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The Great British Speedway Swindle


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I refer to the booking fee swindle, we've all experienced it with Ryanair and/or Ticketmaster and it now seems that some British Speedway clubs have come to the party.

I have booked tickets at a few venues so far this season and again there seems to be no uniformity.

Scunthorpe: £17 at the door £17.51 with online booking fee

Belle Vue: £20 at the door £20 no online booking fee

Peterborough: £20 at the door £20 no online booking fee

Leicester: Before new booking system £17 at the door £17.50 with online booking fee

Leicester: After new booking system: £17 at the door £18 with online booking fee, tickets being released a match at a time, meaning £1 extra for every match using the online booking system.

 

You pays your money and you takes your choice I suppose but Leicester's "choice" to release one fixture at a time does seem to be taking the p155 a little

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23 minutes ago, iainb said:

I refer to the booking fee swindle, we've all experienced it with Ryanair and/or Ticketmaster and it now seems that some British Speedway clubs have come to the party.

I have booked tickets at a few venues so far this season and again there seems to be no uniformity.

Scunthorpe: £17 at the door £17.51 with online booking fee

Belle Vue: £20 at the door £20 no online booking fee

Peterborough: £20 at the door £20 no online booking fee

Leicester: Before new booking system £17 at the door £17.50 with online booking fee

Leicester: After new booking system: £17 at the door £18 with online booking fee, tickets being released a match at a time, meaning £1 extra for every match using the online booking system.

 

You pays your money and you takes your choice I suppose but Leicester's "choice" to release one fixture at a time does seem to be taking the p155 a little

Look at it from the promotors view - they will say they keeping entry prices as low as possible, then up pops COVID.  They introduce on line booking because inevitably payment as you turn up most people will want to pay cash, but with COVID that dirty money. Taking a booking on line costs admin time, admin has to be paid for hence 50p. Let’s say wage of admin is £8 per hour, that means sixteen 50p’s per hour which equates to 3min 45secs per telephone booking.  I think that seems about fair, it’s not the promotors fault, and it’s not the fans fault COVID precautions are in place, but still has to be paid for.

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1 hour ago, Gambo said:

The Booking fee doesn't go to the promoters though, does it? 

And it shouldn't be necessary to book on-line after June 21st anyway? (Hopefully)

But someone gets paid to do the job of handling bookings. And I was being very conservative when I said wages cost was 8 per hour. That was only wages paid, whoever employs that person will have business overheads, National Insurance, holiday pay, sick pay, employee liability insurance, heating, lighting, all add up to a major expense which has to be paid by someone..

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8 minutes ago, OveFundinFan said:

But someone gets paid to do the job of handling bookings. And I was being very conservative when I said wages cost was 8 per hour. That was only wages paid, whoever employs that person will have business overheads, National Insurance, holiday pay, sick pay, employee liability insurance, heating, lighting, all add up to a major expense which has to be paid by someone..

An online booking system should all be done automatically, and would run with minimal user intervention once setup with the fixtures, which I suggest wouldn't take more than 1 hour.

I just find it strange that some clubs should be encouraging the use of the booking system yet choose to add the surcharge to that instead of the pay at the door punters that actually are using up the time of actual people (probably unpaid volunteers)

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1 hour ago, Gambo said:

The Booking fee doesn't go to the promoters though, does it? 

And it shouldn't be necessary to book on-line after June 21st anyway? (Hopefully)

I would assume that the booking fee goes to the system operator as I would think that this has been subbed out as a number of clubs are using the same system.

Some have chosen to show the booking fee some haven't

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38 minutes ago, iainb said:

An online booking system should all be done automatically, and would run with minimal user intervention once setup with the fixtures, which I suggest wouldn't take more than 1 hour.

We are talking about. British club level Speedway here… does that sit well with 21st century technology.

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4 minutes ago, OveFundinFan said:

We are talking about. British club level Speedway here… does that sit well with 21st century technology.

Haha... I know what you mean.

I'm guessing that the system being used has been bought in or is being used on a subscription type model which is where I'm assuming the booking fee comes in, to pay for it.

All I know is that I used the Peterborough system to buy a ticket for almost every match this season and the booking fee said £0

I wanted to do the same with the Leicester system (same system) and they add £1 per ticket and I can only book a ticket for the next upcoming match.

I don't know if you can pay at the door at Peterborough but on their website it says the price of a ticket is £20.

So either Peterborough are getting their system for free, bearing the cost themselves or not being up front about the booking fee.

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1 hour ago, 2ndbendbeerhut said:

So maybe (cough cough ) some clubs are adding the booking fee on to the price of the ticket :blink: ;)

I don't really care which it is tbh, but it would be nice to know if you are paying a booking fee compared to those that turn up and pay on the day

Edited by iainb
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The Wolves one is a bit strange, I've had 2 different types of tickets so paid extra 30p on each ticket to get a text message to save printing it off. However the email I got has  bar codes on so am I paying the 30p needlessly. No idea. Not stressing over it. Lol

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Surely it should be cheaper to buy a ticket ahead? Your basically committing yourself to going which for a sport that can be easily affected by the weather and last minute line up changes is quite a big thing.

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6 minutes ago, marko said:

Surely it should be cheaper to buy a ticket ahead? Your basically committing yourself to going which for a sport that can be easily affected by the weather and last minute line up changes is quite a big thing.

You mean like a season ticket?

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Actually, looking on the Leicester website, entry is by online ticket purchase only, so there's no choice the stated £17 is actually £18. I bought my rained off Leicester vs Edinbugh ticket using the old booking system so actually saved myself 50p... 1p cheaper than Scunny lol

Edited by iainb
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Various kinds of speedway "swindles" are always being added to the British domesic racing scene. One swindle is that now we are at the £1:50 p per race ( almost certainly when inc parking and the raceday magazine ). And that is without any of the "special" food and drink deals. I am amazed to see that early season / first night crowds have returned with a decent bang, so it's a matter of will they keep up to that level which appears to be the previous real average gare in many cases.

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17 hours ago, iainb said:

Actually, looking on the Leicester website, entry is by online ticket purchase only, so there's no choice the stated £17 is actually £18. I bought my rained off Leicester vs Edinbugh ticket using the old booking system so actually saved myself 50p... 1p cheaper than Scunny lol

I have booked my ticket for the Scunny match at Leicester and have not been charged admin!!

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1 hour ago, Skodaman said:

I have booked my ticket for the Scunny match at Leicester and have not been charged admin!!

I've also booked mine, it said £18 £0 booking fee... Where on the website it says admission is £17, don't know about you?

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It is on your own website :icon_smile_clown:if you look with your eyes open as it clearly states in Ticket Office, 2021 Admission Prices, Adult £17. Please be aware there is an additional £1 online booking fee added to the admission price. :oops: 

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