Ladbrokes in Snow Payout Dispute

A Southampton man, who did not understand the rules of novelty betting through Ladbrokes sportsbetting operator, will have to make do with a payout of £32, instead of the £7.1 million that he was expecting.

The tale began after Cliff Bryant, 52, placed an accumulator bet that snow would fall on 24 specific towns across the United Kingdom on Christmas Day.

The White Christmas bet is a popular one at Ladbrokes but an accumulator bet cannot be made on this kind of wager.

Unfortunately for the player, the bet was taken in error and when he saw that snow had indeed fallen on the 24 spots that he predicted, he allowed himself to dream that a payout of £7 million would await him in the New Year.

Ladbrokes apologized for the error and said that it would still honour the punter's bet as single payouts - to the tune of £32.

"We have apologized to the customer for any confusion and for mistakenly accepting an accumulator bet when our own rules state that only single bets are available on a market of this nature," said a spokesperson for Ladbrokes.

"We are happy to void the bets and to pay the customer his winnings on the relevant singles," the group added.

According to Bryan, the first accumulator should have won him £4.9 million and the second a further £2.2 million.

While he admitted that the incident was an error, he also said Ladbrokes should have clarified its rules. "If I made a mistake in my work like that, it costs me dearly and I think the offer should be a lot more generous than they have made," he said.

In the meanwhile, Bryant, acting on advice from Ladbrokes, has contacted the Independent Betting Adjudication Service.