Call the Police - it's a rip-off

Delphi91

Just went online last night out of curiosity to see the price for tickets for The Police in Twickenham in Sept.

It was a presale for fanclub members or wannbe members.

So, two tickets (£90 each - sterling) + charges (£9 PER ticket) + Fanclub membership (if you're not already joined! - £53) = postal delivery of the tickets (£2.75) came to a grand total of £253.75 sterling!

At todays exchange rate, that comes to €372.87.

Add to that the cost of getting there, accomodation, local travel, etc and you wouldn't have much change out of €600.

Now I know it's The Police, but come on!!!!!!! It's not as if they're short of a few quid.

Mike

ChuckProphet

and i thought it was only in this country we were fleeced when it comes to ticket prices!!

Ro: maaan!

Well they can hardly be expected to cater for people travelling to see the gig. Even if it was free you'd still have to pay for travel and accomodation. Not really fair to be pinning that on them. Can't really complain about the membership fee either. Presumably you would have paid that to become a member regardless of tickets for this gig. It's only a presale afterall. You could still get them otherwise.

After all that it's really just 100 pounds for a ticket. Which, tbh, is still very, very expensive. The most expensive gig I've ever heard of before this for a single artist (ie not a festival) was Paul McCartney. 110 euro, I think. 100 Sterling is madness.

honru

Think when Neil Young played Vicar Street a few years ago the face value of the tickets was €115.

Mushy

George Michael....6th June...€111(most expensive ones), and that doesnt include service charges and whatever additives they like to put in nowadays. 9 am tomorrow morning...dont miss out

Ro: maaan!

Thought Neil Young was 105.

Delphi91

Ro: maaan! wrote:

Well they can hardly be expected to cater for people travelling to see the gig. Even if it was free you'd still have to pay for travel and accomodation. Not really fair to be pinning that on them. Can't really complain about the membership fee either. Presumably you would have paid that to become a member regardless of tickets for this gig. It's only a presale afterall. You could still get them otherwise.

After all that it's really just 100 pounds for a ticket. Which, tbh, is still very, very expensive. The most expensive gig I've ever heard of before this for a single artist (ie not a festival) was Paul McCartney. 110 euro, I think. 100 Sterling is madness.

No, I agree that they can't be expected to cater for those who might travel.

However, what irks me is that to benefit from the pre-sale, you MUST become a member of the fanclub at a cost of £53. And I'm not sure that you are getting a cheaper price for the tickets, you just have a 3-day head start on everyone else when it comes to purchasing.

And becoming a member is no guarantee of getting tix either (so they warn). You can cancel the membership afterwards to avoid being re-billed, but I presume you get caught for at least one membership fee.

Judes

This joining a fan club "lark", to push yourself up the ticket queue, is really getting to me!!!

So, I've been a fan of The Police since the late 70's - yes, we're going back almost 30 years! I would have thought that buying singles/albums out of my pocket money (which I scraped together, during the "hard times"), then following Sting's career over the years and buying his albums, would constitute me being a very "loyal fan" . Yet, I am obviously not deemed a fan because I will not and refuse to pay £53 to join an official site. I think that this is very unfair - to the true fans who have spent a lot more than £53 over the years!

I also think that skipping DUBLIN as one of Europe's concert venues is also a slap in the face to Irish fans. Sting has performed in Dublin over the years - yet suddenly, now that there's a big concert - they can't add Ireland to the list of countries. I mean - when they first came out - as an "English Speaking/Singing Band" - I would think that most of their original fans would have been UK/Ireland based - until they got bigger - and began to conquer the world. I hope that there's somebody out there who can remind Sting and the boys of this fact.

A few years ago I joked that if The Police ever reformed, I'd remortgage my house and travel to wherever in the world to see them. But now I'm thinking - guy's you really aren't worth the expense!!!

sambora

I'd love to see The Police but I wouldn't pay crazy prices!!

Den_M

'Call the Police - it's a rip-off'

lol

ghostdancer

can't really see how people can be giving out about the fanclub membership, you're looking to avail of an offer exclusively for members, allowing non-members to take advantage defeats the whole purpose of the pre-sale.

penexpers

ghostdancer wrote:

can't really see how people can be giving out about the fanclub membership, you're looking to avail of an offer exclusively for members, allowing non-members to take advantage defeats the whole purpose of the pre-sale.

Radiohead have presales for their free fanclub.

Mr Marenghi

Best title for a thread ever !

Kinetic^

sambora wrote:

I'd love to see The Police but I wouldn't pay crazy prices!!

Don't you mean Tesco??

Ro: maaan!

