The significant delay to the kick-off of the Premier League match at Arsenal, leading to 35.000 people queuing outside, has provided a reminder of the impact of ticketing systems on modern football. It is also timely to consider the issue of ticketing at Leicester City a year after its introduction of digital ticketing.
At the time of writing, the cause of the troubles at Arsenal is not clear, and thankfully, Leicester City’s transition to its NFC ticketing system has not produced anything as dramatic as the scenes at the Emirates stadium. Nonetheless, digital ticketing and related issues have been amongst those most raised to us by Trust members in the past few months and we have continued to discuss these issues with the club. The Trust suggested a meeting with the club which took place in September 2022 and included representatives from the Disabled Supporters Association and Union FS, and the club’s Communications Director also took a Q&A session on the topic at the Trust’s AGM in February 2023.
The main concern has been fears that some fans may be unable to attend matches If they do not have the necessary smartphone. The club has acknowledged this and has provided alternative options. Initially, these options were not easy for fans to find when buying tickets. We pointed out to the club that this was causing confusion, plus extra work for the club as calling the ticket office was – at the time – the only solution for many. This has been improved with, for example, clear information on the club’s website that a physical card is available for season tickets. Notwithstanding these improvements, there still appear to be more teething issues with City’s chosen system than desirable – with the recent error which impacted iPhone 14 owners the latest on the list.
Initially, the introduction of digital ticketing resulted in significantly increased queues. This appears to have been somewhat improved, but we are still informing the club of issues raised with us by our members and which are still occurring. We continue to be interested in the experience of any members dealing with the club’s ticketing arrangements at the early Home matches this season. Please email the Trust with any information on this.
We will also continue to emphasise that more and clearer communications could be made by the club about the options available to fans when buying tickets. This has had some impact. For example, a couple of seasons ago the ability to transfer season ticket seats to friends or family a number of times per season was only found on the club’s website by downloading the many pages of ticket Terms & Conditions. Following comment by the Trust, it is now more clearly communicated. Similarly, the ability to resell season tickets (again, a limited number of times – the so-called Ticket Forwarding) is now easier to find.
Given the events at the Emirates stadium. The Trust has also now asked the club about their contingency arrangements for such issues.
There are also issues surrounding tickets for Away matches, although the club is clearly limited in the influence it has on the ticketing process used as they are run by the Home club.
The Trust recognises that digital ticketing, and increasingly sophisticated digital entry systems in general, are clearly the future and work well for other events. Such systems also make it harder for tickets to find their way to resales. The important thing is that the club brings fans with them on this journey, communicates clearly at all points and learns quickly from issues that arise.