Misunderstanding results in customer owing £2,500 to trading company

Frank got in touch with us because he felt the spread-betting firm he used didn't explain things properly to him.

What happened

Frank decided to find a spread-betting company for a bet he wanted to place. He found a company that did spread-betting, taking trades over the phone. Frank placed a spread bet with them on how many home wins versus away wins there'd be in the English Premiership Football League.

But the company only gave quotes for home/away goals, not home/away wins. So the bet would be on how many more goals would be scored in home matches than in away matches.

Frank misunderstood this and ended up owing the company £2,500. He complained to us that the company didn't explain the nature of the trade properly. He believed that he was betting on wins, not goals.

What we said

We listened to the recording of the phone call talking about the bet. We heard Frank and the dealer refer to "homes over aways" but there was no specific mention of wins or goals.

We also looked at the company's terms and conditions which Frank signed to up. These said that they didn't quote for spread bets on home/away wins. Their terms also said that customers would need to familiarise themselves with some specifics before placing a bet. This included the nature of spread-betting, jargon that's used, the market and index hours and the expiry times and dates of the contracts made.

Based on the evidence, we decided that the company wasn't at fault for the misunderstanding, so we didn't uphold Frank's complaint.

Spread betting and contracts for differences (CFDs)

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