The Tote is one of the oldest betting companies you will come across in the UK. It was set up in 1928 by Winston Churchill (yes, really!) to be a safe place to bet and return funds to British racing. The Tote launched an online betting site in 2020 to reach out to a larger audience.
The Tote UK is not a traditional fixed odds bookmaker, but functions as a pool betting site for pari-mutuel wagers. They operate in a similar way to a sweepstake where every punter’s bet is collected in a Tote pool. Then, when the result of the bet comes out, the Tote’s takeout is deducted from the entire pool and the remaining is shared among the punters. This Tote review will explore everything you should know about the Tote UK betting site. You’ll get more information about the promotions, betting types and sports you can bet on.
Tote UK has different bonus offers customers can claim. The Tote sign-up offer is one of them and it is focused on new customers. The first step to claiming the sign-up offer is to get on the Tote sports betting site and create a new account. Once you create a new account, you have to fund your account with real money to claim the bonus offer.
The Tote sign-up offer gives new customers £20 when they place a minimum bet of £5. Also, the £20 Tote Credit will be given to them as £10 redeemable against racing bets and £10 redeemable against UK and Irish placepot bets.
Remember that the bonus is reserved for only new customers who just want to create a new account. Regular customers can keep reading this Tote review to find other bonus offers they can claim.
Now that you know how the Tote welcome offer works at Tote UK, let’s take you through the bonus terms and conditions you must fulfil before claiming it.
The bonus offer is only available to punters aged 18 years and more who reside in the UK or the Republic of Ireland and may be redeemed once per individual customer.
You must also deposit a qualifying bet of £20 in Tote credit to claim the bonus offer. Remember the £10 is redeemable against racing bets only and £10 is redeemable against UK and Irish placepots bets only.
Only the value of your qualifying bet will count towards the bonus offer. The value of any subsequent bet will not contribute towards the value of your Tote credit refund.
Minimum Bet | Qualified Markets | Expiry Date | Minimum Odds | Withdrawable? |
£5 | All events | 7 days | N/A | No |
Only new customers from the UK and the Republic of Ireland can claim the Tote welcome offer. So, what that means is that regular players will have no luck if they try to claim the bonus offer.
A new player outside these two jurisdictions cannot claim this bonus offer. As the Tote only operates in the UK and Ireland, there are no bonuses for anyone beyond these two jurisdictions.
To claim your Tote welcome bonus, follow these simple steps:
The betting site also offers regular customers the chance to claim fantastic bonus offers. These Tote promotions were available on the betting site at the time of writing this Tote review. Some of them include Cheltenham Sorted, Stayers Club, and Tote Plus.
You have to stake £100 on Racing Pools Bets every qualifying week to earn £10 Tote Credit for each day of the Cheltenham Festival. The qualifying weeks for the bonus run Monday to Sunday from the start of the festival for 4 weeks. Also, the bonus awards you a £5 Win/Place and £5 Exotics. You can expect a maximum of £40 Tote Credit in total when you claim the bonus offer.
Another bonus offer punters can claim at the betting site is the Stayers Club. To claim your free Stayers Credit, you have to simply place more than six qualifying bets at the specified stake levels throughout the week.
Here are the rewards for joining the Stayers Club:
The Stayers Club is divided into three categories:
All the pools where the Tote Plus bonus applies are denoted by the inclusion of the “tote+” symbol. The bonus offer is reserved strictly for punters that bet at the Tote desktop site or via the Tote app. These punters will get up to a 10 percent bigger payout on winning Tote bets than when playing on other channels.
The betting site will always pay at least the starting price (SP) on win bets, and if the Tote dividend is greater, it’ll pay out at that price. Remember that the bonus offer is reserved strictly for users of the Tote desktop site, the Tote app and selected UK and Irish racecourse customers only.
The betting site doesn’t give out bonus codes to its players at the moment. It focuses on the bonus offers on its promotions page and gives punters guidelines to follow on how to claim them.
The good thing is that you don’t need a Tote promo code to claim any of the bonus offers on the betting site. Just follow the steps on the promotional page and you’re good to go.
Now that you know the bonus offers you can claim at the sports betting site, let’s explore the sports you can bet on at Tote UK.
