IPG/Delta Force Paintball - anyone with any experience of them?

Maggymay

Gee who thinks the post defending Delta Force was put there by one of them?
I absolutely agree with Clarity post in regards to the refund. I work for a company in the refunds department and know that more often than not fighting hard gets results. Threaten to go public. I can only assume that 'delta Force' (who also trade as IPG) survive by people not hearing about things like this. Alternatively I have used a similar company and they were great. I guess its just one of those things...

Mikeinho

Paintball is a complete rip-off IMHO. I'm afraid to say that this has always been the case with paintball companies. They make about 80-90% of their money selling paint-balls alone.

They buy in paint-balls at about 1p per ball. However, the standard amount they charge YOU for the first 100 balls is 10 quid, making that a 1000% mark-up. Even if you buy in bulk, you are still looking at about 6p per ball.

They almost ALWAYS say no to bringing your own paint-balls, and use excuses like 'for safety reasons' or the classic 'you wouldn't be allowed to bring your own alcohol to the pub'... which is simply not the case if you have ever paid corkage. However, could you imagine if you went go-karting and being asked to pay £10 for the first litre of THEIR petrol, and £6 for every litre thereafter?

As a smoker, I don't mind the idea of wasting money for a cheap thrill, but at least I've never spent more than £5 a day on that bad habit.

Okay, so they are a legitimate business and they have overheads like every other business. But why not just charge up-front and let people get on with having fun instead of them seeing coins shooting out of the barrel every time they pull the trigger?

If you go on their websites and check the T&Cs, they always have something that says 'non-refundable'. This is because they are so used to people turning up and refusing to pay extortionate amounts for paint-balls, that they have to legally cover themselves from being taken to court.

Don't get me wrong... paint-balling is a great day-out, but don't think for a minute that it's a cheap day-out. It's all about whether you think it's value for money... and I clearly don't !!

izvetta

hi all ... iam reading your somments on paintballing ,.. and i can agree that it is not cheap.... but you have to haggle .... i see that people said they got 8 tickets for £50 ... i haggled and haggled and got 32 for £100... they also said i had a year to use them but i aksed for longer and got a year and ahalf...
its true that they dont tell you all the details .. they make u think they are doing aspecial deal for you by reduing the ball to £6 but its not true...

i thought it was a good idea cause £10 is waht you can easily spend each time at the bar ..so i wanted to do something different rather than go out and get !!!!ed....

my conclusion is .. you have to know what your getting into ... there is always place to haggle and get a discount ...

stonewash

Hey guys,

I’ve been working for Delta Force for about a year now and thought I would try to resolve some of the issues that keep popping up on this thread.

First of all, IPG is a separate company that sell tickets for Delta Force and other large paintball operators. We cannot take any responsibility for the information they give, or don’t give, in their sales pitch. The salesmen work on commission and some of them have been known to omit certain information. However, they do offer a great deal and bring paintball into the lives of those that wouldn’t normally consider it.

It’s hard to predict how many paintballs you and your group will need for a days paintball. There are many different styles of play and some people are naturally more trigger-happy than others.
Here’s a list of paintball prices:
- £5.99 per 100 paintballs (when purchased in bulk e.g. boxes of 2000)
- £6.99 per 100 paintballs (when purchased in bags of 100)
- Paintball prices in Scotland are £1 more per 100 paintballs due to transportation costs.

All I can say is if you’re interested in paintballing but worried about the price then visit our website (paintballgames.co.uk) or call our booking office on 0844 477 5050 and see what kind of deal we can offer you.

Paintball can be quite expensive and may not be for everyone but with Delta Force you get a lot more for your money. We offer movie-set quality game zones, top of the range equipment and the highest safety rating of any paintball company in the country. Visit our website or call our booking office to find out more.
I hope this has been of some use.

Happy paintballing!

Superfulcrum

Hi All

It's a real con if you ask me, the whole issue of the cost of ammo and how much you are going to use is not really made obvious with these 'street sold' ticket packs.

Get people 'in the zone', get em hooked, and then charge a totally ridiculous price for them to carry on playing, a bit unpleasant when you are dealing with kids birthdays etc.

You can pick up 2000 paintballs for around £30 from any well stocked sports/shooting outlet and I should think they go for half that on ebay. With the quantity that are being used they could charge half what they do and still be making a killing. Everyone expects millionaire lifestyles these days for doing jack.....


just seen I missed the 1p a ball post above so I'm going back to sleep for another hundred years

concerned_paintballer

I have to say, paintball fields are not making as much money as some of the people posting here think they are. The field where i work sells paintballs for $8.00cdn per hundred balls, and $120.00 per case on their fields. the entry fee is $10.00 per day, and the air is built into the cost of paint. We simply provide you with one of our CO2 or HPA tanks to use while you are playing. Equipment rental is $6.00 that provides the player with Marker, hopper, mask, tank. all of these prices include tax.

