Carter USM @ Brixton

[giggirl]

Carter USM playing the Academy again this winter. Tickets for last year's show sold out pretty quickly and then went for silly money on e-bay, so I thought I would flag it up. The date is Saturday 22nd November. There is a pre-sale tomorrow at 9.00am at www.livenation.co.uk.

[KalamityKel]

giggirl wot is it that you do for work my dear?

[giggirl]

Apparently livenation only has circle seats - the circle seats at Brixton are terrible. If you want stalls tickets for Carter then my advice is to buy tomorrow morning from www.ticketweb.com. Ticketweb has the lowest booking fees and tend to send the tickets out quickly.

[paragon]

reckon she works for ticketweb!

[Jah Lush]

She doesn't. She's not called giggirl for nothing you know.

[KalamityKel]

If you're lucky she mite tell ya ;-)

[Keef]

Giggirl isn't trying to make some comission, she's just giving heads up to some gigs going on sale. Good on ya I say.

[giggirl]

I'm so busted. I'm on the sales team at ticketweb and we work on a commission basis. Don't forget to mention me when you book so that I get my 5%. Thanks.

[*Bob*]

You're too trusting, Keefie.

Watch out - women will take advantage of your sweet nature.

[giggirl]

OK this is going to look really fishy now - I've just found a ticketweb link for Carter which is live. What were the chances of that happening? I don't think this is an official presale BTW - but it's live link so go for it.

http://www.ticketweb.co.uk/user/?region=gb_london&query=detail&event=256997&interface=amg&REFID=carter

The parent company of ticketweb is ticketmaster - but ticketweb's booking fees are much less - go figure?

[KalamityKel]

Are they just as badly organised with staff who give out the wrong information too? working in ticketing myself I do have my own issues with them (6)

[giggirl]

Don't even get me started on ticketing. OK here I go.....yes they are all badly organised and run by staff who don?t know their arses from their elbows; their fees are a joke and their so called "customer service" (always a premium number) is non existent. God forbid anything should go wrong with your booking (e.g. your tickets get lost in the post) as you will be put on hold for half a day before speaking to a moron who is rude to you and then cuts you off so you have to redial. If this should happen to you, just phone your credit card company and instigate a ?goods not received? clawback.

My advice to anyone is to always buy directly from the venue wherever possible. Some venues still have their own box offices (Royal Festival Hall, Royal Albert Hall, Roundhouse). If it?s a theatre booking, ALWAYS buy direct from the box office. Otherwise, try and buy from a smaller agent (Stargreen, Gigantic). Only buy from Ticketmaster or Seetickets if you really really must because they do next to nothing at all to earn their booking fees.

A few years ago I had a booking with Seetickets go very badly wrong; their website crashed mid-booking so my booking went through in triplicate and I ended up with 3 times more seats than I wanted. They were top price seats for a really premium gig so the overbooking amounted to about ?800 in value. See?s ?customer services? washed their hands of the problem. Within half an hour of being knocked back by Seetickets I had a letter of complaint hand-delivered to the desk of Andrew Lloyd-Webber who owns Seetickets. Within minutes of that I had a call from his PA (a really nice lady as it happens); I told her that unless I had immediate satisfaction I would take it up personally with Andy the next time he set foot in the Ivy for lunch. Now ALW has lunch at the Ivy about 3 times a week; I eat there about 3 times a year. Do the maths; our chances of ever meeting were not good. Whatever, I had an instant refund and a call from the MD of Seetickets apologising and blah blah blah.

So there you go; if you feel ripped off with booking fees, you know who to write to. Booking fees are money for nothing and it?s time the customer fought back.

I told you not to get me started. Rant over.

[mightyroar]

where do you work though giggirl?

[giggirl]

If I told you what I did for a living I would need to poke you with a sharp stick to keep you awake. I have no links with any music company/agency/band, but suffice to say my ear is very close to the ground and I know pretty much everything that is happening. I just like to flag up gigs because I am of the firm opinion that people should get out more and have fun. Life is short. Very often by the time people find out about great gigs they are sold out and it is too late to get tickets at face value. That's it.

[KalamityKel]

Further to my experience last nite I am even more (6) at ticketmaster... I did nothing but cover up for them, having loads of concert goers shouting at me as if I was a representative of theirs... at one point I did turn round to a mouthy young chav with her posh mother and say "oh I totally agree with you about ticket master. I'm so glad I don't work for such a misinformed and unorganised company" seemed to shut alot of them up! *breathes*

giggirl... have you heard of the TCB Group?

[giggirl]

KalamityKel Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Further to my experience last nite I am even more

> (6) at ticketmaster... I did nothing but cover up

> for them, having loads of concert goers shouting

> at me as if I was a representative of theirs... at

> one point I did turn round to a mouthy young chav

> with her posh mother and say "oh I totally agree

> with you about ticket master. I'm so glad I don't

> work for such a misinformed and unorganised

> company" seemed to shut alot of them up!

> *breathes*

>

> giggirl... have you heard of the TCB Group?

Vaguely heard of TCB Group - do they manage people? Do you work for them?

Sorry you had lots of people being snotty with you. TM are rubbish.

[KalamityKel]

::o god no I certainly don't work for the TCB Group :-| They are apparently meant to be very much like livenation except they don't have a fooking clue wot they are doing.