MANILA, Philippines – The scheduled MetroTurf races last Tuesday and Wednesday were severely affected by the sudden pullout of Philippine Racing Club betting terminals.
Very low sales were posted last Tuesday while races last Wednesday were cancelled due to non-operation of many off-track betting stations (OTBs).
For unknown reasons, the PRCI management stopped the use of a good number of betting terminals last Jan. 5, causing a very big drop in sales.
The facilites were jointly used by MMTC (MetroTurf) and PRCI for several months through their common service provider Global Versatech, Inc. (GVI).
As a result, OTBs using the PRCI terminals at that time had to stop operation. This caught many OTBs by surprise since they have been used to operate any of the two clubs’ terminals during their respective racing dates.
Many are wondering why this happened when top officials of PRCI and MMTC were known to be in very good terms and relations.
This also caught MMTC officials by surprise and it left no time for them “to react to the consequences of the PRCI’s arbitrary action.”
“Nonetheless, we opted to continue our racing operations last Tuesday to fulfill our obligations to the racing public. But the sales were really affected since many OTBs could not switch to the MMTC terminals immediately,” said MMTC racing manager Wilbert Adriano.
MMTC was also forced to cancel out the Jan. 6 Wednesday night races “due to the continuing problems from the sudden pullout of terminals by PRCI last Tuesday.”
This came about as MMTC also deployed more than a hundred new betting terminals to augment its existing 200 that were already installed in various OTBs.
According to MMTC, the installation of the new and most modern betting terminals would speed up transactions and boost sales in the industry. The 100 new betting machines are expected to be fully deployed by the middle of this month.
With the 300 new terminals installed in all 247 OTBs before the Jan. 15 target, the scheduled races at the MetroTurf and betting at the various OTBs would run smoothly and conveniently, MMTC said.
“We assure you that we will have at least 300 most modern terminals installed in all active OTBs before the next races on Jan. 16 and 17,” Adriano added. “And we have already wrapped up our preparations for the weekend’s staging of the Philracom Commissioner’s Cup and the PCSO Special Maiden Race, our first major stakes races ushering the new year at the MetroTurf.”