Chairman of Caymanas Track Limited (CTL) Christopher Brown has informed the Complete Racing Guide that since the introduction of telephone betting in November of last year, close to $10m has been wagered by punters using the two platforms of directly telephoning to a call centre and on smartphones.

“We at CTL are particularly pleased with this development as this innovation is not something we are dreaming about. It is something we have implemented which is gaining traction and working well,” Brown said.

Of the two available platforms, said the CTL chairman, punters have been gravitating more towards the use of smartphones to place their bets after establishing accounts with CTL.

“Yes, the smartphone is the preferred platform by the majority of our clients using our telephone betting service. Further, we have noticed that approximately 55 per cent of the $10m, which is $5.5m, has been wagered by persons overseas. This is an encouraging trend which we are going to enhance by providing more avenues for bettors to top up their accounts,” Brown said.

On Thursday CTL moved to solve the top-up issue by announcing a partnership with Paymaster.

“When we started telephone betting we did so in the knowledge that upgrades were necessary and essential in order to make it more convenient for our customers.

“As such, we entered into negotiations and I am very happy to announce that our account holders who number close to 300 can now top up their accounts at any Paymaster across the island.

“This is a significant step for CTL, as prior to the partnership with Paymaster, an account holder, say in Montego Bay, had to come to the track to place money in their CTL account. Now we have made it easier for that person to do business with CTL,” Brown explained.

He ended the interview with the Complete Racing Guide by saying that other innovations are currently being brokered which will enhance the telephone betting service even more.