Skybet SoW request

azzadle

Newbie member
Joined
Sep 27, 2018
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UK
Hi,

A friend is having real problems with Skybet and he's not sure what to do.

On July 30th, he made 2 x £100 deposits to his account, placed some sports bets and increased the balance to just over £1,400. His account has been open since 2011, and he's made deposits/withdrawals fine until now.

He suddenly gets slapped with an account suspension and asked to provide photo ID, a selfie with the same ID, a bank statement showing his recent deposits to Skybet, and a payslip from his employer. He emails back on the same day with this information, gets a reply 3 days later saying he needs to email the documents one at a time. He does this, and is then told they need a statement for the full month of July.


He sends them an unredacted July statement as requested, days later gets an email saying they could only see up to the 28th, which is nonsense as the transactions are clearly marked 30th and there is a carried forward balance on the statement, indicating the end of the month. He sends the same document and all goes quiet. I should also point out that this statement also shows his salary beig paid in, and the bank account had over £1k in it at the time of these deposits being made.

Almost 2 weeks have passed and he's now being asked about a transfer made by his brother to him on the 28th of July. Skybet want to know who this person is, why they transferred him money, and photo ID from his brother. The transfer was for £200, this was partly money owed to him and partly a birthday gift, so he used that to play with.

I know they're trying to hide behind AML rules and do their best not to pay out here, but how does he proceed with this? What entitlement do they have to see a third party's ID when the account in question has nothing to do with them? Ironically, his brother won almost £1200 from the same bookmaker recently and wasn't asked for any documentation. I've read other stories from people saying they also wanted the 3rd party's bank statements which is highly intrusive.

If everyone's accounts were getting scrutinised over a transfer of money from a family member then we're all doomed surely.

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im afraid once they start asking for SOF/SOW there is no way out,if you want to continue playing at that site you have to satisfy the request,if not move on somewhere else
 
Really need more information.

Guess a lot could depend on what sort of bets your friend normally makes. If he normally deposits £20 a time and makes a few bets then this time suddenly he makes a £200 deposit and bets in a way that was not normal for him on a certain bet that won it would raise questions.

All speculation and could be miles from the truth but without any other details thats all we can do.

Would say tho. If he had been a customer 10 years with no problems at all and he normally deposited a couple hundred at at time and bet the same way i am surprised Sky would have done this. It is a relatively small withdrawal for them.

I know any casino can ask a SOW to make sure a customer can afford to bet. But the way you have described things it certainly seems that something about the bets has triggered an alarm with them and that is why account is suspended and all these checks getting placed.
 
Now that is something I'd have to ask him about. From what I know of him, he's generally your average punter. I'd love to know what their stance would be if he lost that money though. Would they be asking him if he can afford it? Would they be asking for millions of documents? Would they refund the losses? I know the answer to the last question for certain.

Thing is, even if he was betting bigger than normal, who ultimately decides what is affordable and what isn't? Surely that's down to the customer to decide and not the operator?
 
To me, it sounds more like they have linked the accounts and suspect multi-accounting taking place, which has been further confirmed to them by the transfer of money between accounts
Aye, the selfie with the same ID certainly is a bit out of character for Sky; they're usually very much into automated ID checking. Asking for something more specific like that suggests they're not confident the "right" person is playing.
 
To me, it sounds more like they have linked the accounts and suspect multi-accounting taking place, which has been further confirmed to them by the transfer of money between accounts

Do you mean one has access to the other's account or something? I did ask them if this happened and neither has access to the other's account. I know myself they're definitely 2 different people because I played darts with them for years. Person B's account is not eligible for bonuses and is only stake restricted on promotional odds, such as the Saturday super boosts etc. Max stake on those is £10 anyway and he said he can get £2.50 max on but puts on £10/£20 bets on no problems. Person A's account is entirely unrestricted and doesn't ever bother with their promos, so I don't see the need for one to use the other's account for any reason there.

Aye, the selfie with the same ID certainly is a bit out of character for Sky; they're usually very much into automated ID checking. Asking for something more specific like that suggests they're not confident the "right" person is playing.

When I played online (don't any more), I'd been asked for the same thing from a few places, interesting to hear it's not something Skybet usually ask for. I thought they were all at it nowadays!
 