If you actually take into consideration the costs associated with operating a paintball facility these prices are more than fare in my mind. I remember when I first started playing paintball we were paying $0.25 per ball and a case of paint at wholesale was around $200.00. Wow thats a big difference. we have to remember that the overhead to run/operate a successful paintball business with an indoor field, will average around $10,000.00cdn per month where I am located (that is an indoor field approx 6000 square feet). that is what needs to be made before a field owner even puts a penny into their pockets. that would include lease/rent or mortgage payment, staffing cost, building maintenance, electricity, insurance coverage, phone, and maybe a little advertising.

I know that the local players who frequent where I work shoot on average 300 to 500 paintballs each per day.if you said that the average was 400 paintballs and the field fee then that would mean that the field would bring in approx $42.00 per player and after cost of paint and air and remove the tax from the equation(as the field owner does not receive this money) approx $25.00. from this all overhead must be paid. This would mean that the field will have to have 400 players a month just to break even. I am not sure what your areas are like but I know that we do not always receive that many players every month, and that is before the field owner seesa penny.

Sorry for the rant

jpurdy

I agree with concerned_paintballer. Like most other businesses, paintball operators probably aren't making as much money these days. I agree with haggling to try and get a better rate, but a lot of people want everything for free nowadays.

Before you go on and have a rant about how expensive paintballs are, have another read of concerned_paintballers post and think about how much it costs to run a paintball centre. Especially considering they are usually only open on Saturdays (and Sundays for the more successful ones).

I've asked about bringing my own paint before and one of the reasons they said I couldn't was because of safety. There are a lot of different ways to tamper with a paintball, including freezing them overnight. So i'd much rather pay a bit more on the day to use their paintballs, than be shot at with frozen paintballs that would result in a very painful day out.

vlad12

The guy selling it on the street sold me 20 tickets for $80 dollars and told me that you get 1000 free paint balls for every 10 tickets. And now I found out that he lied and I actually don't get any free paint balls.

Chrisjezter

I'd just like to add my thoughts to this thread to warn anyone considering going to a Delta Force paintball site of what to expect.

We were at their Wakefield site this weekend as a group of 11 on a stag do. The first thing to point out is that they seem to have no restrictions on the number of players they accept, so on arrival (at the prescribed 0915 prompt~don't bother) car parking was a joke, and it took almost and hour and a half to process everyone through to the 'base camp' holding area. During this time we noticed from listening to others in the crowd that there are several 'offers' out there - free entry with the yellow pages Leeds advert got our attention as we had paid full price - but the marshalls stuck to the script and we were processed through.

The paint is indeed at the prices advertised. Worthy of note is that the safety equipment does not include gloves - about £6 - £7 to buy if memory serves and if you have anything like a big head seriously consider buying your own mask and taking it. One size does not fit all and several of us had blinding headaches from the poorly fitting masks.

Games were a complete joke. 30 - 40 players per team and about 10 teams on the day. Huge delays as the few marshals handed out the guns and then wait - trek to the game zones (5 mins) then wait. Poorly explained games, and due to the marshals having to cope with so many people also poorly marshalled - cheating was rife and unchecked, and there were several dangerous close range incidents that went un-noticed along with shooting from the dead zone - there were just too many people. Guns were of poor quality, often firing 4/5 balls at a time (money making ploy?) sometimes not firing at all. To top it off the marshals kept taking us to the wrong zones - they were already being used. Walk back to the gun area, wait. Hand back gun for it too be tested (I assume) and prepared for the lottery of the next game (you did not keep the same gun) and back for more paint. Because of the number of people playing each game would take 200 balls min - thats about 50 shots at 4 balls per trigger pull.

I have played paintball several times over the years for parties and the like and have never been left feeling that I had had such bad value for money as we recieved at Delta Force Wakefield. If you would like to be treated like an idiot, herded around all day, play games with far too many people in them with poor equipment and weak marshalling then Delta Force Wakefield is for you. If you want a decent game of paintball then I seriously suggest you find a smaller, independant site who rely on return business rather than hard selling in the street. We will not be retuning.

drain_boy

IPG THE WORLD LEADER IN PAINTBALL

IT SHOULD BE IPG THE WORLD LEADER IN TAKING THE PXXX OUT OF PEOPLE.

I WAS SOLD THE VIP TICKETS ON THE 26/10/2010 FOR £60.00
I TOLD IPG THAT IT WAS MY SON'S 13TH BIRTHDAY PARTY AND THEY SAID THESE TICKETS WERE JUST RIGHT FOR THAT AGE PARTY.

I COULD GO ON ABOUT WHAT THEY SAID HE COULD DO AND WHAT HE WOULD GET BUT THAT WOULD TAKE ALL DAY.
MY POINT IS THEY JUST MISS LEAD YOU.
AS FOR GETTING MY MONEY BACK, I SENT 4 E MAILS TO THEM AND GOT NO REPLY.
I HAVE NOW GOT COMSUMER DIRECT INVOLVED.
I RANG DELTA FORCE AND THEY DONT WANT TO KNOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
S0 TO SUM IT UP DONT BUY FROM IPG OR USE DELTA FORCE.:mad: