Seagull Player

[Napper]

Good emails from everyone. Similar responses to my own .

Just like to go on record to apologise to insider for my comments during the match . Appreciate it isn't your fault and was frustrated.

Let's hope we can get this sorted

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Perhaps the costs outweigh the benefits. I think that Leeds are not in the deal because they defaulted on some payments under one of their former owners. I recall credit card companies a year or two ago refusing to allow Leeds to use their services owing to ongoing disputes which may be connected to a former , litigious, owner.

Do you know which other clubs have their own service?

 

[clapham_gull]

I've personally given up on it. Never been able to get the Android app to work on numerous devices and lost count of the times I've complained in the past.

Performs customer service isn't bad - it's non existent as far as I'm concerned.

I'm actually tired of the excuses from the club about being tied to a contract.

No more money from me until the whole thing is relaunched and if that's 5 years I can wait.

 

[El Presidente]

Do you know which other clubs have their own service?

Nope. Could do some ferreting around but at a Placebo gig at present so busy getting down with the kids!

 

[clapham_gull]

Just remembered I have an active account, I think free since the club gave a year as an apology for the service.

I've now also "cancelled" and have absolutely no intention of using it until the provider is changed.

I take the same approach to the website.

I suggest others do the same, it's easy to resubscribe if the service improves. This may be a one off opportunity to make Perform fix the service.

Has anyone got the Android app to work ? I had an email from them saying it had nothing to do with them, technically not I presume (different developer) but that's as frustrating as the club constantly blaming the league.

I posted a complaint on ask the club, but won't be taking it any further.

I'm finished with it.

Finished with Perform sending generic check your equipment emails, tired of them taking hours to reply.

Tired of the club blaming the league's deal.

I'm quite relieved and can't believed I persevered for so long.

Goodbye Seagulls Player, it was far from nice working with you.

 

[Bozza]

Does anyone else remember the days when a kind soul who could receive the commentary via radio would them stream it online for others to listen to?

Always 100% reliable.

 

[Fungus]

Does anyone else remember the days when a kind soul who could receive the commentary via radio would them stream it online for others to listen to?

Always 100% reliable.

Yes, good old Mike. No longer with us, I'm afraid.

Edit: 100% reliable? Didn't we get "voice-over" from his wife at times?

 

[Eksman]

Reply from PB

Thank you for your email.

I'm very sorry indeed to hear of the ongoing problems with Seagulls Player - and indeed I have just replied to another supporter who has also experienced problems this afternoon.

Unfortunately, the issues we have been facing this season (and last) are not within the club's direct control. This is not an excuse. It's just as frustrating for us as it is for our supporters. As such, we - both Paul Camillin on several occasions and, more recently, myself - have made our feelings known to the Football League and Perform at the highest levels. We will do so again.

However, like most clubs in the Football League, we are currently tied to a long term agreement with the League - for both Seagulls Player and also for the club's website template (which I also consider to be poor) - and, to be honest, I would prefer to be out of this contract for both products and to do our own thing.

The current agreement - called Football League Interactive (FLi) actually dates as far back as Dick Knight's time as Chairman of the club and we are only free to break the contract if we secure promotion to the Premier League - i.e. when we cease to be a Football League club.

Once again, I will be writing to The Football League to convey the views of our fans this weekend and to seek answers - and some form of financial gesture - for the problems we continue to experience. I will also ask Paul Camillin, our head of communications, to ensure that the League's response is communicated to Seagulls Player subscribers.

In the meantime, thank you for your patience - and for your support. It is very much appreciated - and does help the club. However, the current service level and situation simply isn't good enough and you have my sincere apologies on behalf of our club and the League's service provider. I promise I will personally pursue this on behalf of all Seagulls Player subscribers.

Kind regards, Paul


Sent from my iPhone

Great work

So we have it.. Get promoted or we are stuck

 

[Seagulls Downunder]

Can I suggest the following (and I am happy to draft the letter). All of us who are unhappy with the service agree to a joint letter to Paul Barber (not Insider, he is club communication officer and does a fine job), stating the nature of the issue, that it has failed to have been resolved over a long period of time and that as a consequence we (a) want to cancel our subscription as it is not fit for purpose (b) request a refund of sums paid in advance of such service, and (c) failure to take notice of such action will result in a boycott of other club services and products (such as attending the Reading Cup match.

Paul Barber does take notice of issues of this nature, you may not agree with his replies all the time, but I've received responses to communications from him late at night and even had a 45 minute call from him earlier this year in relation to some issue I raised.

I'm just as unhappy with Seagulls Player, the only reason I keep it is to see the match highlights as I am away many weekends in Russia, China, Cuba and North Korea.

