Did the idea of buying tickets on the day ever come off?

[Dave the OAP]

But if they haven't got a voucher how can they get on the bus? And if they're going to allow away fans on without vouchers surely that's unfair on home fans who turn up at the P&R sites without vouchers?

i wasn't disagreeing with you...I didnt realise that it was an issue.

BTW Storer69 will argue black is white if it involves the albion. Seemly everything is rosy in his little world..I have given up with him.

 

[Brovion]

But they aren't though. I've gone to Leicester, Millwall and Coventry and paid on the day this season alone.

Or you can go locally to Lewes or Crawley.

 

[les dynam]

I live about an hour away so I could quite easily be sitting in my local tomorrow lunch time at 2 and think you know what I fancy going to football after all, jump in my wagon and still make kick off.

I wonder if you will still think my "repetitive ramblings" are still that in a couple of years if we've got a half full stadium with an even shiter atmosphere than currently?



Quite agree, we should have done it at Withdean.



For once we agree on something. People know (or they soon will do) there is no where to park so regardless of whether they drive or not surely it's a null and void point? As you say I could be a season ticket holder and not have the travel vouchers.

What would happen if the club did start selling tickets from the ground on a matchday?

Are you actually a BHA fan at all? Casual or otherwise. The atmosphere at the Amex has been great - we've had a few teething issues with the transport, catering and other things, but certainly not the atmosphere. I'm assuming as you seemingly can't be bothered to sort a ticket for yourself, you've never actually visited Falmer yet?

Still really struggling to understand how anybody can complain about a system whereby they can pick up the phone right now, buy a ticket, arrive at 2.45 tomorrow, collect their ticket, and be in their seat by kick off.

 

[Bozza]

Are you actually a BHA fan at all? Casual or otherwise. The atmosphere at the Amex has been great - we've had a few teething issues with the transport, catering and other things, but certainly not the atmosphere. I'm assuming as you seemingly can't be bothered to sort a ticket for yourself, you've never actually visited Falmer yet?

Still really struggling to understand how anybody can complain about a system whereby they can pick up the phone right now, buy a ticket, arrive at 2.45 tomorrow, collect their ticket, and be in their seat by kick off.

He'll answer for himself I imagine, but he is very much a fan and WSU season ticket holder. He made the trek to Coventry on NYE.

What you and others are failing to grasp, I think, is the difference between you, me, Arthur and most on NSC who are pretty staunch fans, and the far more casual 'every now and again' fans.

I'm with Arthur in that these casual fans will not attend if there is much effort or, in some cases, planning required. They will want to decide at 1pm on a Saturday lunchtime that they fancy some football and want to pop straight to the Amex, pay and enter.

At the moment this is not an option - every seat is sold (for league games), but the time may come when that is not the case. If/when that happens we need to make it as easy as possible to get bums on those seats. A half-empty stadium is a depressing sight, as those at Middlesborough or Coventry can testify.

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

. A half-empty stadium is a depressing sight, as those at Middlesborough or Coventry can testify.

Yes. Yes it is. And there you CAN pay on the gate, or like Millwall buy a ticket from the booth and then go in.

Two or three years down the line this could be the case once the honeymoon period has worn off and then we will also have the extra seats.

If we have a bad season or two (and it is possible) then we could be like Palace are at the moment - 12- 15k rattling round a stadium that holds nearly double that.

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

I thought I read earlier you could buy them at Queens Road up until 3pm on the day of a game, could be wrong though...stand by...

They said yesterday you could buy them up to 3pm at Queens Road and as Bozza said you could get the appx 2.30 from Brighton and just about make K.O

 

[Tricky Dicky]

I'm sorry but the days of waking up and deciding to go to a game are now finished. All that is required is a bit of forethought.

