'Consultation over the Gambling Introductory Offer Loopholes board' blog discussion

Before commenting on the broader issues of how the forum operates, I just want to stress what an absolute godsend GIOL was for me personally.

Just over a year ago I was suffering severe financial hardship and while I'd tried many other ways to gain some extra cash (selling stuff on ebay, comping etc.), nothing I'd found was doing more than offering a tiny stop gap to my ailing financial health.

In a year of match betting I made approx £6,000 tax free and am in a far better state of health both financially and personally as a result.

Yes it is a complex area and not for the faint hearted. It took me a lot of reading and re-reading before I took the plunge and there were a lot of large warning notices that came with GIOL to advise people of the dangers and I took those on board.

If the GIOL board had not existed, I would not have read about it elsewhere on the MSE forums and made my way over there. I have no interest in gambling outside of the money making opportunities it gives me and very much doubt I would ever have found out about these loopholes and exploited them without the existence of these boards on MSE.

For people that may be in a similar situation to the one I was in a year ago, it would be sad if this very rewarding money making opportunity was no longer promoted here.

Compared to years ago the offers are far too complex, many offers require 'specialist' spreadsheets to calculate stakes, which many people on here do not understand. Dare I say it many don't even understand the basic 'matcher' concept! How do you police something you don't understand, answer: you can't.

Look at the front page now, no offer worthy of a mention, paltry offers (corbettsports £5 in casino for £10 bet, Getwin bet £5 for £10, Allyoubet £10 refund and of course the behemoth that is the Betfair multiples thread).

The board has moved away from its remit of gambling introductory loopholes (yes thats where GIOL comes from) to new methods totally unsuitable for MSE

There are a number of issues on here.

Firstly: everyone should know about the laws regarding bookmakers and if they into administration / bust. Punters money is not protected and are last in the que when it comes to being paid out through liquidation / administration procedures. Any of the highstreet bookies could go into administration, esp if the banks recall their loans so people should beware that their money is not safe in a bookmaker. The business model of PRS was not the best but in terms of the board rules, it was considered as "risk-free" since you match bet the prices that were given. I doubt MSE could start saying which bookie people should use.

Secondly, you're not going to get a fair discussion regarding the future of GIOL. The majority of people who say to close it will be Trolls, a term that we use to describe people who take offers but contribute nothing. These people want to keep all the best offers for themselves and will abuse anyone who posts a good offer which is risk free - first hand experience at this when I've posted an offer in the past.

Finally, the mods do a great job of keeping tabs on the board. The main prob tho is new members not reading the intro guide or not actually using the search function.

Just wanna chime in. GIOL made me enough money to get by when I was ill for a year and it's helping me top up my degree. Granted, there's a lot of offers I don't understand well enough nowdays to go in for so I don't go in for them. I really think that at the very least this board should be made private to stop lurkers. I don't contribute as much as I'd like because there are people far more knowledgeable than I am and quicker off the mark to post! Sure it will move elsewhere but there's so many clever folks on here and a really strong archive of information it would be a shame to lose it all.

As with Ghost_2005, I also started a little over a year ago. I have made about £6k, with a few errors along the way. That was from a £200 starting point with help from the forum and the tools that are so kindly shared. Offers come and offers go, but I think someone starting today can expect over £5k in the next 12 months without any significant risk except user error risk. To reach that level you do need to be willing to use much of your profits as float. I could take £2k out of my float without effecting my earning potential, but would not want to take much more out.

The forum could be improved, much of the reference material is now dated and discusses sign ups that are no longer there. However, the methods remian the same. The problem is of course that only experienced people could re-write these and that is time consuming. What material there is is perfectly adequite.

One of the main issues with the board are the attacks that come from other sites that do not want to encourage others to look into matched betting. After all, bookies have limited promotional budgets. If a bookie has a £10k budget and 1000 people take a promo then ther is £10 each. If only 100 know of a promo then there is £100 each. That is the basic rational of people who come over from other forums to click "spam" when a decent new offer or loophole is posted. They like it to be their little secret, and not to share with a wider community.

Shortly this thread will come under attack. There will be numerous posts from "low count" posters claiming to have lost money on the back of the GIOL board, and claiming that the board promotes unacceptable risks. Do not be swayed by this influx.

If your editorial board cannot judge what is complex then perhaps they should spend a week match betting. They will quickly learn the methods and see the potential. Anyone who has access to a computer, to microsoft excel, and who is reanably numerate will be able to pick up the basics in no time. I certainly hope most of the editors would tick these boxes!