Why not attach the letter to an online petition I've been told there easy to do and was almost at the point of finding out how easy after many complaints from our members re player. Listening to player on this side of the world is even harder to do as it means staying up late or going to bed and getting up again. Last night was the final straw for me having stayed up until 3.30am and been up since 7.30am the previous day I get it cutting out like everyone else and then miss the goal when it cuts out completely. I've emailed a certain person at the club 3 times already with no satisfactory reply, this person I'm lead to believe is running the media & web department.

 

[clapham_gull]

There is a forum attached to the Android app on the Google play store. There are so many complaints it's comical.

I've never got the commentary to work this way.

You try on a number of devices and Perform lock you out due to their fair usage policy. You then have to email them to unlock the account, if they respond before the end of the game you are lucky.

Awful service. Barber is wrong, problems have existed for years. On many occasions I've contacted the company to ring me after the weekend but they can't appear to be bothered.

They may well have fixed the Android problem by now but who cares. They won't be getting another penny off me.

 

[Seagulls Downunder]

Good to see a reply from Paul Barber but it's not going to resolve things for the rest of the season, for those of us so far away we'll have to make do but I won't be staying up late anymore until the clocks change again and ko for us is 12am and not 2am.

 

[Insider]

Just got back from Middlesbrough and we should be toasting another magnificent away victory. Instead we spent the majority of the journey home discussing Seagulls Player commentary.

All the comments here are totally justified. At the club we fully appreciate that fans are paying for a product. We know match commentary is one of the main reasons many fans sign up and in this day and age it should be easy to provide.

Furthermore we also appreciate fans are investing time to listen, with some even getting up in the middle of the night, depending on time zones.

The simple fact is that the service should just work.

Paul Barber's email outlines the contractual situation, but in terms of the technical side of things we rely on BBC Sussex to dial into Perform's servers via an ISDN line.

The guys at the BBC studio are reliable, but there is no way of them monitoring the stream, short of sitting listening to the feed (which isn't their responsibility).

Two weeks ago we also tested the system over an entire day, streaming direct from BBC Sussex and the stream worked perfectly. Perform accepted this.

The stream worked well for the last three matches, and it seemed as if things were going well.

Pre match we checked the stream from Middlesbrough and it was running fine. Then in the first half we discovered the stream was dropping out intermittently.

Calls were made to Perform to rectify the situation - but once again there were no answers from the tech team as to the quality of the stream. They still cannot identify why the stream drops!!!

One option at this stage was to redial in (possible to another ISDN number at Perform) but we were reluctant to ask the BBC to do this, as when we did at Wigan we lost it completely for a prolonged period.

Alas, the feed dropped completely anyway. We then called the BBC and asked them to dial in again, and despite several attempts - nothing.

Eventually - after three irate calls to Perform - we were given a new number to dial, and the audio came back for the final four minutes. There were still a couple of intermittent drops in coverage, and still Perform cannot tell us whether this is an issue on the feed coming in, or whether it's an issue on the Player feed.

Moving forward we intend to provide a back-up stream, which we will provide a link to if, and when, the Player stream is not reliable or down - but the point is we should not have to do this, the service Perform are employed by FLi to provide should work

 

[clapham_gull]

Just got back from Middlesbrough and we should be toasting another magnificent away victory. Instead we spent the majority of the journey home discussing Seagulls Player commentary.

All the comments here are totally justified. At the club we fully appreciate that fans are paying for a product. We know match commentary is one of the main reasons many fans sign up and in this day and age it should be easy to provide.

Furthermore we also appreciate fans are investing time to listen, with some even getting up in the middle of the night, depending on time zones.

The simple fact is that the service should just work.

Paul Barber's email outlines the contractual situation, but in terms of the technical side of things we rely on BBC Sussex to dial into Perform's servers via an ISDN line.

The guys at the BBC studio are reliable, but there is no way of them monitoring the stream, short of sitting listening to the feed (which isn't their responsibility).

Two weeks ago we also tested the system over an entire day, streaming direct from BBC Sussex and the stream worked perfectly. Perform accepted this.

The stream worked well for the last three matches, and it seemed as if things were going well.

Pre match we checked the stream from Middlesbrough and it was running fine. Then in the first half we discovered the stream was dropping out intermittently.

Calls were made to Perform to rectify the situation - but once again there were no answers from the tech team as to the quality of the stream. They still cannot identify why the stream drops!!!

One option at this stage was to redial in (possible to another ISDN number at Perform) but we were reluctant to ask the BBC to do this, as when we did at Wigan we lost it completely for a prolonged period.

Alas, the feed dropped completely anyway. We then called the BBC and asked them to dial in again, and despite several attempts - nothing.

