[Albion] new away fan ID/ticketing system

[Neville's Breakfast]

Those seats are truly awful. Last visit we were in the back row. Alright I thought as we sat down - you could see a bit. But when the whole away end stands up and you have to as well all game you can't see anything. Hardly worth the trip.

We live 6 miles away so at least don’t have that concern.

 

[jackalbion]

The exchange system could just record transfer of the 'ownership' and then new owner gets the ticket reprinted on they day, assuming its last minute . It all depends on the scale of the transfers I guess , if its because of changes in plans due to unseen circumstances i would hope it is less than 5% so 150 at most for games where we take 3000. This would help genuine fans as much as stop the problem. I guess etickets will come soon ...

I do find it odd that away tickets haven't been moved to e-tickets, I prefer the physical tickets, but I'm surprised no club has decided to move them online. Some clubs I've visited with Torquay do but most don't.

 

[Chinman3000]

I read it that some will be held at the away ground and only those will be checked. Therefore if you receive yours in the post then you know you wont be checked.

 

[Giraffe]

This whole thing is a massive sledgehammer to crack a nut. I'm not sure the issue is that big firstly. But if it is this seems an odd answer to it.

Getting tickets sent for collection is going to be a problem. My experience of doing just that (when post has failed etc) has been that the home club really don't want to bother. You have to find the right collection point, then invariably end up in a massive queue. On one occasion they didn't have my details and it took an hour to sort. This is going to leave a lot of the most loyal fans pretty disgruntled.

Also, we all know that on occasion one of the group can't go on the day. We have to buy the tickets so ridiculously far in advance (two months sometimes), that lots can change. At the moment passing that ticket on is a breeze. What happens now? Do you risk? Probably not, so that ticket goes to waste. Do the club really want less away fans there?

 

[nwgull]

I would be pretty sure it's the logistics involved with physical tickets.

Typically host clubs provide the stock of branded, printed and numbered tickets which our club then distribute.

To facilitate an exchange of a physical ticket would involve the return of it to the club and then the sale and re-distribution. With the erratic postal service involved twice, there could be lengthy delays involved, and there's no guarantee the "seller" will get the ticket back to the club in time for a sale and re-distribution.

In short, I can't see it as a viable proposition until such time as universal e-ticketing comes into play, if it ever does.

I think this is possible as tickets wouldn't need to be returned. For example, my Leeds away ticket hadn't arrived by the Friday before our game last season so I phoned the ticket office to sort a replacement to be picked up at Elland Road on match day (no queues or any issues, although I did arrive about 30-40mins before KO). I asked what would happen if the ticket arrived in the Saturday post and was told that it had been cancelled so wouldn't work on the turnstiles and I'd still have to collect the replacement.

 

[Titanic]

This whole thing is a massive sledgehammer to crack a nut. I'm not sure the issue is that big firstly. But if it is this seems an odd answer to it.

Getting tickets sent for collection is going to be a problem. My experience of doing just that (when post has failed etc) has been that the home club really don't want to bother. You have to find the right collection point, then invariably end up in a massive queue. On one occasion they didn't have my details and it took an hour to sort. This is going to leave a lot of the most loyal fans pretty disgruntled.

Also, we all know that on occasion one of the group can't go on the day. We have to buy the tickets so ridiculously far in advance (two months sometimes), that lots can change. At the moment passing that ticket on is a breeze. What happens now? Do you risk? Probably not, so that ticket goes to waste. Do the club really want less away fans there?

Many businesses wouldn't be able to treat their customers with such disdain... fortunately they have a product in very high demand.

 

[dazzer6666]

This whole thing is a massive sledgehammer to crack a nut. I'm not sure the issue is that big firstly. But if it is this seems an odd answer to it.

Getting tickets sent for collection is going to be a problem. My experience of doing just that (when post has failed etc) has been that the home club really don't want to bother. You have to find the right collection point, then invariably end up in a massive queue. On one occasion they didn't have my details and it took an hour to sort. This is going to leave a lot of the most loyal fans pretty disgruntled.

Also, we all know that on occasion one of the group can't go on the day. We have to buy the tickets so ridiculously far in advance (two months sometimes), that lots can change. At the moment passing that ticket on is a breeze. What happens now? Do you risk? Probably not, so that ticket goes to waste. Do the club really want less away fans there?

Yup. Will be interesting to see if we take our own admin staff to away games to deal with this, because I can't imagine the home clubs will give much of a **** unless they've all introduced a similar scheme. Also, if you book for your group, will all tickets on that booking held for collection and will each ticket holder need to collect their own, or will just the person making the booking pick them all up ?? Again, can't see the home club being arsed to go through the ID checks for a group. Collection at away grounds has been OK to date, but interesting to see how the increased numbers affect that.

 

[fosters headband]

There are some very ill informed views on 1901 members on here.

