Sky Bet Betting Offers

Sky Bet is the online sports betting division of the huge BSkyB company that provides numerous entertainment channels, including Sky Sports, to millions of homes across the British Isles. Its origins can be traced back to the purchase in 2000 of Sports Internet Group, a small online betting company with further growth achieved in 2006 with the buyouts of TotalBet and UKBetting. Sky Bet are now one of the largest online sportsbooks and rely on a huge amount of advertising across their TV channels to attract customers instead of having a high street presence like most other bookmakers. Anyone who registers an account at Sky Bet can play in Sky Bet's online casino, poker and bingo sites using the same login details and funds as for sports betting.

Sports Coverage

The Sky Bet sports betting site is presented in a neat blue and red colour scheme, which is similar to that seen on the TV channels. The homepage emphasises the live events currently being streamed, any special bets on offer and a list of upcoming events over the next few hours, with quick links to the sign up pages, current bonus offers and a list of available sports.

That list includes all of the popular sports that any betting operator would cover such as:

• Football
• Cricket
• Tennis
• Rugby

Including niche ones such as:

• Gaelic Games
• Handball
• Ultimate Fighting Championship

Although heavily focused on the UK market, sports from around the world are still featured, so visitors will find Aussie rules football, baseball, NFL and ice hockey are covered in detail. A limited number of special bets on entertainment and politics are possible, as well as virtual sports such as horse and greyhound racing, football, motor racing and speedway. Placing a bet is a matter of clicking on an event link which opens up the betting slip. This can then be filled out with the chosen stake and the expected return for a win is subsequently displayed. Once the bet is confirmed, further wagers can be added to the same slip; a useful feature is that the punter will be advised if the event is being shown live on a Sky channel, or streamed online. Thousands of events are live streamed, although some require a stake to be placed before they can be watched, whilst certain games and races that are shown on the Sky Sports channels are also available to be streamed on a PC. Other services include a Stats Centre, which shows readers who has scored what, how a team is performing, what an individual players current form is or what they have won in the past. The stats cover several major sports from around the world, including football, tennis, cricket, NFL, darts etc.

A Sporting Life horse racing form and analysis service provides highly detailed information on horses, jockeys, courses and trainers to help Sky Bet customers to decide where to place their next racing wagers. Tips are provided by the trading news podcasts, with Sky Sports journalists and top traders pooling their knowledge, while news stories, videos, expert opinions and more are all on skysports.com, accessed via the Sky Bet site.

Free apps for iPhones, iPads, Blackberry and Android devices let punters bet on the go, with the added advantage that anyone who has £1 or more staked on a UK horse race can watch it live on their mobile. Sky Sports customers can watch the channels on Apple products and selected Android phones and tablets.

Bonuses and Promotions

Like all online sportsbooks, the bonuses and promotions at Sky Bet are not exactly massive, but one unique feature here is the Free Bets Club. Anyone who places an accumulator bet at odds of 5/1 or more, with a stake of at least £5 qualifies to join this club. Win or lose, they will be credited with a £5 free bet at 7pm on the Monday following the week in which the bet was placed. This needs to be done each week to stay in the club, because if one week is missed, then a £10 accumulator bet must be placed in order to get back in. Additionally, Sky Bet will always have some sort of welcome offer as a way to thank new customers for signing up. The details will change from time to time, but could be a free bet, or a deposit match bonus.

A couple of special tournaments are run during the football season (including Fantasy football), with weekly and monthly prizes in the region of £10,000 to be won, plus the free Super 6 competition where players win points for correctly predicting scores, the overall winner getting £100,000s. Each day, Sky Bet have Price Boost offers on certain wagers, where they provide the best odds available. The bets can be for any sport and the latest ones will be clearly highlighted on their website.

Banking

Most of the commonly used payment methods are welcomed at Sky Bet, such as credit and debit cards, although prepaid cards or vouchers cannot be used. A very detailed banking guide that goes through how to use each method in easy steps can be found on their site. The minimum deposit amount is only £5 or currency equivalent, with accounts instantly credited and no fees levied by Sky Bet. When it comes time to withdraw funds, a customer will need to verify their identity before their first request can be processed. By default, all monies will be sent back to the same card that was used to make the latest deposit and should be back in the customer's account in 3-5 working days.

Summary

Sky Bet have some significant advantages over similar operators due to their dominant position on British sports coverage, which is able to constantly advertise the betting service. Although this may seem unfair, they would not be able to retain customers for long if the services offered were not of a high standard, so visitors will find a quality gambling site, with lots of features. The range of sports covered is very good, all within a well designed site that is easy to use. Bonuses and promotions are competitive, with a fun Free Bet Club that's easy to qualify for, although unlike many online bookmakers, they do not have a Best Price Guarantee for horse racing.