Rip-Off Britain: Vent Your Anger HERE!!!

[daveinprague]

Large Gambrinus is almost a pound here now. Youre not the only ones suffering!

 

[bhafc_ross]

Wham Bar 25p instead of 20p and thats a recent change ! discusting

 

[Gwylan]

Doesnt anyone have pride any more?

 

[Smith DID score]

You can go to the box office in person and avoid booking fees, although this is difficult for most people, so I suppose that's where the face value comes from. Also, different agencies cost different prices so you couldn't have a standard price.

Thing is, I understand why the likes of ticketmaster have popped up, because it must make it easier to distribute tickets, but there should be some limit on how much they charge. There's really no reason they need to be charging £4 a ticket, or £10 a ticket for festivals. The face value of the ticket going up surely doesn't make it any more difficult to handle the transaction. It's also more than it seems since clearly they're making more money from inflated delivery prices, or the best one the £2.25 they charge for you to print out your own tickets!!!

It really ought to be no more than £2-3 per order to buy tickets, private agency or not.

1:Not every venue have separate box offices these days but using our beloved BHAFC as an example isn't it true that you still pay the booking fee even when you buy them in person at Queens Road? which makes a £23-00 face value south stand wings ticket actually cost you £25-00 no matter what, so surely it could be argued that its NOT a £23-00 ticket as you cannot buy it for that price anywhere anyhow?

2: Surely there is more than one distributor involved in most big industries for supplying goods to consumers, yet we seem to manage to pay the same price for an individual Mars bar, Zanussi washing machine or copy of the Sun.
so why should it only make a difference with concert tickets?

3:"There's really no reason they need to be charging £4 a ticket........."
Spot on Spider! they don't need to be charging us anything, because they should negotiate their percentage cut of the money like the artists, promoters, venues etc.
I've finally realised what really winds me up about booking fees the most.
Its this we are better and more important than everybody else attitude that the agencies have because they have evolved the market to accept that they and they alone can charge for their services separately.

Having said that perhaps they are more important than anyone else in the chain, If Micheal Jackson had lived long enough those with that - strange - urge would have been forking out £50 or a £100 whatever to pay for all aspects of the Gig - trivial stuff like venue and equipment hire, public liability insurance etc. but only be allowed to go once they've passed their back hander of £10 say- sorry meant booking fee - to the legalised touts who are allowed to rip us off.

 

[Spider]

1:Not every venue have separate box offices these days but using our beloved BHAFC as an example isn't it true that you still pay the booking fee even when you buy them in person at Queens Road? which makes a £23-00 face value south stand wings ticket actually cost you £25-00 no matter what, so surely it could be argued that its NOT a £23-00 ticket as you cannot buy it for that price anywhere anyhow?

Most venues that do run their own box office (eg. Brighton Dome) charge a small booking fee for orders that are not in person which is fair enough, to cover postage and the like and even make a small contribution towards the running of the box office from day to day (ie. help with their costs as a gesture for not simply going to the online agencies). I agree with you though, legalised touting is all the agencies are, especially when they now appear to run ticket auctions for some of the best seats at big gigs.

Another one is premiu seating at theatres. It's expensive enough already, so to cut out the 3 best rows of seats in the place and add another £30-£40 on (Im talking West End here) is really unfair. The best seats should go to those who book first, not to those for whom money is no object.

 

[Smith DID score]

May the ticket agencies be the first against the wall when the revolution comes!

 

[Was not Was]

EEEE ba gum, Ah remember when I cud go t'football, have a night out on't' beer, with fish n chips n take mah lady friend dancin' at Roxy and still have change out of a shilling............................................

This.

The whole thread sounds like my grandad angel moaning that things cost more than they used to ...

 

[Gwylan]

This.

The whole thread sounds like my grandad angel moaning that things cost more than they used to ...

Partly.

I think people have taken to moaning about prices in general rather than look at things (train fares, sporting tickets, accommodation, beer) that is more expensive in the UK than it is elsewhere.

Clearly, inflation means things will go up in price but some of the posters are on here are mentioning items like food and petrol which have gone down in price (relative to inflation) in the past 30 years.

 

[Napper]

Best country in the world..

F off abroad if moaning

 

[jezzer]

...And after much venting and voting the winner is:

EPSON PRINT CARTRIDGES!!

I`ve got an Epson600 printer scanner fax thing and the Epson cartidges are £12 each, sometimes more at places like Comet, Currys etc. Best part of £50 for bloody ink, the printer cost less than £100.

I buy a set of 4 hybrids from a local shop for £12 all told and they last just as long.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

Bus fares and train fares are a joke. As said, if the government / local authorities are genuine about cutting emmissions / car usage, then they need to act on this. Otherwise its all a load of pointless soundbites.

 

[Murray 17]

Any 'green' taxes.