1901 members don't get first dibs on away tickets. They are in the exact same loyalty scheme as everyone else. I am a 1901 member and I fall into the All season ticket holders category for most away games. If it sells out before that I don't get any special privileges.

1901 members don't have to pay for a 5 year season ticket in advance. They can pay monthly by direct debit like everyone else. I think there is a slight difference as the DD is spread over 12 months rather than 10 for all other season tickets (that may have changed). They do have to commit to a 5 year term though.

Some 1901 memberships are allocated to companies and not individuals. But as I mentioned above those accounts need to build up loyalty points like every other account.

Away tickets aren't free for 1901 members.

So am I reading this wrong and the harsh punishment stated below, that a STH passing a ticket on to another STH will be given, also applies to 1901 members also??

Any supporter found to be passing on away tickets will be subject to a ten-home match ban, during that time the excluded supporter will not be able to purchase away tickets and a 50-point loyalty point deduction will be made.

 

[Giraffe]

So am I reading this wrong and the harsh punishment stated below, that a STH passing a ticket on to another STH will be given, also applies to 1901 members also??

Any supporter found to be passing on away tickets will be subject to a ten-home match ban, during that time the excluded supporter will not be able to purchase away tickets and a 50-point loyalty point deduction will be made.

1901 can pass on their tickets to anyone, but if they act like an arse (and probably need to be arrested) the club may take action. Not the same as STH's.

 

[Beanstalk]

There have been a number of arrests and ejections of supporters whose details do not match the ticket owner’s details.

And there in probably lies the truth and reason for an overly draconian and potentially impractical solution. Sadly we have a few idiots who despite knowing they are attending on someone else's ticket could not behave.

I saw someone getting ejected at Fulham. Everyone was fairly calm and it didn't escalate into anger but it was clear that the bloke who did get ejected had a ticket that obviously wasn't his. Whilst some of the punishments and the free pass for the 1901 fat cats are too much it's clearly been an issue over quite a while that makes a mockery of the loyalty points system.

 

[Uh_huh_him]

Is this really such a big problem. How many of away tickets do people think are purchased to pass on 10/20 or is it 100s

there seems to be a fair few being touted/requested on twitter.
As the club have stated - quite a few of these fans are not behaving well (maybe because they think they aren't traceable).

Either there are a lot being exchanged and a percentage are behaving badly, or there are few and they all are behaving badly.
Either way, the club can't just ignore it.

 

[fosters headband]

1901 can pass on their tickets to anyone, but if they act like an arse (and probably need to be arrested) the club may take action. Not the same as STH's.

That’s disgraceful a ten game ban for passing on a ticket from one STH to another STH

 

[Hotchilidog]

What's the lowest STH points a 1901 can have? Are some of them not in the 1st band?

I have friends in 1901 who were not in the top tier for forest green so not sure the first dibs thing is true. They like myself got tickets in the second group

 

[Bozza]

there seems to be a fair few being touted/requested on twitter.
As the club have stated - quite a few of these fans are not behaving well (maybe because they think they aren't traceable).

Either there are a lot being exchanged and a percentage are behaving badly, or there are few and they all are behaving badly.
Either way, the club can't just ignore it.

But the announcement doesn't address that at all, does it? If you have a ticket in hand, you can pass it on to someone else, and there are no subsequent checks on the person who presents the ticket at the turnstile.

What the announcement and process change seeks to address is the situation where someone intentionally buys a ticket for someone else at the outset, as they may be randomly selected for collect-at-ground-with-ID.

 

[CheeseRolls]

But the announcement doesn't address that at all, does it? If you have a ticket in hand, you can pass it on to someone else, and there are no subsequent checks on the person who presents the ticket at the turnstile.

What the announcement and process change seeks to address is the situation where someone intentionally buys a ticket for someone else at the outset, as they may be randomly selected for collect-at-ground-with-ID.

Not if they are well behaved. If they are thrown out and found to have a ticket that is not in their name, then this will catch up with the purchaser, surely?

 

[Beanstalk]

I do find it odd that away tickets haven't been moved to e-tickets, I prefer the physical tickets, but I'm surprised no club has decided to move them online. Some clubs I've visited with Torquay do but most don't.

I guess it is about the difficulty in aligning ticket offices. Currently, the away side sells away tickets to their fans and for e-tickets to work the home ticket office would have to administer all sales to away fans as the users of. I imagine that this is complicated by use of personal data and contractual obligations (between ticket offices and NFC ticketing software providers).

It should in theory all be moved to e-tickets and that would solve a lot of issues, but it would require lots of separate business working together for no real monetary benefit, especially when the workaround is to print 3,000 tickets and send them to the away club to sort out.

 

[dazzer6666]

But the announcement doesn't address that at all, does it? If you have a ticket in hand, you can pass it on to someone else, and there are no subsequent checks on the person who presents the ticket at the turnstile.

