Absolutely LIVID at the BBC

[ChilledMK]

I took the kids to the BBC Earth Experience in London yesterday. Traveled all the way from Milton Keynes. It looked the perfect day out for the kids. It was billed as an ‘interactive experience’ and a ‘transformative audio visible experience’.

I feel like I have been robbed. £100+ to walk around a big room with disjointed images showing random vignettes of animals and rainforests on cinema screens. No seating. No narrative. No touching. And most importantly no interaction. Looking at the website I can tell they have done some very clever camera trickery to make it more than it is.

I have never felt so angry leaving an ‘event’. I can’t believe they think it is acceptable to charge £32 to walk around a big room with a montage of their documentaries available on Netflix. No bad word to say about the staff or security, but the people at the BBC who planned this event are taking the absolute piss. Then to make it worse as we walk into a tat filled gift shop this almost half the space of the event, there is a projection of the earth saying it is my responsibility to make sure all the animals don’t die of climate change…

Would I be unreasonable to request a full refund? The kids were bored out of their mind and we didn’t stay the full hour.

4 including popcorn, drink etc.

Was going to book this - probably won't now, thanks for the heads up OP!

Personally, I wouldn't even bother trying to obtain a refund from Live Nation. They're part of Ticket Master, and frankly you've more chance of seeing my dead granny riding Shergar!

I've been ripped off by them several times for very expensive concert VIP experience packages, and now wouldn't touch them with the proverbial barge pole. I couldn't even get a goodwill refund of my extortionate booking fees.

My only advice is if you paid by credit card, try claiming from your provider, stating the show was neither what was advertised, nor what you expected.

Good luck. 💐

Your mistake was the popcorn and drinks! We just take a bag of Tesco popcorn, saves £££

Im not sure why this isn’t clear - THERE IS NARRATION BY DAVID ATTENBOROUGH. It happens about every two or three minutes.

ITT: people who can’t read

They won't have spent a cent on it! They've licensed the name and the footage, so they're making money from it.

'Narration' is not the same as 'a narrative'.

Interesting. I’d heard good things

I saw thar last Jurassic park film. It was totally boring, Most of it seemed to take place in a lab. I didnt get a refund.

I am sorry OP. I was going to book but couldn't figure it out - what it was or what we 'got' for the £££ so I didn't. I am so sorry you were ripped off but you are doing a great warning job for others :)

I think OP all you can do is give bad reviews online and by word of mouth. I'm not sure what rights you'd have to demand a refund unfortunately

Just got a response from the event team:

‘We regret to inform you that we are unable to issue a refund for your ticket purchase. As stated at the point of purchase, all ticket sales are final and non-refundable. We apologise for any confusion or inconvenience this may cause.’

I don’t care, I’m sick of this. You can bill events as family friendly with the most thought of how to make it interesting for kids is soft toys in the gift shop. This event is very cleverly marketed to ensure maximum profit. We are always being fleeced in this country.

Thank you for your advice. I am taking it to the advertising standards, I’m not letting them get away with it.

I appreciate that I have conflated immersion with interactive, but my point absolutely still stands.

As for the positive views to be found on google, I genuinely believe these to be from people with press passes or from the marketing team themselves.

At the end of the day, the event I attended with my kids was not what was advertised. They have not fulfilled their side and I’m not going to let them get away with fleecing families like this.

Sorry should have read you can’t bill events…

Because it's an enormous double standard for a large organisation that profits partly from flogging plastic shite they've likely shipped in from China, to be lecturing individual families on how we are all responsible for climate change. I'm sure we could all do better, but the hypocrisy is insulting.

@ChilledMK not trying to be inflammatory but can you list what they described in the event info that wasn’t there?

I did think this was interesting from their response - ‘We understand that this was not the experience that you were hoping for and that it did not provide the educational value that you expected’

totally forgot that they also billed it as educational. It wasn’t, they narration would say something stupid like ‘this fish eats something very interesting..can you spot it?’ And then BAM a shot of the bloody Andes mountains. Guess I’ll never know what they ate.

Probably because it's next to the gift shop selling unnecessary tat that's contributing to the problem.

It doesn’t say anything about educational or children in the event description:
https://bbcearthexperience.com/about

it just says suitable for all ages?

This, I've seen people on FB raving about it.

they narration would say something stupid like ‘this fish eats something very interesting..can you spot it?’

You said there wasn't any narration.

What exactly is it you think you didn't get that was advertised?

OP I get you are upset at a disappointing day out but what exactly are you going to complain about? Plenty of people here have explained how their advertising wasn't exactly wrong, although possibly open to misinterpretation. Honestly I'd just chanel your anger into giving reviews wherever you can because I can't imagine complaining to the companies will get you any desired result unfortunately.

I don’t understand how it wasn’t as advertised though. It seems like it was exactly as advertised you just firstly misunderstood the difference between interactive and immersive and secondly just didn’t like it. That’s not the same as false advertising though.

By all means ask the question if you are unhappy with the experience you had, but I wouldn’t expect to get a refund in this case. I think your expectations were set by other experiences rather than their claims.

Just came to say so sorry it was a rubbish day out OP. It’s horrible when you’ve worked hard all week and spend your money on something expecting it to be good. I really sympathise with you.