TopBetta Australia Review 2021

Website Overview

Topbetta is a fairly new entrant into the Australian online bookmaking industry. The website was first introduced in mid 2013 and has already undergone some major changes in format and content. Like all new companies, Topbetta brings with it big positives and big negatives. Considering that should be expected, it’s nice to see that the website’s management group is willing to go out on a ledge and take a shot at being an industry innovator. The jury is still out on this site, but it certainly deserves a chance to catch hold.

The overall website is very business-like without much in the way of bells and whistles. The classic layout features three menu tabs across the top, Sports, Racing and Tournaments (more on that later). Most of the information punters need about a site is available from the home landing page, which makes the site reasonably easy to use. Topbetta is licensed in the Northern Territory where is faces stiff competition from some of the top online bookmakers in the world. When all is said and done, one has to appreciate the fact that management has decided to keep things simple until the site has a chance to gain momentum and mature.

Betting Options

In the sportsbook, most of the attention is focused on major sports, leaving aside unique sports like dart, handball and cycling. As part of a conservative approach, that’s probably a good decision as it helps punters to keep from wasting wagering resources. What they do offer is standard Australian fare in the form of cricket, soccer, basketball, Aussie Rules Football and rugby. From the international scene, most major European football leagues are represented as well as the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, NCAA FB, NCAA BB and the MSL from the U.S. Standard betting options are available, including single bets, multis and proposition bets.

In the race book, almost everything revolves around horse and harness racing in Australia and New Zealand. It would seem that pretty much all of the local racetracks in operation at any given time are represented on the racing menu. Topbetta does a great job of alerting horse punters about next up races. What punters won’t find is access to the international racing scene. From time to time, they carry races from major tracks in Europe and major horse racing events like the Breeders Cup, but beyond that, international horse racing is not currently available.

In what could be seen as a major innovation, Topbetta is one of the very first online bookmakers to offer handicapping tournaments in both the sports and race books. They list both free and paid tournament options with cash prizes and plenty of extra incentives. The free tournaments are a great option for punters with limited resources because the winners earn a free entry into one of the big cash tournaments. This is the kind of innovation that makes one think this site could stick around for a while.

Bonuses and Promotions

Usually, a young online bookmaking operation will post plenty of bonuses and promotions to draw new customers into the fray. That doesn’t seem to be the case with Topbetta. In fact, the website only advertises a welcome offer with no mention or indication of betting promotions. It could well be that established punters get plenty of offers via email or text, but that isn’t going to help draw in new customers.

Welcome Offer: For a small deposit of only $25, punters receive $100 in bonus bets. After the bonus bet amount has been placed in the punter’s bonus account, they have 30 days to use all of the bonus monies or forfeit the entire amount. Bonus bets can be made in any increments on single wagers only from eligible markets. They must also be placed on markets at odds of +1.00 or greater. If any winnings are earned from bonus bets, those amounts, less the original bonus stake, are returned to the punter into their regular wagering account. From there, the punter has to turn over the amount of the deposit, plus any bonus winnings, a total of 2X on markets that carry odds of +1.50 or higher. Once this turn over requirement has been met, punters can then proceed to make withdrawals as they see fit.

Betting Promotions: As indicated above, there is nothing currently advertised as a betting promotion. If punters are interested in finding out what might be available in the future, it certainly wouldn’t hurt to contact customer service and see what might be in the offering in the coming months. For now, the lack of advertised betting promotions should be considered a big negative, especially from a competitive point of view.

Mobile Access

The next negative on the list is the lack of a viable mobile app. Considering the fact all other top Australian online bookmakers have mobile apps, it puts Topbetta at a serious disadvantage in a day and age when punters want to be able to wager from anywhere. Hopefully, this issue is being addressed. For now, mobile device users should still be able to access the regular website, using a standard web browser.

Banking Options:

Like much of the industry, Topbetta offers about a half a dozen banking options. They include BPay, POLi, MasterCard, VISA, nab and bank transfer. The procedures for withdrawals are based on industry standards. This includes the possibility of a holding period, plus the punter may be required to fax in certain documentation to be used to verify their age, name and address.

Customer Service

The customer service department seemed responsive, but they didn’t seem to have answers to all the questions right at their fingertips. Customer service representatives are available each day from 8:00 am to 9:00 AEST. Without a live chat function, the only contact options at present are phone or email.
Note: It’s hard to recommend a site with so many issues this early in its existence. With that said, the handicapping tournaments section should be enough to motivate some punters to at least give Topbetta a look. The worst that could happen would be losing a few dollars to an upstart bookmaker.