What is a "Booking Fee" for...?

Fatso_the_wombat

You accept that when you buy gig tickets online etc, or on the phone that there's a booking fee to pay. It's an annoying rip off, but...

Howevger, is it just me or is it a real cheek that when you walk into a branch of HMV and buy a ticket for a festival - Reading, say - that a £7 booking fee is charged. You're not actually "booking" anything, you're handing over money in exchange for an item. They don't charge a "booking fee" if you buy a CD or a DVD or whatever, so why the extra charge for this item?

(Or am I missing the point entirely...?)

Nile

Hello Fatso the wombat

Welcome to the MSE site.:wave:

Substitute 'booking fee' for daylight robbery...........is my view.:mad: I won't be buying a ticket (cheapest £86 + booking fee:eek: ) to see Madonna in concert, what is the world coming to?

EmmaLi

The NEC is particularly naughty about this - someone I know had a voucher for 2-4-1 tickets for Crufts. The NEC charged her booking fees for 2 half-price tickets.

Scarlet_Fever

Fatso_the_wombat wrote:

You accept that when you buy gig tickets online etc, or on the phone that there's a booking fee to pay. It's an annoying rip off, but...

Howevger, is it just me or is it a real cheek that when you walk into a branch of HMV and buy a ticket for a festival - Reading, say - that a £7 booking fee is charged. You're not actually "booking" anything, you're handing over money in exchange for an item. They don't charge a "booking fee" if you buy a CD or a DVD or whatever, so why the extra charge for this item?

(Or am I missing the point entirely...?)

i soooo totally agree with you - it should be included in the price quoted, and when they do it for each ticket, you think what am i paying for - i refused to buy tickets for the fleagh one year as the 'booking fee' for the 4 tickets was something like £12! not having it

so didnt go

taxiphil

Or to put it another way, a booking fee is the ticket agent shamelessly abusing the monopoly they've got on selling that ticket. It's an absolute disgrace and the government should do something about it.

jenniferpa

What I really like is when it's described as a "convenience fee" It may be convenient for them, but it's sure not convenient for me....

Jennifer

Fatso_the_wombat

Nile wrote:

Hello Fatso the wombat

Welcome to the MSE site.:wave:

Thank you very much!

I just don't get what it's for, though; if it really was for providing the service of "booking" a ticket, then surely it should be per order, not per ticket.

In the old days, when you had to buy a ticket from a person (either at a venue or at the end of a phone) then there may have been some justification for it, but now with online sales where there is no person to person interaction and its all automated, this surely negates the purpose of such a fee.

Furthermore, it should be the same irrespective of the value of the ticket. If something is actually being done for this money then irrespective of whether the ticket itself is £5 or £50 or whatever the task and effort is the same.

Sounds like a scam to me...

Paul_the_Painter

The way the industry works is that the promoter hires the venue (say NEC) and decides a price for tickets (say £30) the promoter gets £30 for each ticket sold, the booking fee is really the profit margin for the ticket seller, if there was no booking fee they would be buying for £30 and selling for £30 - not a way to run a business! If they got rid of the £5 booking fee the tickets would not be £30 but £35 with no booking fee.

They are going to get their money somehow.

Searcher

Paul_the_Painter wrote:

The way the industry works is that the promoter hires the venue (say NEC) and decides a price for tickets (say £30) the promoter gets £30 for each ticket sold, the booking fee is really the profit margin for the ticket seller, if there was no booking fee they would be buying for £30 and selling for £30 - not a way to run a business! If they got rid of the £5 booking fee the tickets would not be £30 but £35 with no booking fee.

They are going to get their money somehow.

I don't know how the industry works and I'm not doubting you but I do find it hard to believe that ticket agencies don't get the tickets at a reduced rate.
Walk around Leicester sqaure and you will see any number of kiosks selling tickets for West end shows at heavily discounted prices.
I've just booked 4 tickets to see Kevin Bloody Wilson at the Hayes theatre in Oct.
Do a search for the Hayes theatre on Google and the first hit is for the ticket agency ents24. They wanted a booking fee of £2.75 per ticket which doesn't sound a lot but at £16.50 per ticket it worked out at just over 16% of the basic ticket price, which to my way of thinking is a pretty good mark up. Then they wanted something like £3.50 for Postage.
I phoned the theatre direct and got the same tickets with no booking fee and £1 for postage. A total "saving" of £13.50 which isn't far off the price of another ticket!
If it walks like a rip off and talks like a rip off it must be a rip off

peter_the_piper

I went to order some Jimmy Carr tickets at my local theatre and was charged a booking fee. It was not until later I saw a small notice which said that the ticket office was run by Ticketmaster. If I read it correctly you are going to pay wherever you go.
Peter.

Becles

If you buy tickets at the ticket office at Sunderland AFC, you can purchase them at face value.

If you telephone the ticket office, you get through to the same staff who post the tickets out to you. There are booking fees charged per ticket if you do this.

I appreciate there is postage involved in posting out the tickets, so I would happily pay an additional 50p per order to cover the stamp and envelope.

I don't understand why the telephone attracts a booking fee per ticket though, as it's the same staff who answer the phone and it's the same amount of effort for them to either hand the tickets over the counter or put them in an envelope.

It's really unfair on supporters who don't live/work near the ground, as they can't get there in person so have no choice but to pay the fee.