Why should it be ? That's how I grew up going to the Goldstone. I know it's not really relevent at the mo with so many STs sold, but with expansion, I would presume there will be more general tickets. For the more casual fan, the harder you make it to get tickets the more you'll put off - even if it isn't actually that difficult in practice, the perception is that it is harder.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

Yep agree. Sorry Edna but Im a little pissed off that I spent £30 on these vouchers (Im not arguing they are not a bargain because they are) and Im not begrudging the the club my £30 BUT lots of people are "fare dodging" and thats WRONG.

But that happens every day on every train ( and will continue to do so until ALL stations have barriers ). It doesn't make the ticket system a failure - it just means there's thieving bastards willing to travel for free.

 

[Mellor 3 Ward 4]

I think the issue is that if you can phone/go online and pick up a ticket at Queens Road right up to kick off time, why can't it be possible to collect at The Amex?

 

[Mellor 3 Ward 4]

Why should it be ? That's how I grew up going to the Goldstone. I know it's not really relevent at the mo with so many STs sold, but with expansion, I would presume there will be more general tickets. For the more casual fan, the harder you make it to get tickets the more you'll put off - even if it isn't actually that difficult in practice, the perception is that it is harder.

Very true.

Several people I know who normally play football on a Saturday are waiting to hear tomorrow morning if their games are still on.

If not, then they hope to go to the Albion.

Going into central Brighton to collect a ticket, before going to The Amex will probably put them off.

 

[Spiros]

I think the travel vouchers are great and will buy again next season. As I understand it, it's not the club that lose out if you don't buy them but the transport companies. I thought the club were effectively subsiding your travel costs by supplying them, In my case I usually use the voucher to 'pay' for part of the journey between West Worthing and Falmer, saving me £3.20 a time.The book has already paid for itself with half the season to go.

Those travelling for free - because they haven't bought vouchers or a ticket - are simply fare dodgers and deserve whatever fine comes their way IMHO.

Re buying on the day, I thought that was all going to be handled via smartcards? If someone hasn't been before, they need to pick up a smartcard rather than a paper ticket. If they have been before then they can order the game online and then just turn up at the ground using their updated smartcard to get in. That's what was talked about at the ST presentation I went to, but they did say it was 'point of arrival' and not necessarily for this season.

 

[Arthur]

Are you actually a BHA fan at all? Casual or otherwise. The atmosphere at the Amex has been great - we've had a few teething issues with the transport, catering and other things, but certainly not the atmosphere.

You clearly live in your own blue and white little bubble. Aside from the second half against Leeds, Burnley and Monday the atmosphere at Falmer has been pretty flat for every game. Even the game against Donny the atmosphere went pretty flat after the initial out pouring of emotion and when we went 1 down. Just look at the umpteen threads on here about creating an atmosphere at the AMEX. People have been printing out song sheets for goodness sake!

I'm assuming as you seemingly can't be bothered to sort a ticket for yourself, you've never actually visited Falmer yet?

You can assume what you like. You'd be wrong but carry on anyway.

Still really struggling to understand how anybody can complain about a system whereby they can pick up the phone right now, buy a ticket, arrive at 2.45 tomorrow, collect their ticket, and be in their seat by kick off.

Because before I decided whether to go or not I want to know a) how cold it is b) the team c) how much I've had to drink d) finally whether I can be f***ed or not before I decide whether I want to go to the game.

I'm not going to get frozen watching our stiffs against a team from the Vauxhall Conference when I could be sat in a nice warm pub. If that makes me a bad fan then so be it. I really couldn't give a flying f*** what you or anyone else thinks.

 

[ROSM]

I may be wrong but most police forces will strongly request that any game with an expected crowd in excess of 80% of capacity to be made all ticket (i.e. no pay on the gate).

That means nothing to us this year but next with 30k seats in, basically any crowd expected of less that 24 k (and we've had quite a few this season that even with the buss of the new stadium we wouldnt have likely sold 24k tickets) could theoretically be pay at the ground. How will the club choose to handle that?

I dont agree - or really want - a situation where pay on the day, at the ground, isnt an option despite us having significant numbers of tickets available.

