Season Ticket Replacement

[wellquickwoody]

Went up to stadium yesterday to get my season ticket replaced because the little electronic chip had broken some how, so I went to to assuming the replacement would be free of very little money got up there they accused me of breaking it and charged me £25 and they said sorry its not us that sets the rules it's Paul Barber this is a digrace I've been a season ticket holder for 5 years and considering I'm only 17 I can hardly afford it any barber is a joke get him out now!

Which chip is that then? Cos on my ST the chip is INSIDE the card, and not visible in any way. So how would you know it was broken?

 

[Seagull73]

Which chip is that then? Cos on my ST the chip is INSIDE the card, and not visible in any way. So how would you know it was broken?

Yeah I have to say that's what I was thinking

 

[DumLum]

Agreed. I treat mine as if it were a gold bar.

You've been melting it down to make Jewelery with?

 

[Notters]

Which chip is that then? Cos on my ST the chip is INSIDE the card, and not visible in any way. So how would you know it was broken?

Er, when it stops working, i.e. the turnstile can't detect it, presumably.

 

[blockhseagull]

So how long do the club expect you to keep your smart card in useable condition.

I'm reasonably careful with mine but they must need to replace every 2-3 seasons won't they ?

 

[34064 Fighter Command]

If you take your ticket/card back to the ticket office, show it is in good clean condition, but no longer works, there surely there is no way they can charge you for a new one. Of course, if your card has been bent, split, cracked or otherwise damaged in some way, then it's hardly a suprise that they are going to charge you the full cost of a replacement is it?

So which was it?

But the chip can also get damaged by other events ( assuming it has an EPROM memory on it - Erasable / Programmable Read-Only Memory ). You can wipe the data from the EPROM just by placing the chip in a high magnetic or Radio Frequency electric field.

Copied from Wikipedia:

A second card type is the contactless smart card, in which the card communicates with and is powered by the reader through RF induction technology (at data rates of 106–848 kbit/s). These cards require only proximity to an antenna to communicate. Like smart cards with contacts, contactless cards do not have an internal power source. Instead, they use an inductor to capture some of the incident radio-frequency interrogation signal, rectify it, and use it to power the card's electronics.

APDU transmission via a contactless interface is defined in ISO/IEC 14443-4.

I also have a contactless smart card for acces to work. With both Work and Albion smartcards in the same wallet at the same time, the access reader gets very confused and doesn't work at all.

 

[34064 Fighter Command]

Which chip is that then? Cos on my ST the chip is INSIDE the card, and not visible in any way. So how would you know it was broken?

Only if he had attempted to use it on Saturday and it wouldn't let him in.

Suggests to me that this card may have ALREADY been deactivated prior to use ??

 

[Superphil]

But the chip can also get damaged by other events ( assuming it has an EPROM memory on it - Erasable / Programmable Read-Only Memory ). You can wipe the data from the EPROM just by placing the chip in a high magnetic or Radio Frequency electric field.

I appreciate that, but as others have said, they've taken theirs in (seemingly undamaged on the surface) and had them replaced, no fuss, and at no charge. In addition, others have had discretion shown, resulting in no charge, the ticket office staff are so helpful if you call in and see them with your problem. How many (real) people, with genuine reasons for a damaged/lost card have actually been charged for a replacement? If your card has been squashed, cracked, bent or otherwise visibly damaged, and there is no reasonable explanation or extenuating circumstances, then why shouldn't the club charge for the replacement?

I think it's been established the OP on this thread is on a wind up, does anyone else, with credibility, have a horror story where the club demanded £25 from them even though the card had simply failed?

 

[gazingdown]

I suggest the OP puts up a couple of pics of the smartcard (both sides). If it looks physically undamaged, I can understand his grievances. If it looks tatty/scratched/etc. then I suspect the club are taking the approach that it has not been looked after. Either that or he went in and "aggressively/rudely" asked for a replacement card.

 

[Eddiespearritt]

This has got to be a wind up thread. Or is it written deliberately in incomprehensible "17 year-old lack of punctuation" style ? I wouldn't go to the stadium for a replacement card until I at least knew it was the correct thing to do - and I doubt very much that the person said as an opening explanation, "It's Barber's fault".

 

[Cappers]

I moved seats and got a free replacement one

 

[seagullsovergrimsby]

Static can also cause the cards to malfunction , a dusty wallet and friction can cause havoc to your cards.

 

[Albion4Ev3R]

It does look damaged at all, I've sent it to the club with a long letter to the complaints department as the club suggested

 

[Albion4Ev3R]

In the interest of balance ...

My season ticket stopped working last November, it wouldn't let me through the turnstiles and I had to be 'manually' let in by one of the stewards. They informed me that the chip had stopped working and that I should go to the ticket office for a replacement. I did just that, prior to the Millwall game I went into the ticket office told them what had happend and was promptly issued with a new card.

At no stage was I charged any fee of any sort. In fact there was no mention of a fee.

I guess this might suggest a couple of things; Charging for a replacment card (when your existing card has stopped functioning) is a new policy since the 18th December or there has been some sort of misunderstanding in getting your new card. Either way I think you need to challenge the Ticket office especially if it isn't your fault that the card stopped working ...

I'll tell them that next time I go up thanks

 

[Everest]

I moved seats and got a free replacement one

Of course you would, they have the seat details printed on them.

 

[TWOCHOICEStom]

It does look damaged at all, I've sent it to the club with a long letter to the complaints department as the club suggested

I take it you mean it DOESN'T look damaged? In that case, why the hell did you pay? If you've gone into the club shop and said, "My card has stopped working" and they've said "Sorry lad. The chip is broken" I just can't believe they'd try to charge you £25 and if they did, I wouldn't have left until I'd got a new one for free.

You do understand why people think you're bullshitting don't you.

 

[Brownstuff]

This has got to be a wind up thread. Or is it written deliberately in incomprehensible "17 year-old lack of punctuation" style ? I wouldn't go to the stadium for a replacement card until I at least knew it was the correct thing to do - and I doubt very much that the person said as an opening explanation, "It's Barber's fault".

I have had a few issues with the club this season and the staff member did use the 'as a result of Barber explanation' basically meaning financial tightening

 

[34064 Fighter Command]

Which chip is that then? Cos on my ST the chip is INSIDE the card, and not visible in any way. So how would you know it was broken?

It is possible for the electrical contact between the chip and antennae to become physically broken, as they are printed on different layers of the card, but you would have to physically bend the card quite hard. I suspect that if the card has been otherwise working ok up to now then the owner has corrupted the Digital Signature or Certificate stored on the chip, this would not necessarily affect entry to the stadium but could just mean that e-cash could not be loaded onto the card. The access to the Stadium uses data that is not erasable when the card is held near a reader, but topping up and spending e-cash requires data on the card to be written as well as read by the card readers. That's why you have to hold your card over a reader for some period of time to activate your e-cash, it's held on the card, not on some central database ( can you imagine the complexity of cabling and network delays if every card reader in the stadium had to communicate with a central server ).

For example, he may have gone for an X-ray at the hospital or dentist and had his Smartcard with him in his wallet.