Why should we in the UK pay so much when we contribute less than 2% of the world's 'greenhouse gases'?

And don't give me that, "we all have a part to play," rubbish.

 

[Brighton TID]

Best country in the world..

F off abroad if moaning

Agree totally...

However, you only have to casually mutter the words 'British' and 'Gas' and I will want to hit something, anything, violently hard and relentlessly with no mercy shown

 

[Tooting Gull]

I don't know why there hasn't been some major insurrection over tax on petrol and diesel in this country.

Admittedly Alan Brazil is somewhere to the right of Ghenghis Khan politically, bu he stated the other day that to fill up an SUV cost $20 (£15?) in the States, but £70 over here. How can any government justify that sort of robbery, other than on the grounds of 'it's been like this for a while'. What is it, about 80 per cent tax?

Still, even if we ignore the fact that some people badly need their cars and don't have the option, maybe it's part of a masterplan involving subsidising train travel to offer incentives to people, where posssible, to use an alternative...oh no, wait, the train prices are a total rip-off as well.

People moan about strikes on here, if the French were charged what we pay you'd have wall-to-wall, 24-hour, 365-days-a-year motorway blockades.

 

[Simster]

I don't know why there hasn't been some major insurrection over tax on petrol and diesel in this country.

Admittedly Alan Brazil is somewhere to the right of Ghenghis Khan politically, bu he stated the other day that to fill up an SUV cost $20 (£15?) in the States, but £70 over here. How can any government justify that sort of robbery, other than on the grounds of 'it's been like this for a while'. What is it, about 80 per cent tax?

Still, even if we ignore the fact that some people badly need their cars and don't have the option, maybe it's part of a masterplan involving subsidising train travel to offer incentives to people, where posssible, to use an alternative...oh no, wait, the train prices are a total rip-off as well.

People moan about strikes on here, if the French were charged what we pay you'd have wall-to-wall, 24-hour, 365-days-a-year motorway blockades.

The French are charged what we are.

According to the AA, we have the 12th highest priced unleaded and 2nd highest priced diesel:
http://www.theaa.com/motoring_advice/fuel/

I'd much rather we vented our spleen at the cost of rail travel, but even there, we have mitigating circumstances. The trouble is that we are having to pay for 40 years of under-investment.

 

[scooter1]

£3.70 for a pint seems a little steep.
With regard to train fares, yes they're expensive if you need to go somewhere now, or before 9am, but I booked an advance purchase on line from Brighton to Victoria, it was £5. And with an on-line discount of 40% it went down to £3..
And then the obvious ones, fuel, road tax, council tax etc

 

[Nibble]

Best country in the world..

F off abroad if moaning

It is certainly not the best for value for money, anyone who is slightly canny recognises that. It is a rip off country you can't deny it. I wouldn't move abroad for 2 reasons 1- I am a racist and 2- I would miss the slags. You can stick your French sensuality, your Spanish sultryness I like a lively knee trembler round by bins with a good old cow c*nted Northern cum bucket.

 

[Was not Was]

Any 'green' taxes.

Why should we in the UK pay so much when we contribute less than 2% of the world's 'greenhouse gases'?

And don't give me that, "we all have a part to play," rubbish.

And the answer to your question is: because we all have a part to play. Of course.

 

[Hannibal smith]

£1.10 for a packet of Hula Hoops at Cherwell Valley services. Not even the Grab bag size. Just a shitty normal packet of crisps.

Robbing. Bastards.

 

[Was not Was]

I don't know why there hasn't been some major insurrection over tax on petrol and diesel in this country.

Admittedly Alan Brazil is somewhere to the right of Ghenghis Khan politically, bu he stated the other day that to fill up an SUV cost $20 (£15?) in the States, but £70 over here. How can any government justify that sort of robbery, other than on the grounds of 'it's been like this for a while'. What is it, about 80 per cent tax?

Still, even if we ignore the fact that some people badly need their cars and don't have the option, maybe it's part of a masterplan involving subsidising train travel to offer incentives to people, where posssible, to use an alternative...oh no, wait, the train prices are a total rip-off as well.

People moan about strikes on here, if the French were charged what we pay you'd have wall-to-wall, 24-hour, 365-days-a-year motorway blockades.

Well, Americans have the highest per capita carbon footprint in the world. It's higher than the rest of the developed world chiefly due to (a) driving everywhere and (b) big houses which cost more to heat/cool than smaller homes.

The problem is the States having petrol prices so low they come nowhere near reflecting the environmental damage caused. IE it's too cheap there, not too dear here.

It's hard to say what sort of price would be right here - but to give you a feel for it: the price at which hardly anyone would get in their car to go half a mile to the shops. The fact so many people do this shows petrol (and the cost of motoring generally) is too cheap, if we are even half-serious about climate change.