked all foreign bookies from the country, and then I deposited 4-5k back into BF a day or two later after it was clear that Betfair didn't care about my local blockade. But had no issues with that deposit and these things never even crossed my mind honestly, I was worried more about my account than the balance on it, but now I regret doing that since the only other deposit that I made was the starting trading bank (up to 1k) years ago, and I guess I can't really claim to them that I built my balance on their exchange anymore.

So if you don't get flagged for this crap right after you deposit money into Betfair, does this mean you're in the clear and you can grow the balance to whatever size? Or is Betfair known to randomly flag accounts whenever, say when your balance grows to like 5 figures which may look juicy for them to potentially seize, are there any known documented cases around where Betfair did that sort of stuff or was it all directly related to bigger deposits?

And I may have skimmed through a few posts so it's unclear to me whether Dannyboy is a big Betfair winner or a bigger winner elsewhere, because logically I'd assume if you're winning big directly on Betfair then you should eventually get your funds back as it should be that much easier to prove where the money came from, like in the poklius example above.

Although I can definitely see how and why bigger winners from elsewhere would have all sorts of issues depositing larger amounts to Betfair nowadays, shifting money around was always going to get more complex eventually due to all the changes around, but I feel "PC payers" (aka bigger winners) should probably have an easier ride in case they get randomly flagged for whatever.

[Euler]

I have to jump through hoops nowadays to move money through financial institutions. I guess it's slightly worse for bookmakers.

I'm familiar with compliance procedures and they are triggered at just £5k, so companies have to show some level of diligence for amounts above that.

On a trip to the US once, one of my dollar cards was locked for the third time because I transferred £6k to it to funds expenses while I was overseas. This was an almighty pain as that was the whole reason for transferring the money. It was with a 'fintech' bank and there was no phone number to call just an online 'chat' area that took five or so days to reply to simple messages, which usually asked for more information.

I explained to them already that I had completed all compliance when I opened the account and twice before, when asked. They failed to resolve it in enough time for me to use any funds, so on my return, I transferred the money back and they locked it again asking why I had transferred funds in and out. You really couldn't make it up.

[Dannyboy1]

Anyway, don’t want to go too off topic so good luck am1go with your account.

Thank you!

Did you send a complaint to IBAS?

No, I don’t bother with IBAS. But maybe as you’re not from UK and legal action isn’t so easy you might want to submit a complaint to them.

Have you emailed [email protected]? (Didn’t help me at all but might be worth a try)

[Dannyboy1]

@Kai, I am down on my Betfair account but have large winnings elsewhere, which have been shown to them. In addition to that, the amounts I have deposited to Betfair are a very small % of my “net wealth” (which I’ve proved to them). I’ve been through this source of wealth process with 10’s of bookies before and never experienced anything like this. In fact, it’s a process which lasts a day or two max usually.

[Dannyboy1]

Oh and on top of all this, in April, I had a rather large (19k at 2.8) inplay bet queueing to be matched and they suspended my account for “responsible gambling”. Bear in mind I have been placing these types of bets and larger weekly, for almost a decade.
I could not access my account to see if the bet was matched or cancel it and it took them 5 days to unlock it. I lost 11k because of that.

[Naffman]

Oh and on top of all this, in April, I had a rather large (19k at 2.8) inplay bet queueing to be matched and they suspended my account for “responsible gambling”. Bear in mind I have been placing these types of bets and larger weekly, for almost a decade.
I could not access my account to see if the bet was matched or cancel it and it took them 5 days to unlock it. I lost 11k because of that.

That sucks!

I love how on my account it says my main wallet limit is 10k yet my exchange games wallet I can bet up to 100k despite never once using it

[ilovepizza82]

How come you have 10k limit and I only 5k ?
How can you raise your limits ?

[Naffman]

How come you have 10k limit and I only 5k ?
How can you raise your limits ?

You have to ask them but I tried to raise it up to 15k from 10k and you have to either hit the 10k or be very close to that exposure amount, otherwise they won't do it.

[Kai]

@Kai, I am down on my Betfair account but have large winnings elsewhere, which have been shown to them. In addition to that, the amounts I have deposited to Betfair are a very small % of my “net wealth” (which I’ve proved to them). I’ve been through this source of wealth process with 10’s of bookies before and never experienced anything like this. In fact, it’s a process which lasts a day or two max usually.

Thank you for clearing that up, despite it being a touchy subject for most people. In that case I am slightly less shocked with their behavior but it still seems way over the top with what they're putting you and OP through.

In OP's case especially, maybe from Betfair's perspective seeing a foreign account with large deposits may seem like a relatively easy cashgrab, not really sure whether that's the irrational fear part talking or if it's a very real fear of losing both your funds and more importantly your invaluable trading account, especially if you add various restricted territory elements into the mix as well.

[Am1go]

Have you emailed [email protected]? (Didn’t help me at all but might be worth a try)

yes, I communicate with them initially.

[Am1go]

Thanks everyone! Problem is solved, i got money!

[Kai]

Great news indeed, happy for you man.

It would probably be helpful if you could leave a few tips or guidelines (lol, if there's any) in the thread at the end for future reference, now that you've went through the whole ordeal and process etc

I have a feeling you won't be the last person to go through something like his, since moving money around nowadays is getting increasingly more difficult and annoying for everyone.