Clueless in Cardiff... (ticketmaster.co.uk)

Member Name: nikkisly

Product:	ticketmaster.co.uk
Date:	12/01/02 (1043 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Ease of use

Disadvantages: Lack of product knowledge

It's a long way from Cornwall to Cardiff. I know this because that was Mr nikkisly's excuse when I wanted to attend the inaugural British Speedway Grand Prix at the new Millennium Stadium last year. Oh, he eventually relented, after a lot of...well, let's say gentle persuasion. But by that time, the tickets had completely sold out.

So, this year, I started the gentle persuasion in plenty of time for the event in June 2002. To be more precise, I started in 2001, on the very day that the tickets were released for sale. It was therefore with his (grudging) blessing that I arrived at Ticketmaster.co.uk., credit card in hand.

The site itself is quite plain, mainly black, white and grey with just a few splashes of colour. (It is also oversized for my small screen and navigation therefore involves a lot of sideways scrolling.) Across the top is a list of headings: Music, Theatre, Sport, Attractions and Performing Arts. I briefly considered clicking on Sports, but then decided that it would probably be a lot simpler and quicker to run a search for the specific event, rather than risk having to wade through loads of Rugby matches (metaphorically speaking, of course.)

The search offers a choice of event or venue. I ran a search for British Speedway Grand Prix and up it popped almost immediately, showing event, location, date/time and, most importantly a little green "On Sale Now" button. I clicked...and ground to an immediate halt.

The tickets were listed in descending order, starting with the highest priced seats. With each price was a location within the stadium. Except I have never actually been to this stadium and I certainly don't know my West Stand from my Hyder Stand or my BT Stand from my Gate 2. All I knew was that I wanted to sit somewhere between the third and fourth bend of the speedway track. The site offered information about the venue and this was my next port of call. However this consisted mainly
of directions to the stadium, some scanty notes about disabled access and a list of things such as flares and photographic equipment that I would not be permitted to take in with me.

The site has a "Help" and a "Contact Us" facility. "Help" dealt more with site navigation queries, so I braced myself and rang the telephone number given under contacts. I spoke to a person who knew absolutely nothing about the event, venue, or tickets and had probably never heard of the term customer service.

Was there anyone I could speak to who would be able to help? "Dunno." Was there a manager I could speak to? "He's out of the office" When will he be back? "Dunno". After several fruitless minutes of "Dunno-ing", I left my telephone number and was promised that I would be called back immediately the manager returned. (Hopefully, he has now been registered with The Missing Persons Helpline and I sincerely hope that his family managed to have a good Christmas without him.)

After five days, I rang the helpline number again and spoke to someone else who knew nothing about the event, venue or tickets, but was at least prepared to try his damnedest to be helpful. I explained what I wanted and he managed (eventually) to find a site plan that told us everything - except where the third and fourth bend of the specially laid speedway track was likely to be on the night (presumably in the exact same place it was last year). The very nice man suggested that I check the internet for some clues. Fine, although I had already done that and not managed to find the answer and, besides which, I expected a firm selling tickets to have some idea of what they were selling me. Eventually I took a gamble and asked for two cheap seats in the stand I thought was most likely to be approximately where I wanted to sit.

"Sold Out!" I was told.

I took a deep breath, ignored Mr nikkis
ly's somewhat panic-stricken throat cutting gestures, and booked two seats at £49 each. Then came problem number two. I wanted aisle or gangway seats and my telephone friend didn't know which seats were located on an aisle or gangway. I gambled again and opted for seats numbered 1 and 2, but I still don't know exactly where I will be sitting or even how much of the event I will be able to see. For £98, plus a handling charge of almost £5, this is frankly just not good enough. (It is especially poor considering the fact that we will be travelling a long way to the event, spending a lot of money on petrol and also on accommodation.)

My tickets were promised for the beginning of December. They eventually arrived at the beginning of January, but at least I've finally got them.

The navigation, layout and speed of this site are excellent. The site security seems excellent. Unfortunately, their product knowledge and customer service in this case let them down very badly. What is the point of having an internet ticket booking service in the first place if it takes endless telephone calls to actually get your tickets? And there is a postscript...

I happened to mention to a friend over Christmas that we were intending to go to Cardiff and he immediately asked where I had got my tickets, since he too had tried to go last year only to find the event fully booked. Some days later, he rang to say that he had purchased his tickets - the "cheap" seats that I had tried to buy three months earlier which had allegedly "sold out". Assuming he must have picked up a couple of returned tickets I asked him to check to see whether cheaper seats were still readily available. They were.

Having used only one aspect of their services, I will give this company the benefit of the doubt and award them a generous 3* rating for the ease of use of the site. Yet, however slick and fast the site may be, it's efficiency is ir
relevant if you can't actually use it as it is intended and are unable to get the information you need in order to make an informed purchasing decision. I tried to book tickets on the very first day that they came on sale, so suppose that could possibly be a reason why their staff knew so little (note the use of the word "reason" rather than "excuse"!) Yet, having said that, my friend who booked three months later had exactly the same problems. He had at least attended a Rugby match at the stadium so had a slightly better idea of the layout although, like me, he found it difficult to guess where the speedway track would be in relation to the various seats. I will be updating this opinion after the first week in June...watch this space.

Summary: