[Albion] LoyaltyPointGate - discussion with the club

[essbee1]

It’s because the JCL’S suddenly want to start going to away games this season. Funny how there was no moaning about how many points people were getting per away game last season....

Especially at Rotherham and Huddersfield away last season, both of which were top.

 

[Kalimantan Gull]

It’s because the JCL’S suddenly want to start going to away games this season. Funny how there was no moaning about how many points people were getting per away game last season....

 

[Deleted member 2719]

Plastics has to be plastics.

I do not know the answer, but i do know the loyalty system just favours the recent fan, that can't be right sometimes fans miss the odd season due to life circumstances and their Albion loyalty in past counts for a big fat NOTHING.

What happens when things are not so rosey in the Albion history later on and gates fall, look after your genuine customers and they will look after you.

 

[studio150]

How many of the current crop of albion fans would have attended a reserve game against Charlton Athletic to get a ticket for a cup game against Derby County?

No, instead they spend their hard earned money buying tickets for a game that actually mattered to a lot of people just so they could get points to be able to go to the glamour ties in this stupid division and then not actually go, so pissing off a lot of fans who actually wanted to go and support the team.

So it has come to this with our fan base!

Welcome to the new world.

And how many went through the Goldstone turnstyles and then immediately left the ground happy that they had a Derby League Cup ticket

 

[Shropshire Seagull]

Great had a ticket but used a friends who had a spare rather than going back home to get it before traveled

Assuming is was one ticket per fan number on sale, your friend has now pocketed your LPs without attending?

 

[Goldstone1976]

What is wrong with fewer points for cheap tickets (and they already have fewer for what are expected to be very popular away games)?

Any non-zero point games will cause similar issues though. Obviously, the fewer the points available, the fewer the number of folk who will buy a ticket for that game. If you made it (as I think you suggested) 2 points for a £10 game, you'd certainly reduce the number just buying for the LP considerably.

 

[Titanic]

What is wrong with fewer points for cheap tickets (and they already have fewer for what are expected to be very popular away games)?

Any non-zero point games will cause similar issues though. Obviously, the fewer the points available, the fewer the number of folk who will buy a ticket for that game. If you made it (as I think you suggested) 2 points for a £10 game, you'd certainly reduce the number just buying for the LP considerably.

and to reinforce this point, the two games that have been seen as a particular 'problem' have been Barnet 15 points for £10 and Bournemouth 10 points for £10.

 

[Official Old Man]

ULTIMATE ANSWER
PB and board meet in a secret room under the Amex
Firstly release a statement to Bozza that they will not accept this again and a system is in place to deduct points from unused tickets (not true of course).
Then discuss points required for Man Utd away and, using the normal system, come to maybe 290. Then announce the figure as 280, thus taking away any advantage gained by these 10 points.
No one will be any the wiser as we have no idea how they get to the LP number they announce anyway.

 

[Tooting Gull]

You're not the first person to write on here that the moaners are jcl's who won't go to away games if we go down - so can I point out that lots of us who are moaning are people who did indeed go to Barnsley and Huddersfield and others, but not having a season-ticket means all of a sudden we can't get to away games. As you well know there are lots and lots of exiles who enjoy away games and to call us glory-hunting jcls is simply insulting.

So please reset your thinking, I've been to Rochdale four times and whilst that was nice and easy to get a ticket I have no desire to go back to Rochdale. however if I can never get to see Brighton away I might start really pining for the lower leagues once more. Bournemouth in the league cup looked like one of the few games that we non-sth holders might be able to get tickets for, and for there to be 700 no-shows is a real kick in the teeth.

What a great post. Just sums it up from a certain perspective (which happens to include me as well). Long-time fan, done the Lg 2 thing, no longer a STH, no chance of getting tickets for away league games I would love to attend. In the new reality, we don't have any right to a ticket, and we accept that. But maybe a bit less of the dismissive bollocks for proper fans who did go to the f**king Scarboroughs and Kidderminsters of this world.

 

[ROSM]

Having two sons who are just in the third group for away tickets at arsenal and west ham (missing out on 2nd tranche by 2 and 5 pounts respectively) im kind of kicking myself that i didnt do a loyalty point harvest at the leicester game which we couldn't attend but the ticket sales went down to that group.

