STS No Longer Accept UK Customers: STS only entered the UK back in 2019 but by 2023 they had enough and stopped taking new registrations form 16th January and bets from 14th February. STS remain active in other markets and are completely solvent, meaning any funds you have with them are safe. Funds can bet withdrawn through the site as normal or if the UK site has already closed when you read this you can contact support to arrange a withdrawal.
Poland’s largest bookmaker created excitement when they eventually launched in the UK, being a big established company they were able to compete with the big old high street names in terms of features, odds value, market coverage and promotions. Indeed, they did very well and created a large profitable account base in the UK. They made record revenues in Q4 of 2022.
However, despite being successful in the UK they were doing much better in other markets, particularly at home. With new regulations due in the UK that would require further investment in the market and new procedures they felt this was a good time to get out. It is a damned shame too because STS offered something unique in the UK as well as competition for the big names. This is yet another good brand to abandon British shores. Hopefully they will come back in the future.
The UK online betting market is a tough nut to crack, and the road to success is littered with failed bookies, some of whom barely lasted a year. STSbet have already passed that milestone, and their tactic seems to have been to come out all guns blazing.
Rarely do new bookies hit the ground running with so many advanced betting features available on their sites, but STS have broken the mould by launching with full live betting capabilities, 24/7 customer support, and more market range and depth than some time served bookmakers can manage.
How have they achieved this? Well, the fact that they have been Poland’s number one high street bookmaker for the last ten years probably helped. STS might be new over here, but they have over a decade’s worth of experience and the resources in place to go head to head with the big names.
Their product is fully rounded with live betting, cash out, and a full casino suite that would be the envy of many other brands, and although there are still a few kinks to iron out, STS Bet are certainly worth your attention.
- Market Depth – A lot of bookmakers offer great depth in some markets, at STS this can be said for the whole book.
- Fully Rounded Product – It’s ready to go out of the box with live betting, full cash out, a huge casino, and more.
- Esports Champs – Few others give this sport the same level of attention as STS Bet.
Help is on Hand
A key factor to consider with any new bookmaker, and one which many punters ignore to their peril, is the customer support service.
This can be the difference between smooth sailing and stormy seas if and when you come across an issue, and at STS Bet there is both good and bad in store.
Support is available in English 24 hours a day and seven days a week, which is an encouraging first sign that shows commitment from the company. However, you are currently limited to live chat and e-mail and the FAQ is pretty barren too, which isn’t necessarily a problem unless you can’t get through on live chat.
There is no social media presence yet either, but this is early days so a lot could still be added as they find their feet in the UK. A phone line would be very welcome, for instance.
That said, jumping in feet first with a 24 hour service is commendable and hopefully a sign of things to come.
Betting Market Diversity
It’s not just the number of different betting markets available at STS that is impressive, but the variety therein as well. Of course you can bet on football – right down into the National League in the UK – and tennis and the like, but with options such as futsal, curling, cycling, bandy, surfing, women’s floor ball…the list of unique betting markets is a long one.
Esports bettors are in for a real treat, as STS have committed a lot of time and sponsorship money to promoting this category in the past. Things have cooled off since, but not in terms of market availability; you can bet on Call of Duty, Counter Strike, League of Legends, DOTA, and more, and market depth is strong too.
It’s now good news for horse racing fans too, as STS added racing to their book in 2022. This isn’t a traditional British bookie by any means, but a place to go to bet on both popular sports from around the world as well as to explore new possibilities.
For big events such as top tier European football leagues and the Premiership you can often find around 1000 different betting lines per event, and the options are novel and interesting to have a look at. We mean that there are betting lines that are lesser spotted, like double chance a total over/under as a single market, and goal range for the match – markets are often worded differently to how you might usually find them too, so don’t be caught off guard by that.
Elsewhere you can rely on at least 50+ markets for pre event ATP Tennis and around 100 for Russian ice hockey; as a bookie hailing from Europe you get much more depth in obscure leagues and competitions than you might be used to.
Odds
It’s hard to get a real handle on how STS perform in terms of odds as they haven’t been around long enough to get a real feel for them, but from a few quick comparisons we can see that they are often in line with the top bookies we have all heard of.
They do sometimes fall behind a little but it would be surprising to see them offering odds that could be considered below average. Of course, you can expect to find competitive odds on Polish markets, especially football, and some markets might not even be available elsewhere so the odds on them might be the best by default.