Eventually - after three irate calls to Perform - we were given a new number to dial, and the audio came back for the final four minutes. There were still a couple of intermittent drops in coverage, and still Perform cannot tell us whether this is an issue on the feed coming in, or whether it's an issue on the Player feed.

Moving forward we intend to provide a back-up stream, which we will provide a link to if, and when, the Player stream is not reliable or down - but the point is we should not have to do this, the service Perform are employed by FLi to provide should work

Is the Android app actually capable of receiving the commentary ?

Take a look at the reviews on the Google app store and particular the associated forum.


http://flfootballapp.uservoice.com/forums/70641-general

 

[glasfryn]

Just got back from Middlesbrough and we should be toasting another magnificent away victory. Instead we spent the majority of the journey home discussing Seagulls Player commentary.

All the comments here are totally justified. At the club we fully appreciate that fans are paying for a product. We know match commentary is one of the main reasons many fans sign up and in this day and age it should be easy to provide.

Furthermore we also appreciate fans are investing time to listen, with some even getting up in the middle of the night, depending on time zones.

The simple fact is that the service should just work.

Paul Barber's email outlines the contractual situation, but in terms of the technical side of things we rely on BBC Sussex to dial into Perform's servers via an ISDN line.

The guys at the BBC studio are reliable, but there is no way of them monitoring the stream, short of sitting listening to the feed (which isn't their responsibility).

Two weeks ago we also tested the system over an entire day, streaming direct from BBC Sussex and the stream worked perfectly. Perform accepted this.

The stream worked well for the last three matches, and it seemed as if things were going well.

Pre match we checked the stream from Middlesbrough and it was running fine. Then in the first half we discovered the stream was dropping out intermittently.

Calls were made to Perform to rectify the situation - but once again there were no answers from the tech team as to the quality of the stream. They still cannot identify why the stream drops!!!

One option at this stage was to redial in (possible to another ISDN number at Perform) but we were reluctant to ask the BBC to do this, as when we did at Wigan we lost it completely for a prolonged period.

Alas, the feed dropped completely anyway. We then called the BBC and asked them to dial in again, and despite several attempts - nothing.

Eventually - after three irate calls to Perform - we were given a new number to dial, and the audio came back for the final four minutes. There were still a couple of intermittent drops in coverage, and still Perform cannot tell us whether this is an issue on the feed coming in, or whether it's an issue on the Player feed.

Moving forward we intend to provide a back-up stream, which we will provide a link to if, and when, the Player stream is not reliable or down - but the point is we should not have to do this, the service Perform are employed by FLi to provide should work

I hear what you say and know its not personally your fault, but its been pants for years even when I lived in Wales the blasted thing used to give up the ghost this while the Albion was playing at Withdean, this fault whatever it is has been there lurking for a long while

 

[clapham_gull]

I hear what you say and know its not personally your fault, but its been pants for years even when I lived in Wales the blasted thing used to give up the ghost this while the Albion was playing at Withdean, this fault whatever it is has been there lurking for a long while

Exactly, there have been issues for years.

What I find remarkable is the lack of an official communication from Perform or the league regarding the service.

Will there be an apology on their website or an email to all subscribers ? How about something from the league for a change... Or is it nothing to do with them either.

So frustrated a while back I set up another account, after constantly being locked out the primary one.

After cancelling that I get bombarded with spam from the club asking me to resubscribe.

No more. I'm finished with it. I'll just wait for this legendary contract we are constantly reminded of to expire.

 

[TSB]

Do you know which other clubs have their own service?

Boro, for one. Leeds another.

 

[clapham_gull]

Well I tried to cancel, they now claim not to be able to find my account.

Complete joke

 

[KZNSeagull]

I sent a follow up email linking to this thread and asking if I would be informed of the result of the investigation. Received this reply:

Please accept our apologies for the issues you faced with the commentary today.

The issue has been investigated by the relevant team and are working round the clock to implement a comprehensive fix to ensure we do not have these issues again with coming round and to avoid such issues in the future.

Best regards
Guru
Customer Services

----------

I think that means no, we will not tell you!

 

[Muzzy]

I sent a follow up email linking to this thread and asking if I would be informed of the result of the investigation. Received this reply:

Please accept our apologies for the issues you faced with the commentary today.

The issue has been investigated by the relevant team and are working round the clock to implement a comprehensive fix to ensure we do not have these issues again with coming round and to avoid such issues in the future.

Best regards
Guru
Customer Services

----------

I think that means no, we will not tell you!

At least you received a response, I've heard nothing!
The irony of the name Perform alone should give reason to least raise a grin.

 

[KZNSeagull]

At least you received a response, I've heard nothing!
The irony of the name Perform alone should give reason to least raise a grin.

Yes indeed. Or they are using the England Cricket teams example of the word.