Blue Jays bet winds up in B.C. provincial court

A B.C. sports gambler is suing the B.C. Lottery Corporation for allegedly preventing him from cashing in on his faith in a Toronto Blue Jays winning streak.

In a small claims court action, Gregory Butchart says BCLC voided bets he made in August after claiming they had taken his wagers in error.

But the Langley man says the corporation took so long to tell him that it ruined his odds for making a profit elsewhere.

"It was eight days after I placed my bets. The Blue Jays had won eight games in a row," he said.

"If I had that time, I would have been able to place the bet somewhere else."

No correlated bets

The case provides a primer into the complex world of sports betting and the rules which allow BCLC to take bets on sports events through its online sportsbook PlayNow.

Key to the process is that the corporation says it cannot accept single bets on games without violating the Criminal Code, so bettors have to make two picks at a time.

The only caveat is that PlayNow also doesn't accept so-called "correlated" bets: wagers where the result of one event fully or partly contributes to the outcome of the other.

If a bet is taken in error, BCLC reserves the right to void the wager.

That's what Butchart claims they did after taking $275 worth of bets in the first four days of August; he bet on the Jays to win the American League East and the New York Yankees to win a wild-card spot.

At the time, he claims, the odds on those bets were 45-1. 

But then on Aug. 10, Butchart claims he got an email from BCLC saying his bets were "highly correlated" and his odds "grossly inflated."

They accepted to offer the bet with the worst odds, or to void his bet entirely.

While Butchart admits that the Jays winning the division would take them out of the running for the wild card, he disputes the notion the two were highly correlated.

"They're very slightly correlated," he said. "There were still 16 other teams that could win the wild card."

The house always wins

Butchart disputed the decision and in the beginning of October, BCLC decided to give him special odds of roughly 13-1 for a payout of $4,062.

"Right off the bat, they say we're going to change the odds on this. And I said: 'Well, I don't agree to that,'" he said.

"And they said: 'Well you have a choice. We can either change the odds or we can void the bet completely.' That's the power that they have."

Butchart is suing for the $8,560.50 which he claims he should have won if his initial bets on the Blue Jays had been accepted when he placed them — before the team's winning streak.

Niko de Jonge owns SportsBettingCanadian.ca, a web site for Canadian bettors. He says he can see why BCLC disputed the bet, but thinks they could have let Butchart know sooner.

"There's not a lot of correlation there, but there's definitely enough that the sportsbooks wouldn't want to accept the bet at the odds they were giving out," he said.

"There's definitely an error on PlayNow's account. They should not have let him make the bet in the first place."

De Jonge says it is worth noting that sportsbooks generally design their terms and conditions so the house doesn't lose in the event of an error. And that includes posting incorrect odds and accidentally taking correlated bets.

In a statement, BCLC says it tries to fix inaccuracies as soon as they happen.

"On any given day, there are thousands of bets offered ... with many multiple possible outcomes," the corporation said. "Unfortunately, human error can occur and periodically bets may be taken in error."