Clearly my own fault by working to the spirit of the scheme

 

[Tooting Gull]

I think the club should employ one of those court artists who do sketches of defendants during trials for broadcast on the BBC news.

They could do a sketch of the away crowd during the game and then this could be matched back to a photo-database of ticket purchasers. Anybody who has purchased a ticket but does NOT appear in the sketch isn't awarded the relevant Loyalty Points. Simple AND effective.

That made me laugh. It's also not easy earning a crust as an artist, creating jobs too.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

How many of the current crop of albion fans would have attended a reserve game against Charlton Athletic to get a ticket for a cup game against Derby County?

No, instead they spend their hard earned money buying tickets for a game that actually mattered to a lot of people just so they could get points to be able to go to the glamour ties in this stupid division and then not actually go, so pissing off a lot of fans who actually wanted to go and support the team.

So it has come to this with our fan base!

Welcome to the new world.

Yes, I remember having to go to a reserve game to get a ticket for the Chelsea cup game in 67.

It’s because the JCL’S suddenly want to start going to away games this season. Funny how there was no moaning about how many points people were getting per away game last season....

Have you forgotten how many boasted about buying Huddersfield tickets which were priced at £10 because it was on Sky and on a Thursday night? Lots on Nsc saying it would give them points for Villa away on the last day of the season. I went to Huddersfield and there were lots of empty seats.


[MENTION=600]Bry Nylon[/MENTION], very amusing, but Snappy was taking lots of crowd photos, so I reckon the majority of us are in those.

 

[albionite]

Why is this even an issue. Just don't do loyalty points for the tin pot cup or only have them for the home games.

 

[ROSM]

Plastics has to be plastics.

I do not know the answer, but i do know the loyalty system just favours the recent fan, that can't be right sometimes fans miss the odd season due to life circumstances and their Albion loyalty in past counts for a big fat NOTHING.

What happens when things are not so rosey in the Albion history later on and gates fall, look after your genuine customers and they will look after you.

The scheme also favours people travelling with friends or alone rather than with younger children

One of my sons was too young to be a season ticket holder when we first moved to the amex so althougb he attended (under 2s can sit in laps) he doesnt have any points for that.

Its also children and parents of young children who were less likely to attend midweek cup ties and gain extra points

 

[pastafarian]

Surely the Liverpools and Chelseas of this world have struggled long term with this issue, i doubt they have a fool proof system but what do they have in force?

 

[darkwolf666]

Summarised - "well if you will behave like school children, we'll treat you as such!"

I agree it's poor that people abused the system last night, but, the club can't retrospectively change the T&Cs of the loyalty. They can for games in the future, but not when people bought tickets in good faith, whatever their reason to do so.

Of course they can change the ts&cs, if governments can change the terms of pensions mid flow I am sure a piddling thing like loyalty points shouldn't be a problem...

 

[Driver8]

Just void the points of those who didn't attend, which seems an option in this instance.

Possibly harsh on those who were planning on going but for whatever reason couldn't, but arguably not as these are 'loyalty' points, i.e supporting the team, not points for just being able to buy a ticket.

This has to be the response. And those saying the club can’t do things retrospectively, I think they can pretty much do as they please with their own loyalty scheme if it is being abused.

 

[Return of the Rev]

Bournemouth scan every ticket on the turnstile. They know exactly who attended and who didn't last night.

I'm pretty sure the club will be requesting the information on the no shows and deal with them in the appropriate manner.

Not sure you can punish someone because they didn't go to a football match

 

[Giraffe]

I'm wondering whether the club should wait and see whether whole thing really is such a big issue over a number of matches, and not construct some expensive and complicated new system to deal with a problem which may really apply only to this particular match.

Completely agree with this post. There is a very real danger of the club using a sledgehammer to crack a nut here. I bought a ticket and went but I do feel the mistake happened when 10 points were given to a match of little consequence, at which under 21's could pay just £3, adults £10

I say this as someone who went to both... but if they wipe everyone's points for last nights game are they going to do the same for Barnet where there were many more than last nights 600 no shows?

Another good point. You can't just do it for Bournemouth. I suspect several thousand did it for Barnet, not a few hundred (ps, not me I attended btw)

Maybe I'm missing something here but is it really that big a deal?

No, I don't think it is.

Fewer points for cheap tickets and it stops being a problem (without the need for any of these costly, time-consuming and inconvenient measures).

