[aiwen_cotlet]

The floodlights went off in the 53' of a Romanian soccer game (funnily enough, seconds before a goal was about to be scored; that's not relevant for the dispute, just funny). See https://twitter.com/Emishor/status/1322971653551304704

The match was abandoned as a result (there was another failure before the game that delayed the start). I bet that one of the teams would score O2 goals during the game (clearly a full-game wager). Since the match was abandoned in minute 53, it seems like a crystal-clear call. See their soccer betting rules, section #2 on postponed and abandoned matches: https://www.bovada.lv/help/sports-fa...-betting-rules

I tried getting this point across the thick skulls of Bovada customer service, but it was impossible . They seem to have two tiers of support: the first one probably don't speak much English and will just shoot back to you "We looked into it and we were right" no matter what you say. Eventually, they escalated it to the "Sports Team" who gave me a more informed response but it seems like they believed the game had played the full 90', which it had not. You can see in the twitter video (or other videos on youtube) that the lights go off and 1 minute later the ref whistles the end of the game. I tried to reach back to the "Sports Team" showing them such videos, but the low tier support team replied saying "It appears you've already contacted us with this inquiry and we were able to provide assistance"

I withdrew all my money and filed complaints with everyone. Not like I bet a lot of money on this, but their support is just atrocious and I lost all respect for Bovada. Their support team is either incredibly stupid or playing dumb.

[lonnie55]

Customer supports generally deteriorated over the years. Sometimes it's hard to figure out if you're talking to a real human-being or just to a bot. This is probably due to the fact that more bookies used to have their own customer service, while today level 1 support is being outsourced to CS farms in south asian countries.

[aiwen_cotlet]

Yeah, that makes sense. I suspect these were not bots, based on spelling/grammar errors.

[aiwen_cotlet]

Hey SportsBookReview folks, I was wondering when can I expect to receive an acknowledgement that you will handle my complaint. I filed a complaint two weeks ago, on November 2nd, but haven't received any kind of confirmation. Admittedly this was not a large amount of money, and I agree with prioritizing other complaints over this. But I was curious what the typical timeline is and/or what might it be in my case. Thanks

[Headsterx]

Got paid?

[Headsterx]

Hey, that's a little confusing and giving a link to twitter doesn't really help your case, but it's good entertainment. I advise citing a more reputable website regarding the result of a match. I was confused on the game as you said it was abandoned with the score 1-1. But everywhere I went I saw result as 0-3(???). A few times when I disputed an incorrect grading I generally cited Flashscore. It's interesting as they have it "awarded" which I don't know exactly what that means. The game was abandoned but the league 'awarded' the match to the visiting team as it was the home team fault for the floodgates not working(?). And so the league made the result 0-3(?).

https://www.flashscore.com/match/IZL...#match-summary

Never heard of futaa but it looks pretty impressive as they gave details on the game:

https://futaa.com/event/3407563

Anyway, is it still considered an abandoned game if a team is "awarded" a victory with a final result? I guess you can make the argument though that the match did not go 90 mins and it should be "no action." Good luck and hope you at least get your money back.

[caramba]

Anyway, is it still considered an abandoned game if a team is "awarded" a victory with a final result?

It is when their rules say "Postponed and Abandoned Matches: An unplayed or postponed match is settled as "No Action". Any match that is abandoned before the completion of 90 minutes play will be graded as "No Action", except for those wagers where the outcome has already been determined at the time of abandonment. The match must be fully determined for wagers to stand."

Aiwen, keep fighting them on this. Even though it's not a lot of money, they shouldn't get away with things like this.

[Random Username]

Reminds me of a nightmare in play bet I had in my early days. You couldn't make this up. It was a match in Argentina 1st, I bet on a goal to be scored in the next ten minute period. Within seconds of doing so, the floodlights went out. Phoned the betting company immediately asking for the bet to be voided but they refused and kept the clock running. Think it was in the 60 to 70 mins segment. The lights came back on about 3 mins before that period ran out, and a penalty was awarded shortly after with the inevitable disputes taking place. By the time the penalty was scored it was approximately 35 seconds over the time. WTF. Just as well it was only a tenner.

