Something that prospective sports bettors should definitely be aware of and understand is what a Bet Slip is. You cannot make a bet, whether online or in-person, without a bet slip.
If you go to a bookie or a betting shop, you’ll be given a bet slip as a receipt for your wager. If you win, you return to the bookie or betting shop with your bet slip to collect your payout after the event. If you’re betting online, you will usually be able to see an electronic bet slip once you’ve chosen odds or a market to bet on with your preferred sportsbook.
The bet slip is like a ticket where all the information you need—stake, odds, markets, and any other relevant details to your bet—is displayed for you to see. You can see your projected payout based on your stake and odds, which can be helpful in communicating value to less experienced punters.
A bet slip also allows you to see your bet before confirming or placing it: when you have your online bet slip open, your bet has not been placed yet, you must click the confirm or place bet button to finish off the process and get your wager out there. This means that while your bet slip is open, you can consider the market you chose and possibly tweak or change it or your stake before actually pulling the trigger.
If you bet a lot, the bet slip can seem like an afterthought, something that you didn’t even realize had a term to describe it, but they are a very useful and informative tool. They’re pretty much like you’re own little like odds calculator for every bet or parlay you make.
Some sportsbooks will have a designated section on their page where you can click and open up a new bet slip for the picks you plan to make. The more top-of-the-line providers, such as Bet365 however, simply open up a bet slip as soon as you click or choose a market or line and boom, there it is for you.
A bet slip can also be used to put several single bets down at once, or to combine several markets together to create yourself a teaser, pleaser, or parlay. For example, if you want to bet on three different outcomes but you want them to be all singles instead of in an all-or-nothing parlay, your sports betting site will have a function to specify that. Many sportsbooks are unique in how they allow their punters to make this distinction.
On Bet365, for example, if you select one market, it opens a bet slip, but if you select a second one that can be parlayed with the first one (ie: not a Moneyline, point spread, or prop bet from the same event) the bet slip will automatically turn into a parlay slip with a large section for your stake at the bottom and small sections next to each individual market for stakes as well. If you want to bet those markets as singles, you can input each individual stake in the small sections, and if not, fill-in your stake in the parlay section.
On Bodog/Bovada, it’s a little bit different. After clicking a second market, this sportsbook will add that line to your bet slip as a second single bet. The bet slip will have two tabs at the top, one that says ‘singles,’ to keep them as single bets, and one that says ‘multiples,’ to combine them into a parlay or teaser.
The Bet365 way is less common than the latter, but you are likely to come across both single bet/parlay bet slip formats as you scoure the web for the best sportsbook for your betting needs.
The bet slip is one of the biggest things that beginner bettors have going for them, as it gives them a well laid-out view of their bet and its details and gives them a chance to rethink (or think better) of some potential gambles. Just remember: if you really want to make the bet, you have to confirm/place it too.
Many a punter has put together a winning bet slip only to come back after the fact and realize they never confirmed it. Don’t be that bettor.