Exactly.

Was the ticket exchange open for this? If the club is going down this path then they need to make it easier for people that legitimately can't attend to get a refund on tickets

Another very valid point. Regardless of what happened last night the inability to pass an away ticket to someone else if you cant go through a formal exchange makes it harder to get full attendance although I believe you can return the ticket to the club?

Seem to remember at a couple of England away games 50 or 100 people were randomly selected to pick their ticket up near the away turnstile,might put a few people off purchasing in the first place if they were deliberately intending not to turn up.May have this confused with knockout stages ticket collection but im sure it happened a couple of times.

For the Scotland game and some other high risk games England fans have had to do that. it is a right pain though. You invariably have to turn up somewhere city centre, have ID, and join a big queue. I remember spending three hours queuing at the Moscow UK embassy once just to get a ticket for a football match. Or you wait until you get to the stadium and join what will be another massive queue. Do we really want to encourage massive queues outside stadiums in todays high security times. It really does seem like complete overkill.

I would be very disapointed if theh removed points from those who attended. I needed the points for west ham and future games coming up and as the peopl who attended were the minority seems harsh to be punished as well but I guess I will have to put up with whatever the outcome.

I just hope the club react. Appropriatly.

You cannot retrospectively punish those who attended. Would be very odd to do this and additionally how would they know they have got it right? For example if five of you bought a ticket, and only four went last night how do you know you used the right ticket that was assigned to you?

Need to be careful about an over-reaction here and using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

This, this, massively this.

Nothing is going to be completely foolproof.

And this. In my view the previous scheme was good enough. We certainly never suffered any of this shit then did we? However having changed it they now need to stick to it and not start tinkering with it. If they do that they may create further unforeseen problems. Just give it a chance to breath like a good cheese and not sack a manager after four games

I don't profess to know the answer - except, unless they do go the full hog, there will always be ways to game the system and always be people prepared to do so.

I think this is right, but I do think that the Bournemouth game was a perfect storm that I am struggling to see happen again anytime soon.

A lot of people have suggested that non attendees don't get their points. But how do you really know who didn't attend? Not mentioned yet, until my comment above, is that lots of people buy groups of tickets for 5/6+ people. There is a good chance that of that some of their group didn't attend. Maybe just one. If that is the case did the attendees make sure they used the correct ticket? I don't think I would have done. Who does in a group? Fine if you all attended. But why should someone who attended miss out because their mate didn't?

So frankly I don't see how any retrospective action can be done fairly. And that is speaking as someone who bought a ticket and went yesterday. I predicted this would happen as soon as I saw the ticket price and loyalty points. If there is anything for the club to learn it is the relationship that exists between price and points. Yes on paper turning up to Bournemouth on a Tuesday night for what was mostly a reserve match deserves loyalty, but paying only £3 for under 21s or £10 for adults is less loyal than the league match was. That's a fact in my view and the club were a little naive not to realise this. I believe something similar happened for the Huddersfield away match last year when £1 tickets were available.

I just hope that the club take longer to think about this, watch the scheme for a few more months and then realise it is not fundamentally broken, they just need to think about the award of loyalty points for cup games that's all.

ps) I'm comfortably in the top tier, go to all or close to all the away games and have done for many years so "I'm alright jack". I therefore have no real axe to grind on this, other than I feel sorry for anyone trying to get into the top or second tier as it has become a closed shop very quickly.

Final, final point. Quite a few returns appear on the website and if you are quick you can buy these with lesser points. Or that was the case for earlier away games where they honoured the original points allocation dates. I saw this as a chance for those with lesser points who were keen. Now however (for the last 2/3 away sales) the returns are only available in the points allocation where the game sold out. Is this fair? They have had their chance, shouldn't it then be opened as per the original on sale dates?

One final point. For the league game, my wife had to collect her ticket from the stadium ticket office as she purchased one of the returns, we were told that she wasn't on the list, even though she had the confirmation email. The Bournemouth ticket office claimed that the list sent by BHAFC for this was wrong (possibly the wrong game!) and many people had the same problem. This just highlights to me the potential problems of a retrospective adjustment using Bournemouth systems and a presumably manual adjustment.

pps) anyone else took a picture to prove they were there last night?

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Not sure you can punish someone because they didn't go to a football match

Neither should you reward them.