Ticketmaster

[whimsywhoo]

Has anybody ever used this company? I booked tickets to the CBeebies Live Event, at the beginning of August. I've still not had the tickets.
I've spoken to a couple of people on MN who booked at the same time and they've had there's.
When I call they say they can't check on tickets until 7 days before the event!

Used them loads of times. The "worst case" is that you do have to ring them a couple of days before the event and then they will leave your tickets at the box office for collection on the day (and waive the postal fee).

I used them to buy tickets for last Saturday's England match - had no problems at all

A friend of mine uses them regularly to buy tickets for events at the NEC in Birmingham, she's never had any problems either

I'm sure you'll be fine, can understand why you're worrying tho

Well this is for the NIA in Birmingham and I know Nutcracker got the for the same date, we booked on the same day me via internet her by phone and she had them ages ago
We managed to get front row seats too, it's for ds's 3rd birthday so i hope they come

Whimsywhoo,

Hi there. As a former Tickemaster employee I can probably explain the problem to you. Firstly they are a very honorable company, you will get your tickets and they're not fobbing you off. I used to work in their customer services department and we often got problems like this. The agent who booked your tickets should have explained to you what kind of tickets they were. It maybe that they did but you didn't realise what that meant - or they may not have told you. Anyway - there are two types of tickets. Box office jargon for the usual type of tickets you would buy for a theatre event is "soft tickets" these are tickets printed there and then onto a generic ticket stock with the date and seating details on them. Those kind of tickets are printed asap and posted out to you asap. The other type of tickets are called "hard tickets." These are specially printed tickets for the event often with pictures from the show on them, holograms etc. These type of tickets are put on sale long before they have even been designed often, certainly befroe they have been printed and distributed to all of the agencies who have bought allocations from the event promoters. I would imagine if you have not recieved your ticekts yet then they would be hard tickets. It is very likely in that case that ticketmaster have not even recieved them from the promoter yet to distribute to their customers. Some promoters do leave it a bit late sometimes. Hard tickets are always sent by special or recored delivery so you would have paid a little bit extra for postage. This means they can been traced and located if they get lost on the post.

When you ring Ticketmaster Customer service they can see when they look at your account number the date you booked and paid for the tickets and the date they were printed (or in the case of hard tickets allocated) to you. When that happens the tickets are posted straight out that day so if your tickets have not arrived they can sort it out for you. And they will. If your tickets are soft tickets they can be re-printed and either reposted or left for your collection at the box office on the day (which is what is usually done in that case for security.) If you tickets are hard tickets (which I suspect your are) if they are lost in the post they will have been send special so the customer services dept will track and trace them with the post office and locate them and either arrange for redelivery or if they have been completely lost they will bend over backwards to sort it out for you. Believe me I have gone way out of my way to help people who'se hard tickets have been lost by royal mail - so don't worry!

If you haven't called them already call and find out if they are hard or soft tickets and when they will be posted if they have not been already. If they are soft tickets it may be a silly delay like they are awaiting new ticket stock to print them onto from the venue.

PLease do rest assured though they are not sharks and whilst they are a big company they do honour thier contracts with people.

Hope that helps, sorry if I waffled.

Emma xx

I used them to buy Mark Knopfler tickets for DH. When it got cancelled, they sent me a letter saying contact us for a refund. I did but because my credit card number was different, it caused all kinds of grief. I had had my bag stolen so all my numbers changed. It took me 2 hours on the phone, a lot of crying and demanding to speak to someone in authority before I got any help. After that, they demanded a letter from my bank to prove that my cards had been changed and the crime number for the original offence.
Never had much problem getting tickets from them but I wouldn't want to have to go through getting a refund again.

gyscrym.

Thats awful!!! I know why they would need that info from you and that it would make things much more difficult (because of credit card fraud and the like) but you should never have been put through that much hassle. Its a good job you told them though as your refund would just have sat in your CC company's slosh account as they wouldn't have re-credited it to you. What a nightmare!

One good thing came out of it, I no longer have to buy concert tickets. DH asks me to, I say after the last time, I don't think I can, he pays for them! Result!

Hi
Thanks so much for the advice. Good news, I had an email this afternoon saying the website had been updated and the CBeebies were listed and the tickets started getting posted out on the 10th October, so I should be getting them soon

Just wanted to say this is normal, and Ticket master is OK. Often seating plans are finalised nearer the time as each venue and gig can differ due to mixing desks etc. If they don't get them out on time as Sharklet says you can pick up on site from box office.
Watch out for touts guising as genuine companies they will sell tickets that they don't even have.