[Optional]

A Romanian language report on what happened here https://www.prosport.ro/fotbal-inter...iga-1-19132655

Send in a complaint form and we'll ask them to re-look at this one https://www.sportsbookreview.com/sportsbook-complaint/

[aiwen_cotlet]

Hey, that's a little confusing and giving a link to twitter doesn't really help your case, but it's good entertainment. I advise citing a more reputable website regarding the result of a match.

Haha yeah I get what you mean about reputable sources, but Flashscore makes mistakes too. I had an earlier dispute with Bovada on the number of corners in a match, where Flashscore didn't agree with Livescore and other sources. And in this case, the Flashscore summary is misleading because it doesn't say anything about the game being abandoned (Bovada actually sent me the Flashscore link in our back-and-forth... shouldn't they have actual game analytics data that they pay for?)

Anyway I think the game not being correctly labeled as abandoned on sites like Flashscore is what makes this a little confusing and it's why I sent them the twitter link with the video where you can clearly see the lights going off and the ref ending the game immediately after. Yes, it's a very unusual situation but it shouldn't be a difficult call - all they need to do is use a bit of critical thinking.

The game was abandoned but the league 'awarded' the match to the visiting team as it was the home team fault for the floodgates not working(?). And so the league made the result 0-3(?).

Yup, because it's the home team's duty to ensure everything is running smoothly.

Anyway, is it still considered an abandoned game if a team is "awarded" a victory with a final result?

Yes, it's in their rules. And if, for some reason, they wanted to consider 0-3 as the final result - even better. I bet on the away team scoring 2+ goals during regulation time

[aiwen_cotlet]

Never heard of futaa but it looks pretty impressive as they gave details on the game:

https://futaa.com/event/3407563

Cool, I didn't know about it either, but I use a similar one, betsapi.com:

https://betsapi.com/r/2634550/CSM-Po...orul-Constanta

Ha, now that I look at it, this one correctly marks the game as abandoned! Last time I checked it didn't explicitly say 'Abandoned'

[aiwen_cotlet]

It is when their rules say "Postponed and Abandoned Matches: An unplayed or postponed match is settled as "No Action". Any match that is abandoned before the completion of 90 minutes play will be graded as "No Action", except for those wagers where the outcome has already been determined at the time of abandonment. The match must be fully determined for wagers to stand."

Exactly!

Aiwen, keep fighting them on this. Even though it's not a lot of money, they shouldn't get away with things like this.

Absolutely! Anyway, karma already manifested: when I was cashing out I also redeemed my reward points for a ~$2 casino bonus. Those $2 turned into $90! Plus I withdrew in bitcoin, which went up quite a bit since.

[aiwen_cotlet]

Reminds me of a nightmare in play bet I had in my early days. You couldn't make this up. It was a match in Argentina 1st, I bet on a goal to be scored in the next ten minute period. Within seconds of doing so, the floodlights went out. Phoned the betting company immediately asking for the bet to be voided but they refused and kept the clock running. Think it was in the 60 to 70 mins segment. The lights came back on about 3 mins before that period ran out, and a penalty was awarded shortly after with the inevitable disputes taking place. By the time the penalty was scored it was approximately 35 seconds over the time. WTF. Just as well it was only a tenner.

Yeah, WTF that's insane! Good thing it wasn't a lot of money. But was the game clock also running when the lights were off? I thought they would have paused it maybe...

[aiwen_cotlet]

Send in a complaint form and we'll ask them to re-look at this one https://www.sportsbookreview.com/sportsbook-complaint/

Thanks, Optional. I'd already sent in a complaint a while ago, but I will send in a new/updated one shortly.

Edit: Just sent it.