As penexpers said, some bands have free fanclubs/mailinglists that do presales. The idea behind it is really just to give fans that do make the extra effort to find out about gigs and generally take an interest in the band get priority on the tickets. Charging for such a club is the way things are headed for big acts these days anyway. A bit ****. But I would argue that if you're paying 53 euro (a year?) then you're getting more than just a presale for tickets. Of course I could be wrong. Is there anything more to it? And can't you still buy them if you're not a member? Just a few days later...

Judes

In reply to "penexpers" - well, maybe this system should be abolished in future - and that everyone is equal in their access to Tickets for any event?!If ticket touts take over - everyone will be up in arms about them ripping us off - well, I don't think the Fan Clubs should be able to do it - they're basically a legalised tout - because that £53 membership is really an extra £26.50 per ticket anyway .......................but that's just my opinion.

Alternatively, if you have been a member of a fan club for years - then yes, a bit of preferential treatment would be nice - but if you only join up to get the chance of tickets - again - that's not fair on those who have been members of the fan club for years - because there is no guarantee - I mean Joe Bloggs who joined the club last week could be lucky enough to get 2 tickets and Josephine Bloggette who has been a member for 10 years may not be so lucky.

So is there a fair way of doing this - YES but NO but YES - everyone buys at the same time!!! (Again this but my humble opinion).

Judes

Sorry "penexpers" - I meant to reply to "ghostdancer" - OOPS!!!

grumpytrousers

Judes wrote:

In reply to "penexpers" - well, maybe this system should be abolished in future - and that everyone is equal in their access to Tickets for any event?!If ticket touts take over - everyone will be up in arms about them ripping us off - well, I don't think the Fan Clubs should be able to do it - they're basically a legalised tout - because that £53 membership is really an extra £26.50 per ticket anyway .......................but that's just my opinion.

Alternatively, if you have been a member of a fan club for years - then yes, a bit of preferential treatment would be nice - but if you only join up to get the chance of tickets - again - that's not fair on those who have been members of the fan club for years - because there is no guarantee - I mean Joe Bloggs who joined the club last week could be lucky enough to get 2 tickets and Josephine Bloggette who has been a member for 10 years may not be so lucky.

So is there a fair way of doing this - YES but NO but YES - everyone buys at the same time!!! (Again this but my humble opinion).

there's no fair way to distribute tickets. period. back in the day when you had to queue up outside your local shop to buy a ticket for Queen in Slane, then it was different; only a fan would bother their hole doing that.

Now the web and ticket vending services have democratised the whole thing, and you can, if you fancy making a few bob and have a credit card, sit in the office and buy six tickets to a gig you've no intention of going to, and try and sell them on. And you'll take six tickets from people who genuinely wanted to go to the gig.

The fanclub route, of which i'm not a fan, basically means that people have to commit a few more quid to be a little more sure (but not certain) of getting to the gig; the cynic would say that seeing as The Police plc, or Rolling Stones Inc know full well that their gig *will* sell out anyway, and if they can get a few more quid without lifting a finger, then they'll go for it.

all you can ever hope for is that at the 9am ticket sale start, that more touts than fans buy, and that the touts have to offload at a loss...

NIBBS

f®eak s&#169 wrote: »

Think when Neil Young played Vicar Street a few years ago the face value of the tickets was €115.

the Neil Young tickets were €105 (maybe €115 with handling fee crap).....

and the most expensive George Michael tickets are €131 so it's even worse, at least with the Neil Young gig it was a somewhat intimate venue.........GM outdoors is a con.......
I saw earlier the tickets for the Police in the MGM Grand in Vegas are $78 - $270odd....... now that's a rip off.........
I reckon The Police will do Croke Park and the tickets will be over €100 for standing......

Judes

So, the latest on how to "not" get Police Tickets! One of my colleague's has spent half the day on/off Ticketmaster website - is trying different areas of UK, gets so far then told - no tickets available. That was for Manchester and Cardiff - don't when they're releasing Twickenham and Birmingham - unless they have and they're already sold out.

Unless those boys come to Dublin......................

grumpytrousers

http://cgi.ebay.ie/2-TICKETS-THE-POLICE-TWICKENHAM-BLOCK-B2-ROW-9-SEATED_W0QQitemZ150100130749QQihZ005QQcategoryZ1306QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

sorry dude; think the twickenham ship has sailed...if you think they're worth paying that money, plus travel etc, then go for it, but this seems to be a classic case of a load of touts offloading immediately after the tickets sell out, cos they know that as the concert draws closer, it's harder to shift tickets at mad prices...