BSP betting

Tick Place bets at BSP on a system's Settings page and that system's bets go on as Betfair SP bets instead of at the live price. It's the setting our own Gap systems use. Six things to know before you turn it on.

1. No sub-minimum stakes at SP

The bot can't place a bet under Betfair's £2 minimum at BSP. Any SP bet with a stake below the minimum is cancelled, whatever your Allow small stakes setting says.

2. Only in markets that offer BSP

Betfair SP is available on most horse racing and greyhound win and place markets, but not all. Where a market doesn't offer it, the bot falls back to the best available back or lay price, depending on whether your staking plan is a back or a lay plan.

3. Lay bets at SP are placed by liability

When you lay at SP, Betfair takes a liability, not a stake. The bot works out that liability from your stake and the current price at the moment it places the bet, then Betfair works out the actual stake at the off, once the real SP is known. If the projected price when the bet went on differs from the final SP, your actual stake will differ from the one you asked for.

To keep that gap small, place SP lays as close to the off as you can, ideally no more than a minute before, when the live price is closest to where the SP will settle. Until the market reconciles, the bot shows the bet as a liability (for example "Liability=20"); the stake appears after the off. There's a fuller explanation of the maths in Lay betting liability explained.

4. Minimum liability for SP lays

Betfair has a minimum liability for lay bets placed at SP: £10 (A$30 for Australian markets). A lay whose liability comes out below that is rejected by Betfair and shows as cancelled in the bot. Check your stake against the prices you're laying at: £2 at 4.5 is only £7 of liability (£2 × 3.5), so it wouldn't go on.

5. Your odds limits become SP limits

The bot sends your odds limits with the SP bet, so a back bet is only matched if the starting price is at or above your minimum; otherwise it lapses. Until reconciliation the price column shows "BSP"; after settlement it shows the actual price, or "Unmatched" if the SP didn't reach your limit.

6. Why a matched SP bet can land slightly outside your range

The real BSP only exists once the market goes in-play. Before that the bot can only see the projected SP, which is often different from the final number, and it's the projected figure it compares with your min/max odds when it decides to fire. Betfair lets you set a minimum price on a back SP bet but not a maximum (and a maximum, not a minimum, on a lay). So if the actual SP comes in below your minimum, a back bet is unmatched, but if it comes in above your maximum, it's accepted. That's exactly how it works placing SP bets by hand on Betfair: you can't guarantee the top of the range, only compare the projection with your limits and let the off decide.