The site allows odds in fraction, decimal, and American.
Interface and User Experience
Blue and orange are the brand colours at this site, and apart from the white writing you won’t see many others. This serves to create a vibrant appearance and keeps things feeling fun.
That’s all very well, but if navigation and performance aren’t up to scratch then betting online soon stops being fun and quickly becomes a real pain in the behind. Luckily though, the TG Lab platform provides an interface that is well designed allowing an easy flow from one betting market to another, and numerous ways to find your market.
Use either the sports list which also works as a filtering device to narrow down your search, use one of the suggested quick links for anything currently popular, or use the search bar to go direct if you know exactly what you are looking for. There is the odd minor bug to iron out but nothing major.
The site performs reasonably well but this would be my only real issue with STS Bet. It doesn’t compete with some of the best in the business in terms of load speeds and now and again this can be irksome. Still, the desktop fares better than the mobile site, but more on that later.
The easy access to stats when available and the ability to see make up of each market before you open it up (cash out availability, multiple betting compatibility, etc) is a real bonus, making up for inadequacies elsewhere.
You could easily get from the homepage to placing your bet in under ten seconds, and where there are many betting lines they are grouped into useful categories such as goals, halves, cards, etc. This saves a marathon session hunting for your bet.
Mobile Betting
If there is one area where STS should focus their attention then it is here.
Their mobile offering isn’t bad but it has a fair amount of catching up to do. For instance, there is no mobile app at the time of writing for either Android or Apple users. This wouldn’t be so much of an issue if the mobile optimised website was up to scratch, but it suffers from the same issues as the desktop site.
It struggles to keep up at times, feels jerky, and to be brutally honest falls below expectations in terms of loading speeds. The layout, navigation, and design are all fine, they work great, it just doesn’t feel as powerful as it should, and when you’re looking for updated odds and seconds count that can be costly.
Still, fans of the bookie should be able to put up with it in non-urgent scenarios, and all of the features from the desktop site are available on mobile as well.
The search function is your friend, but a combination of scrolling sidebars and drop down menus help to keep the screen tidy as you browse and jump from one selection to the next.
The betslip is intelligent enough to know when it is needed and when to keep out of the way which is a good time saver too.
Casino, Gaming, Slots
Any punters who like a spin of the reels or a hand of video poker will be more than satisfied with the other side of STSbet’s website. The casino boasts more games than some stand alone online casinos – there are almost a 1000 slots for a start – and there are plenty of different things to do as well.
Slots, table games, live casino, live games, even game show type live games. It’s all there. Video poker as a particular strength with 40+ variations of the game available, and they also list games by provider which is perfect for anyone who has particular tastes and doesn’t want to wade through everything else.
STS: The Perfect Match
STS are spot on perfect for punters who enjoy dabbling in more obscure sports alongside placing more substantial bets on the favourites. The key here is that market depth per sport and per event is excellent for popular sports, so you won’t find yourself unable to find the market you want.
That makes the more niche options a real bonus rather than a compromise.
It should also be fairly obvious that any esports bettors need to get themselves an account here immediately; there are very few online bookies that give as much attention to betting on video games as STS Bet.
Think of STS as the wild card. They are a bookie who’s main strength is that they are difficult to categorise – they will always pleasantly surprise you.
How Would You Like to Pay?
As you can see from the table, the list of payment providers is currently fairly small but it does provide some degree of flexibility, and the list may well grow as STS establish themselves in the UK.
There are plenty of other European focussed providers but for UK punters you will be looking at:
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The maximum deposit for all methods in £1,500 but this will be per transaction, and if you want to deposit more you will probably be able to if you contact them first. As for withdrawals, this can be as low as £2,000 but most payment methods are capped at £20,000. Again, this would usually be per transaction, although saying that you may still have to get in touch with them if you plan on dropping crazy amounts of money or have lucked out on an 8-fold accumulator or something.
You should also be aware of the low winnings cap.
Winning & Betting Limits
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The maximum winnings at STS is a not unsubstantial £100k, but it’s low compared to other bookies. Granted there are bookies with maximums of over £1 million out there but in reality how likely is it that this will effect your £20 stake on The Hammers (or whoever)?
However, bets like accas can soon add up, so do make sure you are not staking more than you need to hit the upper limit if you are an accumulator fan.
