Stan James

The Deal
I signed up for Stan James a bit before Cheltenham when they were offering a free £50 bet after you make a qualifying bet of £50 at odds of 2 or more. This offer has now dropped to £25. The offers for the bookies seems to move around a bit and just before big events tends to see the biggest bonuses.

It took me a while to cash in as I've had my funds tied up in other bets, but I finally made a move.

The Result
I matched a £50 qualifier on a football match with odds of 3 at Stan James and 2.96 at Betfair. The bet lost at Stan James and I made £48.97 at Betfair, so the qualifier cost me £1.03.

I put the free bet on football as well, 4.75 at Stan James and 4.6 at Betfair. I lost at Stan again and made £39.90 at Bet Fair.

So profit from this deal was £38.87.

Thoughts
Both of the matched bets I did were slight arbs, in that the lay odds at Betfair were actually better than Stan James back odds. The commission at Betfair ate this up, but it helped me make the most of the deal.

The free bet was an SNR, or Stake Not Returned bet. You get the most out of these by betting at high odds to make the stake as small a percentage of the total as possible. With a limited bank roll I was happy to grab what I could. As my float builds up I should be able to take better advantage of these.