 

[Dave the OAP]

which brings the discussion around full circle.

Does anyone know if they are discussing or looking to place booths at say Brighton Station ( or falmer station by the bridge for example) where the casual fan can turn up and purchase a ticket, as I thought that was something that was agreed last year?

 

[Brovion]

He'll answer for himself I imagine, but he is very much a fan and WSU season ticket holder. He made the trek to Coventry on NYE.

What you and others are failing to grasp, I think, is the difference between you, me, Arthur and most on NSC who are pretty staunch fans, and the far more casual 'every now and again' fans.

I'm with Arthur in that these casual fans will not attend if there is much effort or, in some cases, planning required. They will want to decide at 1pm on a Saturday lunchtime that they fancy some football and want to pop straight to the Amex, pay and enter.

At the moment this is not an option - every seat is sold (for league games), but the time may come when that is not the case. If/when that happens we need to make it as easy as possible to get bums on those seats. A half-empty stadium is a depressing sight, as those at Middlesborough or Coventry can testify.

That is it in a nutshell. On the spectrum of Brighton fans I'm far more towards the casual, fairweather, part-time, big-game-charlie end than I am towards the STH go-to-every-game end. I went out of my way to get tickets for Donny because I really wanted to be there, but for the other games if I've got a ticket then fine, if not then it's no big deal. I'm certainly not going to jump through any hoops to get a ticket for 99% of Brighton matches, and IF it gets to the stage where the matches aren't selling out then the system to sell tickets to casual fans had better be piss easy or 99% of the time we won't bother. And I mean piss easy by our standards, not someone like superphil's.

Anyway, this is all hypothetical at the moment, and no, I haven't made up my mind if I'm going to Wrexham yet. It'll depend on a number of things, I really should repair the gutter that blew down in the gale.

 

[Husty]

You can buy them at the Queens Road shop on the day of the game, can't you?

And online and collect @ the ground (or atleast you could @ THE Withdean.)

 

[GT49er]

I don't know about SELLING tickets (I've heard rumours that we aren't allowed to according to the planning permish) but isn't it time the club adopted the win-win option of operating as a season ticket exchange agency? STHs could have access to a secure website, and if they notified the club by say, 12 o'clock on match days that they weren't coming, then their space could be sold on the day - half for the club, half for the STH (or whatever proportion the club decided).

It would obviously be welcomed by the STHs - effectively they'd be getting cheaper season tickets, the club would get revenue where they aren't getting any now, and there wouldn't be so many empty seats. Booths could be set up SOMEWHERE - Falmer station, Brighton station, the car park, anywhere - and if the club don't want masses of cash sloshing around to be kept secure and banked, it could be plastic only - no problem with that, it doesn't need to be some ruddy smart card.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

He'll answer for himself I imagine, but he is very much a fan and WSU season ticket holder. He made the trek to Coventry on NYE.

What you and others are failing to grasp, I think, is the difference between you, me, Arthur and most on NSC who are pretty staunch fans, and the far more casual 'every now and again' fans.

I'm with Arthur in that these casual fans will not attend if there is much effort or, in some cases, planning required. They will want to decide at 1pm on a Saturday lunchtime that they fancy some football and want to pop straight to the Amex, pay and enter.

At the moment this is not an option - every seat is sold (for league games), but the time may come when that is not the case. If/when that happens we need to make it as easy as possible to get bums on those seats. A half-empty stadium is a depressing sight, as those at Middlesborough or Coventry can testify.

As I understand it, Arthur is a season ticket holder so therefore already has a smart card. As it's a cup game, he can go online and get his card charged for the cup game without having to go into Brighton right up to 3pm. That's ok for the people who have already got cards.
The season tickets are over subscribed so therefore the club aren't that bothered at the moment to issue new smart cards to new customers, but next season if gates start falling or when the new seats get put in, I can see a drive to advertise tickets and issue cards which can be charged at various outlets as mentioned by granny earlier. It isn't a priority right now all the time the games are a sellout.