Hi everybody,
Just to clarify, the reason this users' account was suspended was because he threatened our licence and, in turn, our business. This left us with no choice other than to take action in line with our Terms & Conditions.
As we understand that you will have more questions on this issue here are the key points from our perspective which will hopefully give you a clearer picture.
- Jason and James came to an agreement that, for the benefit of both parties and for the continuing growth of Smarkets as a potential rival to Betfair he would be willing to change his betting patterns.
- Jason offered a lunch meeting with James to discuss how this could be enacted with the proviso that he cease trading until an arrangement had been reached.
- James continued to trade in the manner already agreed as non mutually beneficial despite multiple polite requests to reassess the behaviour. In reply we received the first thinly veiled messages of potential threats against our license.
- After a final warning James proposed a change in trading behaviour that would have been more in line with our original intentions for our relationship. However along with the proposal came a more direct threat against our license and our business. It was at this point we took the difficult decision to suspend his account.
Smarkets has no policy of suspending winning accounts. We regret we had to take action in this case as we are more than aware of the value of a good reputation in this industry. However we take threats against our business very seriously and cannot be anything less than proactive in circumstances that we deem threatening. We understand James' frustrations and understanding that he has been punished for being a winning trader but that is simply not the truth of the situation. Ideally we would have come to an agreement that left both parties happy with the outcome but, despite multiple attempts on our behalf, we were unable to do so.
This industry is fraught with underhand practices that leave everyone wary of motives and schemes. We want nothing to do with those practices and are working extremely hard to improve the experience for everyone. It would be very easy for us to not to have replied to these claims and simply dismiss them as part of the cost of doing business in the gaming sector. We appreciate that even our side of the story in this case may not be enough to persuade you that our actions in this case were correct but hopefully you can respect that sometimes we have a business need to make unpopular choices. We are not perfect and will make mistakes along the way, but we are still commited to creating an open and transparent exchange platform that everyone can enjoy.
As always, we are open to your feedback, please contact us via
[email protected] if you have any questions.
Smarkets