You can bet on different sports at Tote Sport UK. The betting site ensures that punters get competitive odds when they play. These sports include the following:
Tote horse racing allows you to bet on future races, live races and international races. When you select any of the options, you find different events you can bet on displayed on your screen. There are two types of bet you can place when you choose to bet on racing – single and multi leg Bets. The single leg bets has different betting options you choose and they include the following:
The multi leg bets also have different betting options you can choose and they include
There are four betting options you can choose if you want to bet on football and they include match predictor, 1X2, correct score and both teams to score. These betting options have different syndicates you can further choose when you click on them.
Tote doesn’t have odds set for its sports. The dividends that are paid are calculated according to the volume of bets placed by customers on each winning combination. If 100 people each bet £1 on a race, then the total pool is £100. This pool is then shared among the winners once Tote have subtracted their commission.
The minimum stake per line is only a single penny at the Tote! Before you get too excited and think you can win £25,000 from a penny bet, the pot is shared on a pro-rata basis, so someone who bet 10p will get ten times the share of someone who bet 1p.
In addition, no matter your bet-per-line, the minimum stake per bet is 50p. This means if you are betting a penny per line, you must select a minimum of 50 lines.
The betting site doesn’t have the in-play Betting option on its site. This is because it’s not a bookmaker per se as it functions like a pool betting site. So, every bet you place has to be done on specified days before the actual event.
The betting site doesn’t take bets from punters while any event is in progress like most bookmakers do. As the Tote is mainly centred around horse racing, betting on races ‘in play’ (i.e. once the horses have started running) is something no UK bookmaker will offer anyhow.
The majority of horse races available for pool betting at this site can be streamed directly, either from the desktop site or the Tote app. You don’t even have to have placed a bet on the race to watch it – as long as you have made at least one deposit to your Tote pool betting account, then you can watch any race that is streamed by the Tote.
It will probably not surprise you to learn that there is no football streaming at the Tote.
All the best betting sites have bet builders for punters that want to combine more than one bet on their slips. That way they stand a higher chance of winning big for a relatively small stake. Because of the pool betting nature of the Tote, bet builders are not appropriate here, hence there is no bet builder available at the Tote.
Besides sports betting, Tote offers other functionalities to its customers that want to explore and they include:
The first step to playing Tote Fantasy sport is to pick your horse. You can use your 10,000 guinea budget to select 7 horses. Also, ensure you study what other players are picking and study form.
The second step is to select your boosts. You can choose from two options here – Stable Star and Stewards Enquiry. Select Steward Star for 2x points and Stewards Enquiry for a placing bump.
The third step is to score points and win money. The top 25% of players make a profit and the winner takes the jackpot.
Virtual horse racing allows you to enjoy the fun and excitement of the sport without worrying about the form book. You have to select your preferred number or colour from the set field of virtual runners and place your bet.
Tote has a dedicated virtual Sports section that allows you to bet on virtual horse racing daily. The great thing about betting on virtual horse racing is the simplicity that comes with it. You don’t have to worry about the form, the stats, the track or the weather conditions when you place your bet.
This is a popular competition on the betting site that starts in November each year and ends in April. The 2023 competition started with the Paddy Power Gold Cup day at Cheltenham and ended on Grand National day at Aintree. Check for details about the latest competition at the site.
Toke UK has different support channels you can use if you have questions and issues you want to raise. They include email, live chat and phone channels. Remember that the support channels are open between the hours of 8 am until midnight, 7 days a week (except on bank holidays).
The best way to get in touch with the betting site is through the live chat channel. Just click on the speech bubble icon on the right-hand corner of the screen to get started. A pop-up will show you a chat option you can use to send your message. You should get a response within a couple of minutes of sending your message using the live chat option.
The second support channel you can use at the betting site is the email support channel. Send your email to [email protected] and expect a response once the support staff gets your message.
Alternatively, you can send an email to [email protected] to give your feedback on the gambling experience so far on the betting site.
The last support channel you can use at the gambling site is phone support. You can call this number if you’re based in the UK – 0800 032 8188. There are also provisions for punters that are not in the UK. Call +44 194 231 4045 and you’ll get a response from the support staff.
The betting site has a mobile app called the Tote App, which is a very convenient way to place the pools bet via the Tote. The Tote mobile app was designed to make it easier for punters to get on all of their single-leg and multi-leg bets.
With just a few clicks on the Tote mobile app, you can select all your favourite meetings and read the Racing Post spotlight for every horse on the field. Some of the features available on the Tote mobile app include the following:
You can use the next-off feature or scroll through the races at all the meetings and place your bet on the app. The betting app has guide prices and a Racing Post spotlight to help with your selection.
