Event Ticket Refunds - Arnold Sports Festival

Emx

Need some advice please!

In 2021 I bought tickets to attend the Arnold Sports Festival, through Eventbrite. We bought 2 separate tickets to see a live Q&A with Arnold Schwarzenegger - these were separate tickets to the main festival, though main festival tickets are required to attend the Q&A. Arnold was unable to attend, and the organisation rolled our tickets forward to the 2022 event.

2022 rolls around and the Q&A has been rearranged for the Saturday of the event. We buy our day tickets as they are required to attend the additional session, and then with a week's notice they change the event to the Sunday so we are then forced to buy Sunday entry tickets also. I had also bought a ticket for a separate photo opportunity on the Saturday which was also cancelled, though with notice.

Sunday comes around, and ten minutes before the Q&A is meant to start, we go to take our seats only to find out that it has also been cancelled. We were not informed of this - the only announcement made was apparently on the Friday on Instagram (which I didn't have) with no other effort to contact ticket holders made.

Since then, despite a public message or two on Instagram and one or two generic mass e-mails saying that ticket-holders would be contacted and receive refunds, nothing has actually happened.

I sent a follow up e-mail today:

Hello,

Please can you update me on the status of refunds for the Live Arnold Q&A event? The lack of communication and delays in processing are not acceptable. I have attempted to contact the organisation multiple times including through Eventbrite and Facebook.

I originally purchased two tickets for the 2021 event, which were rolled over to the 2022 event after the original cancellation. I was then forced to buy extra day tickets for the 2022 event after the Q&A was changed to the Sunday at short notice. Then, the Sunday event was also cancelled - with no notification to ticket holders other than on Instagram, which I did not have access to. We only found out that the event was not going ahead ten minutes before when we went to take up our seats.

I also bought tickets for the Jean Claude Van Damme photo opportunity for 2022 which was also cancelled and transferred to this year (2023). I bought the tickets with intentions to attend in 2022, and cannot attend the 2023 dates. Even if I was available on the new dates, this option would incur additional undue financial burden due to travel and accommodation costs that would be required.

I require refunds for the following:

2x Arnold Q&A tickets 2021 £134.40

2x Sunday day tickets 2022 £123.20

1x Jean Claude Van Damme photo op ticket 2022 £230.99

Total: £488.59

I have attached the Eventbrite receipts.

Please respond at the earliest convenience.

I got an auto-reply, saying the following:

Hello and thank you for your email.

If you are emailing regarding a refund or the non-appearance of Arnold at the Arnold Sports Festival UK 2022, unfortunately we are no longer working with the Arnold Classic group and we don’t have access to the website or individual email accounts as these are now owned and managed by the US company. Therefore, this mailbox is no longer monitored by the UK team.

If your email is regarding Jean Claude Van Damme tickets, we apologise this is taking longer than we first anticipated but please be reassured we have your information and we will be in touch with you in due course.

 Kind regards

Customer Service Team

Arnold Sports Festival UK

I don't believe I can use Section 75 as they were two separate tickets (i.e. items) for each event, so no item was over the £100 threshold other than the JCVD photo op.

I'm not quite sure where to go next...

sheramber

You could try a chargeback if it is less than 120 days since the date if the event.

Lukasx123

Any advice for how to pursue a refund outside of the chargeback period?  I don't actually know whether the organiser is still active and plan to hold another event this year, or whether they have liquidated.  I do know that they have changed their brand now.