[Albion] Yesterday’s attendance

Superphil said:

The segregation bits did look smaller, about time too. Still disappointing to see so many empty seats, why wouldn’t the STHs not put them on the exchange if they aren’t able to make it?

Click to expand...

Sussex Nomad said:

35,500?

Click to expand...

Sussex Nomad said:

Yep, that is the problem, and no clubs seem to have in-house developers. The websites are dross, handled by the same company, and they end up going to shite like Survey Monkey to do their own business. They need an in-house dev or two to sort this out. I won't be using the exchange again when I can't make it.

Click to expand...

Bozza said:

I'm not sure if I posted this before, but it's part of an email sent my Paul Barber to me recently on the subject, and he said I could share if I wish. So, just in case...

"We could have had a fully functioning ticket exchange in place some time ago. Again, as previously explained, there have been two key reasons why it hasn’t been put in place: (1) a lack of demand and (2) business models that wouldn’t have worked for the club – or, more importantly, for fans. Instead, we have developed a simpler system built from scratch that is more cost effective for the club and for fans.

It’s currently clunky and it’s highly manual. But it works - and we promote it when it’s active. It’s been used hundreds of times this season already (as well as on several notable occasions last season). It is however a complete myth to suggest transaction volumes will soar with a more automated exchange or a better financial incentive. It didn’t at Spurs back in my day there - and it doesn’t at other clubs now.

For whatever reason there’s a reluctance amongst some fans to offer their seat for exchange. I really don’t know why. It’s the key reason why the big clubs quickly lost very lucrative deals with viagogo and others in the secondary market within a short space of time – quite simply, those providers couldn’t generate a return on the guarantees they had paid upfront because transaction volumes were too low.

I know that many fans think this is a simple problem to fix. I’m afraid it isn’t. There are three basic business models (and some hybrids):

- the provider pays a big fee to the club - and then owns the club’s secondary ticket market; the provider either allows a “free market” on prices and/or they charge a % to buyer and seller. These deals usually only exist for the biggest clubs (and less so now).

- a hefty license fee is charged to the club for the software. The club can either provide a free or fixed market for re-sale pricing (and takes a % of the transaction value if it is above face value) or, more common, it charges fees to buyers and/or sellers.

- the club works with a provider to develop its own exchange, imposes conditions on sale (e.g. to buy you must be a club member to minimise potential security issues) thereby limiting flexibility to a degree but also limiting costs to fans as far as is possible too.

Clearly, a simpler more flexible system will help but the vast majority of PL clubs still experience up to 10% of “no shows” every week. That’s a lot of empty seats every game. And, yes, we are as frustrated as those fans that see the empty seats - and those fans that want to get access to them. It’s a topic of regular debate amongst clubs – and it has been for years. But we can’t re-sell what we don’t get back!

Finally, we have refined the current clunky ticket exchange to make it easier for us to activate and, more importantly, so it will be easier for fans. Unfortunately, the delay is not us “breaking our promise”, it is a complex payment system issue that has much wider commercial repercussions for us to fix at this particular time. Once resolved, it will be a better system that returns cash to fans not vouchers.

In summary, those that want to use the current ticket exchange, clunky and inflexible as it is, are doing so – and some, regularly. It doesn’t ever make sense to activate a ticket exchange when you have tickets left to sell. We can only promote it when its activated because it is a waste of time and resource to pre-list tickets when the exchange might not get activated, hence the long-awaited upgrade."

Click to expand...

Tom Hark said:

Been here before, will be here again, but bears repeating...

Club know how many people bought tickets i.e. the amount of revenue due to the taxman.

Club knows full well how many people actually clicked through the turnstiles.

It's an insult to the intelligence to formally announce tickets sold as attendance as opposed to people clicking through the turnstiles. One's a statutory requirement to the taxman, one's a courtesy to those who actually turned up on the day.

Click to expand...

Bozza said:

I have a vague recollection of reading somewhere that Pretendance = Attendance is a Premier League rule.

Click to expand...

kingcole said:

Coz they don’t know about it.
The exchange page is very basic and even looks a bit spammy.
The exchange page can’t be accessed from some Apple devices.
You can’t put tickets on the exchange until it sells out, often a few days before and after those who can’t go may have already left on their holiday or to partake in whatever it is that’s preventing them from going.
You are never told if your seat has sold
Some don’t value the £25 shop voucher (less if a concession)

All above are genuine reasons but I can say with some certaintly that mainly it’s the first point

Click to expand...

Bozza said:

I have a vague recollection of reading somewhere that Pretendance = Attendance is a Premier League rule.

Click to expand...

Weststander said:

An honest and clear explanation by PB.

Click to expand...

Bozza said:

I have a vague recollection of reading somewhere that Pretendance = Attendance is a Premier League rule.

Click to expand...

amexer said:

Arsenal,Spurs and Man United tickets could sell twice over and should be put on exchange as soon as released

Click to expand...

Weststander said:

An honest and clear explanation by PB.

Click to expand...

kingcole said:

Great to see another over 35500. From my vantange point in the ESL it looked like a smaller than usual segreagtion area between S1F and S1G. Sure in the past is has been 5 columns but looked less, maybe just 3?

Click to expand...