What the announcement and process change seeks to address is the situation where someone intentionally buys a ticket for someone else at the outset, as they may be randomly selected for collect-at-ground-with-ID.

Indeed….they can’t differentiate how a ticket came to be passed over. Maybe another example where a blind eye will be turned to the handing over of tickets in ‘legitimate’ circumstances (even if the handover remains unauthorised). Stopping the deliberately wrong purchases probably solves most of the issue (providing there are a high enough number of checks to make the chance of getting caught real).

 

[jackalbion]

But the announcement doesn't address that at all, does it? If you have a ticket in hand, you can pass it on to someone else, and there are no subsequent checks on the person who presents the ticket at the turnstile.

What the announcement and process change seeks to address is the situation where someone intentionally buys a ticket for someone else at the outset, as they may be randomly selected for collect-at-ground-with-ID.

I'm more irked at the random selection, people do abuse the system, where people just buy for every away game with someone else's ticket, that is wrong. I think they will find that a lot of these tickets that are being passed on though have little to do with Season Ticket holders and more to do with corporate / freebies. I think the run of fixtures have not helped the problem, Fulham, Bournemouth, Brentford in a row meant that tickets have been hard to come by. There was someone on twitter who was begging for a ticket to every game and I told him, that if he wants a ticket to these games he needs to go to City Away etc. I think the points system works very well, and is much better than systems other clubs use which are incredibly open to abuse. However it does feel like the club sometimes goes over the top with some issues to prove a point, and it can feel like they are restricting the regular away fans sometimes, and that they can often come across as catering to other fans, that is only my opinion though and it is a fine balance (which is why the fact that the FAB had different categories was good). Ultimately I think they have a list of people who they are targeting and this is a threat to them to stop doing it, and that the majority of fans who buy tickets legitimately will be unaffected.

However I do think some are far too quick to criticise the club on ticketing decisions. The Spurs issue last season was a communication cock up, and that was something I think they've done well to address this time with Arsenal. As well many people moaned about small allocations for Wolves and Leeds but ultimately those tickets went down to Purchase History before selling out, then when people decided they wanted to go to Leeds as we beat Wolves 3-0 and Man United 4-0, tickets suddenly came hard to come by. If they were so bothered why didn't they buy a ticket in the first place.

 

[jackalbion]

I guess it is about the difficulty in aligning ticket offices. Currently, the away side sells away tickets to their fans and for e-tickets to work the home ticket office would have to administer all sales to away fans as the users of. I imagine that this is complicated by use of personal data and contractual obligations (between ticket offices and NFC ticketing software providers).

It should in theory all be moved to e-tickets and that would solve a lot of issues, but it would require lots of separate business working together for no real monetary benefit, especially when the workaround is to print 3,000 tickets and send them to the away club to sort out.

Yes it is a bit complicated, but I am surprised the Premier League do not have a centralised database. The Torquay tickets in which I had e-tickets in the away end were bought through the Torquay website, but were PDF Wrexham tickets, so there must be a way to do it.

 

[drew]

I think we should use the loyalty point system, that currently works. I don't think it should be first come first served, I'd happily enter a contract for 5 years, 10 years, 20 years for my season ticket, but I don't have the option as I can't afford the prices they charge per season in the 1901 club, it is something only achievable by money. I don't think its right that a 1901 can skip the queue with his ticket to get away tickets. The most 'loyal' fans are the ones who do every single away game, while I'm sure there are many in the 1901 club that do, the fact that some people can just jump on the bandwagon and use the guest tickets does not show loyalty. If season tickets are allocated 1 seat per away ticket then so should 1901 tickets. Not the option of 4 guests, when we were in the championship and you could essentially bring guests, as tickets went to general sale or were POTG I introduced people to away games who are now regular travellers, but instead of giving the option to bring guests to season ticket holders, they will give it to corporate 1901 members who will take someone out for a jolly on an occasion to Liverpool or Manchester United. I met a Liverpool fan in the away end last year who works for the company who has corporate 1901 tickets so despite never going to a Brighton away game jumped the queue in front of everyone else. I sympathise with those who can't get tickets due to the system like Neville's breakfast, but this problem also massively stems from 1901 coporate members racking up the points on their 1901 guest tickets. I know of people who don't even have season tickets, but go to every away game due to the fact they have mutuals who have 1901 tickets. But I believe this whole loyalty branding of it is nonsense, people who can't afford a season ticket for various reasons are just as loyal as someone who travels away every game, they just can't afford to be as loyal.

Tend to agree with most of that. The simple solution for the club to show fairness is that loyalty points accrue for the individual and not the ticket. If someone has corporate tickets then they should have to register with the club who is using them and that individual will need the relevant loyalty points to join the queue. That would mean individuals that have 1901 and go to games will get points as they always have. There may well be some corporate tickets that are used by the same person and they too will get points but it will stop people like your liverpool example freeloading.