It’s also worth noting that in a less usual move the company have set a single upper limit for all bets on all sports. Many bookies have very low win limits on less popular sports or competitions, but that is not the case here.
The minimum bet is just 10 pence, while the maximum will vary depending on the event and bet type in question. You can always check by hitting the ‘max’ button though, just remember to check that your stake won’t stand you to win more than £100k.
Betting Live In-Play
A lot more markets open up once a game goes live, and at STS Bet there are a heck of a lot of games going live.
From the main in-play interface you will be greeted with a list of available sports categories with live games in play, and the individual matches below. These are stacked by country and league and all can be collapsed up in order to focus only on what interests you.
Basic bets like win/draw/win and over/unders can be placed from here, and you can also see some basic match information along with how many alternative betting lines are available in event view.
Event view is where the real fun can be had, and where you will find the stream if there is one or the digital interpretation of the game if there isn’t. There are a few more stats too and you are kept abreast of the situation with second by second visual updates. It can create a surprising level of suspense in all honesty.
There is also a calendar and results service available as part of the live betting package, but the feature that really deserves some attention is the Bet Booster. This tool enables informs the bettor with interesting statistical facts regarding the game in question, then offers the odds relating to those stats below. An example might be, “Once tied at the 10th minute, 7 of these last 10 Real Betis’s matches resulted with more than 2.5 goals.”
Key Betting Features
There are one or two features that haven’t been covered in much detail yet but that are worth bringing your attention to and exploring a little further.
Statistics
The stats tool is a very useful companion to your betting activity especially if you prefer to trust data and numbers over your gut.
There is an awful lot of information in there covering around 20 different sports, and there is even info on obscure leagues from the Finnish Bandy league, for example, so no stone is left unturned.
You can find greater levels of data with some other bookies’ stats tools but we are talking about minute details here. This will suit 99% of bettors perfectly, and the use of diagrams as well as hard numbers makes the tool more engaging than some others.
The utterly bizarre thing here is that the stats tool isn’t available from the website. You have to search for it separately. So although it is a brilliant tool it is incredibly difficult to find and not easily accessible when you want it. A major kink that needs ironing out asap.
Blog
Your modern day equivalent to a weekly sport magazine.
The articles in the blog serve more as betting tips with interesting stats about the teams involved rather than listing articles and opinion pieces. That said, they often pose questions as well and are an interesting read.
You can expect a handful of posts a month, up to ten at most, and it will tend to cover big competitions or fixtures in the betting calendar so it’s a good way of getting ahead of the game as to what is coming up.
The posts won’t take long to read either so are probably best suited to those who like to get their information quickly before moving on; it’s more like the daily Mirror than the Guardian.
About the Brand
If you go to Google maps, hover over Poland, and type STS Bet, you will see scores of location markers pop up. This is because in their native country STS Bet are the biggest bookie with the largest market share of all – and they only started trading in 2008.
As you can see, the guys behind the brand don’t hang about and they like to get things done. This also goes some way to explaining why they have decided to enter the UK market, which is known for its difficulty and competitiveness and is not for the faint hearted.
They officially declared themselves open for business to UK punters in February of 2019, albeit under a white label license, but the decision to expand was made long before. In 2016 the company relocated to Malta to allow themselves a smoother transition into foreign markets, and the UK wasn’t their only target – German punters are also accepted at STS Bet.
The company became the proud owner of their own independent license to operate in the UK for the start of 2020 and have been using the same since then, and their relationship with BetConstruct who provided the initial white label license has since been discontinued, with STS opting for a more interesting platform (albeit with fewer features) by the lesser known TG Lab.
The brand are proud of their heritage and as well as sponsoring Poland’s national football team, also sponsor many top flight clubs in the country. They are yet to spend any money on that kind of thing in the UK, but they have signed up Peter Schmeichel as a brand ambassador in the past, which will no doubt enamour them to Manchester United and Aston Villa fans.
Contact Info & UKGC Link
- Name: STS Bet
- Registered Company Name: STS.Bet Limited
- UK Licence/ref No: 54498
- Parent Company: Vivaro Ltd
- URL: www.stsbet.co.uk
- Live Chat: Available once logged in
- Phone Support: Not Available
- E-Mail: [email protected]
- Twitter: No social media
- Registered Company address: STS Gaming Group, Skyways Offices, block C
3rd floor (C5), 177/179 Triq Marina, Pieta, PTA 9042