Bookmakers prepare for the World Cup betting bonanza on June
British bookmakers are planning on employing extra staff from June to cope with an expected £1 billion betting bonanza’ on the World Cup according to a report by ThisisMoney. Ladbrokes suggested that it would require about 20 per cent extra man hours from its 500 call centre staff to cope with the tournament, and would be using speech recognition software to help during peak periods.
Betting exchange Betfair, who have announced that they could match as much as £500 million on the event, has already taken £8 million worth of bets, mainly on who might win and whether Wayne Rooney will play.
Leighton Vaughan Williams, head of Nottingham Trent University’s Betting Research Unit, said: ‘Four years ago, you could bet on who would win a match. Now there is a myriad of bets available that weren’t offered before - particularly "inrunning" bets on who will score the next goal, or whether anyone will be sent off.
But the downside of the bonanza would be if England wins the World Cup, with analysts warning of profit warnings from some of the publicly quoted bookmakers.