Person B's account is not eligible for bonuses

Then it definitely sounds like they are suspicious of multi-accounting then. Obviously without specific information it's not possible to tell, but given the amounts you mentioned I would imagine similar or the same bets were placed on both accounts and Skybet have linked them. As one account is restricted, that has probably flagged on their system ahead of the other account.
I would imagine, from the limited information that "person A" is a matched bettor and is now using family accounts to continue / to circumvent betting limits.

Regardless of whether that is true or not, the biggest problem is the transfer of funds of £200 and then deposits equal to that amount being used. Skybet will probably interpret this as placing bets for a 3rd party. AFAIK they can't use AML / SOW to withhold withdrawals, so the person should be able to get the funds but most likely have their account closed (unless they change their minds and accept what has already been sent to them)
 
Then it definitely sounds like they are suspicious of multi-accounting then. Obviously without specific information it's not possible to tell, but given the amounts you mentioned I would imagine similar or the same bets were placed on both accounts and Skybet have linked them. As one account is restricted, that has probably flagged on their system ahead of the other account.
I would imagine, from the limited information that "person A" is a matched bettor and is now using family accounts to continue / to circumvent betting limits.

Regardless of whether that is true or not, the biggest problem is the transfer of funds of £200 and then deposits equal to that amount being used. Skybet will probably interpret this as placing bets for a 3rd party. AFAIK they can't use AML / SOW to withhold withdrawals, so the person should be able to get the funds but most likely have their account closed (unless they change their minds and accept what has already been sent to them)
I know for certain that person B used his account for matched betting before, which is probably why he's not entitled to bonuses/promos any more. Person A certainly hasn't done anything like this, I've tried explaining how it works to him in the past and I'd have had more success talking to my dog :D

I understand your point though, hopefully he'll be able to retrieve what's in the account but if they close his account, I really don't think he'll be that bothered. If there's any progress, then I'll update here.
 
Update - Sky have said that 1 or more placed were 'late bets' (as in, placing a bet after the outcome is known) so they're refunding the deposit only. Obviously couldn't get him done with the SoW request so they've used another nonsense excuse to get out of paying. Not really sure how he would be able to place dozens of bets knowing the outcome from his own home. He said these were bets on the Olympics across different sports. Attached is the email they sent him, which he sent to me.
 

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Plenty of live streams available during the Olympics, both legit and not-so legit. Presumably Sky's site was accepting bets once the event had finished, but before they had been updated.

(Though surprised they've banned over it, given if that's the case, it's a failing on their side which a punter has exploited, perhaps even unwittingly.)
 
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im afraid once they start asking for SOF/SOW there is no way out,if you want to continue playing at that site you have to satisfy the request,if not move on somewhere else
I was told they do that for safety reasons. 1 - to be sure that the money you're spending is not stolen for example, and 2 - to closely monitor for signs that you're developing an addictions. So in all cases I'm pretty sure it's a legit request from their side.
 
Plenty of live streams available during the Olympics, both legit and not-so legit. Presumably Sky's site was accepting bets once the event had finished, but before they had been updated.

(Though surprised they've banned over it, given if that's the case, it's a failing on their side which a punter has exploited, perhaps even unwittingly.)
This is it - anyone could unintentionally get on a live game of any sport in their favour, it does go both ways though. When I had online accounts, I vividly remember backing a player to hold serve in the tennis when they were 30-40 down. As the in play countdown timer hit 3 seconds, I saw in the background that the game had ended. They took the bet and when I complained about it, they told me it was tough and that was the nature of in play betting. Seems that its one way traffic as usual!

FWIW - my friend said he can remember one instance of this happening during this period and all bets were placed while the game was live, not after it finished. His biggest profits were from the tennis semi final between Djokovic and Carreno Busta.
 
to closely monitor for signs that you're developing an addictions.
If they banned everyone who was even mildly hooked then casinos would have 80-90% of their player base disappear overnight. Slots are addictive by design.
 
I was told they do that for safety reasons. 1 - to be sure that the money you're spending is not stolen for example, and 2 - to closely monitor for signs that you're developing an addictions. So in all cases I'm pretty sure it's a legit request from their side.
yes its all about control,when i started playing online 7 years ago it was not like now,and since Covid its got worse,oh well i wont be playing much more with removal of autospins and reduced RTP
 
If they banned everyone who was even mildly hooked then casinos would have 80-90% of their player base disappear overnight. Slots are addictive by design.
Depends on the certificate the casino has. Some of them are more strict, others - let casinos do their thing freely.
 

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