Avoiding Being Limited

Today we’d like to tell you how to reduce the risk of getting under the bookie’s radar in the form of limiting the maximum stakes you can place.

Why do bookmakers limit stakes?

The vast majority of bookmakers are not fond of pros as they deprive them of profits. That’s why bookmakers apply all sorts of limitations and blocking against arbers. The most popular method of dealing with professional gamblers is to reduce maximum stakes.

Under cutting limits means reducing the maximum bet size to the minimum value (often it's 1-2 $/€). This thing greatly complicates arbitrage betting, and in some cases makes it impossible.

As for the time through which the account can be restricted, it all depends on the particular bookmaker. For instance, such loyal to arbers bookmakers as Sbobet and Pinnacle don’t cut limits, while Betcity can reduce the maximum stake amount after a few days or even hours of active arbing.

It’s important to understand that if you’re already faced with account limitation, then it’s virtually impossible to return the maximums to its previous level. In this case, some gamblers decide to leave the bookie, or they stay and continue to bet at lower limits.

It’s also often practiced by arbers to re-register an account in the system for someone from friends or relatives. This phenomenon among pros is called multi-accounting, and bookmakers don’t welcome it at all.

How to avoid cutting limits?

It’s clear that nothing can fully protect you from possible bookmaker’s sanctions. But we offer to your attention some rules that can help you to prolong the account at the bookmaker.

1. Try to alternate arbs with regular stakes. Once an arbitrage situation appears, it is logical that pros are beginning immediately to place required outcomes in the bookmakers. This may cause the so-called “load” – a situation where the bulk of bets are made on a certain outcome of the event, and its amount is significantly higher than the rest of outcomes taken together.

It can be clearly seen by the bookie, and if all your stakes will fall into the stream with other arbers – you'll get limited pretty fast.

Therefore, we strongly recommend to alternate arbs with regular stakes. This will keep your account from cutting long enough.

2. Don’t bet on overestimated odds. If you see that an odd for a particular outcome at one bookmaker is significantly higher than others, we don’t recommend betting on it!

There is a high probability that such an odd was overestimated intentionally, or it was formed due to an error in the bookmaker's line.

Tip: You may always use the option “close odds” on our service to compare the bookmakers' offers for this or that outcome.


3. Round up your stakes. Oftentimes you need to bet on the unrounded stake amount (e.g. 24.18$, 17.36€) to get maximum profit from arbs. If you bet like this your chances to get limited are markedly increased. Bookmakers are well aware of that and can identify you as an arber.

It may not be such a critical moment because the bookies are mainly caught arbers by way of playing. However, it’s better to be reinsured and round up the bet amounts to the whole number. By the way, in the settings of our arb calculator, it is easy to set rounding of the bet to required value.


4. Don’t place large stakes on unpopular leagues. Personally, we strongly don’t recommend making large bets on unpopular championships (e.g. the fourth division of Greece, the second league of Kuwait Championship).

The point is that such bets are very likely to entail sanctions from bookmakers. In addition, if we talk about stake sizing, then it's better not to bet on the maximum allowable amount for one or another outcome. This applies not only unpopular leagues, but also the key sporting events.

5. Don’t withdraw large sums in one payment. Anyway, it is better to minimize the orders for withdrawal on an unlimited account.

It’s clear that you’ll need to redistribute funds between accounts at bookmakers to work with arbitrage betting. And it’s absolutely normal thing.

However, it’s important to understand that each request for payment is an additional reason for the bookmaker to pay attention to you. Especially if we’re talking about a large sum.

6. Don’t get carried away by repeated stakes. Repeated bets are often extremely negatively perceived by bookmakers. And personally, we’d advise to minimize their number or even exclude such bets.

If you follow all the above rules, you will be able to reduce the risk of falling under bookmaker’s sanctions in the form of cutting limits. However, we would like to highlight that an important factor is choosing the right bookmaker to work with.

More details about choosing a bookie to work with here.

Conclusion

Cutting limits is an unpleasant moment in the work of pros and any arber can face this problem.

However, if you stick to our advice and responsibly approach the choice of working bookmakers, you will be able to save your account from cutting long enough.