Betfred offers to sell 25 shops to satisfy OFT

NORTH West bookmaker BetFred has offered to sell 25 shops to satisfy the competition regulator after its £265m acquisition of The Tote this summer.

The Office of Fair Trading said it now wants the Warrington-based group to fund a buyer for the shops in the locations where it had found there were competition issues.

The regulator said: “Given the reasonably small number of potential purchasers, the OFT requires an up-front buyer to be identified before accepting undertakings from Betfred to divest these betting shops.” 

Ali Nikpay, OFT Senior Director and Decision Maker in this case, said: “Betfred’s acquisition of the Tote did not raise competition concerns at a national level.

“However, there are some local areas where it has resulted in the elimination of or a significant reduction in choice of betting shops for consumers. The OFT is now considering Betfred’s offer to divest one of its betting shops in each area to remove the OFT’s competition concerns.”

At the time of the deal Betfred owned 840 betting shops and the Wigan-based Tote 517.