The betting app also features Placepot, which is Tote racing’s most popular bet. Why most punters love the Placepot is that they don’t really have to pick a winner to win. All you have to do is to find horses that will place. The more selections you have that place, the more likely you are to win a share of the £25,000-minimum Placepot pool.
The betting app also allows you to quickly pick exotic bets anywhere away from your desktop device. For example, you can place your Trifecta or Exacta from 1p a line with a 50p minimum stake.
The betting site has made its app the home of its betting tournaments, allowing players to compete against some of the best punters in the UK and Ireland. That way you can test your punting skills and know if you’re good enough or not.
The Tote Placepot is many people’s first bet of the day, which is the betting site’s most popular bet. To win the Tote Placepot is simple – pick a horse to place in the first six races at any UK, Irish or selected international meeting.
Most punters prefer the Tote placepot because it offers them the chance to win big off of small stakes. Besides the huge payout that makes the Placepot a great bet, it can keep you entertained throughout your racing day.
Besides sports, Tote has a casino section that features quality games from top game providers. Some of these games include slots, table games and scratch cards.
Tote online casino features hundreds of slots of games from the best game providers in the iGaming industry. Also, you can claim fantastic bonus offers at the casino site. They include Spin the Wheel and Drops and Wins.
Tote casino features quality games from top game providers in the iGaming industry. Some of them include Inspired Gaming, Pragmatic Play, Blueprint, Ruby Play and Wizard Games.
These games also have reasonable RTPs and maximum wins. Also, they have flexible betting limits, allowing high-rollers and low-rollers to get a chance to play.
The total number of games available on the casino site is over 700, which is not bad for a betting site that has a casino section. As you would expect, you’ll find more slot games at the casino site than other games. Some of these slot titles include Joker’s Jewel, Sugar Rush, Book of Golden Sands, Hot Pepper, Starlight Princess, Book of Fallen, and Mustang Gold.
Tote Casino doesn’t feature bingo games at the moment. We hope the casino site will include them in its game collection in the future.
Tote Casino doesn’t feature poker games at the moment. We hope it will include them in its collection of games in the future.
Tote Casino features 14 table games in its casino lobby. These game titles include the following:
Besides table games, Tote Casino features seven scratch cards and they include the following:
Tote only accepts fast and secure payment methods on its site. These include debit cards like MasterCard and Visa cards. This might pose some drawbacks to players who want to use other payment options besides the two payment options accepted on the betting site.
The deposits you make using Visa and MasterCard at the Tote are instant and free of charge.
Payment Method | Fees | Minimum Deposit | Minimum Withdrawal | Processing Time |
MasterCard | Free | £5 | N/A | 3 – 5 working days |
Visa | Free | £5 | N/A | 3 – 5 working days |
The withdrawal time on the Tote betting site might take between three and five days, depending on the payment method you’re using. We believe it would be better if the betting site had more payment options on its site.
Tote was created by Winston Churchill in 1928. The UK government-backed betting company was created to be a safe place to bet and return funds to British racing. In 2020, the betting site launched its website – Tote.co.uk – and later launched its mobile app where you can bet conveniently via any mobile app.
Tote is the trading name of TDCO Limited, which is licensed and regulated in Great Britain by the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) under account number – 54779. TDCO Limited is a company registered in England and Wales under company number – 11300287. The registered head address of the company is 6th Floor 6 Kean Street, London, WC2B 4AS, United Kingdom.
The betting site understands the importance of information security and the techniques needed to secure information. As a result, it uses reasonable organisational, technical and administrative measures to protect your personal information from unauthorised access by third parties. One of these security measures is the SSL (Secure Socket Layer) Certificate, which provides end-to-end security for the punter’s information on the betting site.
In this section of our Tote review, we explore what we like and don’t about Tote betting site.
What We Like:
The Tote is one of the oldest betting options in the UK. It has been at the heart of British racing for over 90 years. Betting at Tote is different from betting at a bookmaker’s site. It focuses on pool betting and operates like a sweepstake where every punter’s bet is collected in one central pool. This Tote review has explained everything you should know about the Tote betting site.
Why not create a new account at Tote now, to get £20 free bet offer when you make a first deposit of £5 into your account?