Tickets refund

YuvalCohen

I purchased 2 two tickets for a ballet performance at the Royal Albert Hall (RAH) for the Nutcracker. 
The show  was postponed by a year (From December 2021 to December 2022).

I asked RAH for a full refund... and their answer:
"If you are unable to attend the rescheduled date, we can either process a refund back to the original payment card used or transfer the funds to a credit voucher that is redeemable for one year. The refund to card will be for the face value of the tickets whereas the voucher will be for the full amount. If you would like a refund or voucher, please call our Box Office on 020 7589 8212 and our team will be able to help you with this. "

They specifically didn't offer full refund to the card!

On top of the face value (of the 2 tickets), RAH charged total of £15.48
These are: 

• Standard handling fee: 12.48
• Restoration Levy: £3

Questions:

1. Is this legal not to offer a full refund ? (consider the consumer rights acts)
2. Since I paid using credit card (and the full charge was over £100), can I claim full refund using section 75 of credit cards?

Are there any ways to receive full refund not in a voucher?

Where should I warn other people about it, after all this is Royal Albert Hall, and I expected them to offer an immediate full refund, they disappoint me! I will never purchase another tickets from them under such terms & conditions. 

Note:
RAH has over 5,000 seats. If for each seat RAH earns £8 due to event cancel (or postponed) that is £40,000. This incentivize RAH to cancel and postpone performances. 

Aylesbury_Duck

I think, but I'm not entirely sure, that they can offer the two solutions they've outlined.  Check the terms and conditions of your purchase.  Do they say anything about the handling fees and levy?  RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets.

As for your note, no it doesn't incentivise RAH to cancel performances.  They will a. lose high-margin sales of things like refreshments, merchandise and programmes, and b. they won't be in business long if their MO is to be a performance venue that doesn't have performances 

As for where you go to warn others, nothing wrong with a factually accurate review on any one of the numerous ratings websites, but let's face it, a venue like the RAH is not going to struggle to fill seats, even if you warn thousands of people.

YuvalCohen

Aylesbury_Duck said:

...  RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets....

Thanks much for the detailed reply.
As per: RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets

The tickets were sent via email...  does anyone can really claim that it justify £8- per ticket???

To be honest, when I purchased the tickets from RAH, I did not expect such a behaviour! From now on, I'll boycott them. (Just think what will happen if a high-street shop would charge £8- 'handling fees' for each returned item...)

photome

YuvalCohen said:

Aylesbury_Duck said:

...  RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets....

Thanks much for the detailed reply.
As per: RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets

The tickets were sent via email...  does anyone can really claim that it justify £8- per ticket???

To be honest, when I purchased the tickets from RAH, I did not expect such a behaviour! From now on, I'll boycott them. (Just think what will happen if a high-street shop would charge £8- 'handling fees' for each returned item...)

I think most venues/ticket sales would be the same, so you may end up not being able to go to any venues if you boycott them all

having said that I would hope for a full refund if it was the venue that cancelled

Aylesbury_Duck

YuvalCohen said:

Aylesbury_Duck said:

...  RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets....

Thanks much for the detailed reply.
As per: RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets

The tickets were sent via email...  does anyone can really claim that it justify £8- per ticket???

To be honest, when I purchased the tickets from RAH, I did not expect such a behaviour! From now on, I'll boycott them. (Just think what will happen if a high-street shop would charge £8- 'handling fees' for each returned item...)

But you were happy to agree to the handling fee when you bought the tickets.  I completely agree that £8 is a farcical for sending an email, but the only way to (sometimes) avoid it is to collect the tickets from the venue yourself.  My local theatre offers that, I've no idea if the RAH does.

Manxman_in_exile

Aylesbury_Duck said:

YuvalCohen said:

Aylesbury_Duck said:

...  RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets....

Thanks much for the detailed reply.
As per: RAH would argue they've earned the handling fee, because they've handled the tickets

The tickets were sent via email...  does anyone can really claim that it justify £8- per ticket???

To be honest, when I purchased the tickets from RAH, I did not expect such a behaviour! From now on, I'll boycott them. (Just think what will happen if a high-street shop would charge £8- 'handling fees' for each returned item...)

But you were happy to agree to the handling fee when you bought the tickets...

That's what I was going to say too, but, on reflection... I might be more than happy to pay £8 handling fee and just treat it as part of the overall cost of attending a performance that I really wanted to see - but if the venue then cancelled the performance I think I'd be pretty annoyed if they tried to keep the handling fee too... I'd expect it all back.

And if they are saying they'd reimburse the £8 if the OP accepted a credit voucher rather than a cash refund, then I think that's a bit like adding insult to injury.

Sandtree

RAH may be just agents selling the tickets on behalf of the production company just like Ticketmaster or any other site. The production company has cancelled the show so is refunding the ticket price, the agents selling the tickets are passing that refund back and keeping their fees for having done the processing etc.

YuvalCohen said:

RAH has over 5,000 seats. If for each seat RAH earns £8 due to event cancel (or postponed) that is £40,000. This incentivize RAH to cancel and postpone performances. 

That is assuming all 5,000 seats are sold via them which is an exceptionally big assumption

Secondly, you clearly are not considering 1) all the lost sales across the bars etc they dont get because of the cancellations which are from people who booked directly and indirectly and 2) how much it costs per day to run a business like the RAH, most of which will be standing costs irrespective of what goes on in any given night.

Finally... have you seen their accounts recently? Unsurprisingly they are somewhat decimated and their balancesheet is a quarter of what it was pre-pandemic... theatres etc are not doing well out of cancelling performances etc, they are dying because of it.

cx6

This is some info:

https://www.resolver.co.uk/consumer-rights/ticket-sales-event-cancelled-complaints

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5759397/peter-kay-tickets-cancelled-but-no-refund-of-fees-from-ticketmaster