Bookies may not relish paying out losing bets but they will at least cough up your winnings in a swift fashion when your bets do come in. For most online bets, you will find your earnings appear in your account just minutes after the event on which you’ve bet has concluded. Similarly, if betting in a bricks and mortar betting shop, you can cash in your bet slip pretty much immediately after the full-time whistle (or equivalent).
The pace at which bets are settled is certainly not an issue within the industry but this has not prevented some bookies from paying bets out early. In such cases, rather than waiting for a winner to be fully confirmed, a bookmaker has opted to jump the gun, paying out while the event was still going on. Why a bookie would choose to take an entirely unavoidable risk like this is a very good question, so let us explore the answer now.
What Does Paying Out Early Mean?
Although we touched on this above, we wanted to explain in a little more detail what paying out early entails. If we start by taking a football match, for example, for only some bets will need to wait until full time to be settled. If you back Tottenham to beat Everton but they are losing 4-0 after 80 minutes, although their chances of winning are microscopically small, there is still a chance of them turning the game around. As such, the bet will technically stay alive until full-time.
Decided Bets Paid Out Before Game End
Bookies can settle other markets much earlier on in the contest. If you had Harry Kane to score first, but Calvert Lewin nods Everton ahead, this bet is over as Kane can no longer score first. That bet will therefore have been settled as having lost. Conversely, if you bet on over 2.5 goals and Everton score to make it 3-0, this market can be settled as there is no way of the scoreline shrinking (once VAR has given the all-clear of course). At this point, it is an absolute guarantee that the match will have over 2.5 goals. Even though this market can be settled before the conclusion of the match in question, this is not an example of a bookie paying out “early”.
When Outcome Is Not 100% Certain
With the above examples, the bet in question has been decided (even if the match in which the outcome takes place has not). It is possible, however, for a bookie to decide that they will not wait until the outcome is 100% certain; instead, they will pay out the winnings (on one likely-looking outcome) in advance. This does not mean that all other bets are declared as losers at the same time though. All other active wagers will remain open as the bookies, in this instance, cannot simply cancel the remaining bets, no matter how unlikely they look.
Real Madrid & Barcelona La Liga Champions Example
To give you a more concrete example, imagine you had a bet on Real Madrid to be crowned La Liga champions but with eight games to go, Barcelona are ahead by 15 points. In this situation, a bookmaker may decide to pay out on all “Barcelona to win the league” bets but your “Real Madrid to win” bet will still be active in case they do perform a miraculously comeback and pip their great rivals to the title.
Why Pay Out Early?
Now you know what paying out early entails, your next question is no doubt, why does a bookie bother taking such a risk? The answer to this is usually to gain publicity. Because it is rare for a bookie to take such action, it inevitably ends up creating headlines especially if it relates to a popular event or competition. Sometimes the outcome which is paid out as an early winner ends up happening, meaning it is some free publicity for the bookmaker in question. This is far from insignificant as stories like these tend to feature in many papers and websites, helping to increase brand awareness.
Exposure & Publicity
Perhaps even more important is that the exposure itself is of a positive nature. It is easy enough for bookies to make headlines for the wrong reasons but paying out bets early is a very customer-friendly policy. Readers may be thinking to themselves, “if I choose to bet here, maybe they will do the same for one of my wagers”. It really can end up offering quite a lot of appeal especially once a bookie gets a reputation for doing in on a regular basis, like Irish bookie Paddy Power and UK-based Betfred.
As we will shortly reveal though, sometimes the approach backfires and the attempt at some free publicity ends up costing them a hefty sum. Although bookies will always pick an early payout outcome that they think will happen, they can never be sure and sometimes their predictions end up being wrong. Although this will bring some additional publicity along with it, we can safely assume the bookie will be left with a sizeable hit from the whole affair.
Bookies Calling Early Payouts Right
Bookies were so sure Obama would secure his second term, they paid out early (vverve / Bigstockphoto.com)
Here are some of the biggest instances where the bookies’ decision to pay out early worked in their favour and cost them nothing at all.
Betfred & Premier League Winners
Lifelong Manchester United fan and Betfred owner, Fred Done, has often been optimistic about United’s title chances. On two occasions, his optimism has ended up costing him a lot of money but, in 2013, he managed to call it right. Even though there were 12 matches to go, so almost a third of the entire season, Done made the call with his favourite side 12 points clear. The result never looked in doubt afterwards with Sir Alex Ferguson guiding his men to an 11-point title win during his farewell season.
While Fred may love United, he is not one to pass up the opportunity for some good press coverage when the opportunity arises. In December 2017, with 22 games of the season left to play, he paid out on local rivals Manchester City to win the title. The decision to make this incredible early call came as City has just beaten United 2-1 at Old Trafford, sending them 11 points clear. Although far from an unassailable advantage, Done was simply convinced that City were the best side in the division. He was not wrong either as Pep Guardiola’s men cruised to a 19-point title win, scoring 106 goals in the process.
Having got a taste for these early bold calls, Done has been back at it since, paying out a nice Christmas bonus to anyone that backed Liverpool during the 2019/20 season. Again, there were 22 games to go but the then 75 year old was “super-confident that it will not go wrong”. His judgement was well placed this time with Liverpool easing their way to a first Premier League title. Two years later and anyone that backed Man City ended up getting their money before the end of the calendar year too so it has become something of a common theme of late.
Obama Seals Second Term
Moving briefly across to politics now and election betting is certainly something that attracts a great deal of interest. Two days prior to the 2012 United States elections, Paddy Power had taken £600,000 in bets for the incumbent Barack Obama to defeat Republican rival Mitt Romney. Although polls suggested it was going to be a tight race, a spokesman for the company stated that almost all betting traffic had been on the incumbent president. With the price on Obama having dropped to 2/9, Paddy Power called the race early, one that Obama won by 332 electoral college votes to 206.
While this may seem like an altruistic Paddy Power act, the face they were standing to lose a considerable sum on an Obama win could have driven the decision. He was by far the punters’ favoured pick and had they not closed the market early, despite the unappealing odds, their losses would have been significantly greater.
No Faith in McGregor
Paddy Power may be an Irish company but they had absolutely zero belief that Conor McGregor could pull off an upset in the ring against boxing legend Floyd Mayweather. Although there was no news to suggest McGregor was suffering from an injury, or anything similar, the result was called before a single punch was thrown.
Viewing this as a complete mismatch, Paddy Power simply thought there was no point waiting for what looked like a foregone conclusion. The bookie paid out £250,000 to customers that backed Mayweather on the grounds that, “only one of them is a boxer”. To his credit, McGregor certainly did not disgrace himself but Mayweather’s class prevailed on the night.
Bookies Calling Early Payouts Wrong
Bookies were also sure Trump would lose, but were very wrong (Red marker / Bigstockphoto.com)
Much like most punters, bookies are not immune to making bad predictions. When it happens to the bookies though, rather than saying goodbye to £5 or £10, they can easily end up losing a six-figure or even seven-figure sum with a failed early payout call.
President Trump
Following their success of the early Obama call during the previous election, Paddy Power were back at it four years later. The 2016 race appeared to be a little one-sided with pollsters largely in agreement that Hillary Clinton would become the first female president of the country. So assured of this were Paddy Power that they paid out three weeks early, costing them in the region of £800,000.
Around the time bookies were offering odds as short of 2/11 on Clinton, with Trump available at a much larger 6/1. Some favourable events late on though proved the polling to be unreliable as Trump stormed what initially appeared to be a very unlikely victory against his more established foe.
United Hurt Betfred Once Again
The first case of a bookmaker paying out early came all the way back in March 1998 when Betfred started cashing out bets on Manchester United to win the league. This entirely unprecedented move created a lot of press for the company especially as there was a fair amount of the season to go. With United 12 points clear though, Fred Done was confident a third successive title was in the bag. Little did he know though that his much-loved team would drop points in five of their final 10 matches, gifting the title to Arsenal in the process.
You think Done might have learned his lesson after this costly error of judgement but, as discussed earlier, he loves paying out early on this market. Sometimes, such as with Liverpool (2019/20) and Man City (2017/18), he gets things spot on but punts on United have been more hit-and-miss. As well as the failed 1998 prediction, Done ended up losing a lot of money by paying out early in the 2011/12 season. Although Sir Alex Ferguson has been promised that a Betfred early payout on his side would not happen again, the “curse” returned as United squandered an eight-point lead with just six games remaining.
Early Payout Promotions
As we have highlighted, most examples of early payouts involve a very popular event or competition and one that has attracted a huge volume of bets. Not all early payouts create such headlines though as there are some bookies that run long-term promotions that offer customers the chance to claim an early win. At the time of writing, this was something you could only access at various UK-based bookies, though check the current offers at your betting site of choice for the latest information.
In such cases, these kinds of offers state that if you back a team to win an eligible football match and they go two goals up, your bet is a confirmed winner regardless of the full-time score. So, if you put money on Man Utd to beat Leicester and the Red Devils take a 2-0 lead but end up drawing 2-2, you would still be paid as though they had won. It is a nice (free) offer to have to cover your bets given that data from five years of Premier League action shows that a team with a two-goal lead, at any point in the match, will fail to win around 7% of the time.