Thursday, January 07, 2010

(1) Comments

Another Mets ticket office anecdote

SS

Ed posted this as a comment but I thought it warranted a post.  Good info here.


Shannon,

I have a 15 day ticket plan, the orginal deadline was Dec. 18th. I called to say that I wanted to move my seats within the same price range but to a better view and gave them the location ( 528 to 524). They said I needed to take advantage of the on-line partial renew plan and that my name would be placed on a list in the order I renewed. They explained to me that the section I was looking to move into was sold out last year and I needed to wait until they had a renewal totals in,seasons ticket holders, then partial season holders and then 15 day holders had preference.

I made my partial payment and after not hearing from them since the deadline past I called them today. They stated they were currently going through the process of counting non renewals on season tickets, moving 40 game plan requests and 15 day plans on the list who renewed would be getting calls next week. They had my request and stated basically that I would probably get my request based on availability and when I renewed.

They were very helpful, polite and stated everything very clearly. 

Thanks Ed, good explanation, and I enjoy this type of information-cycle that we had today on the site.  I think it's good for fans to have this type of info-exchange.  Much appreciated.


Personally, I still think they should just take your money and move you quickly. 


My brain:  Wouldn't a computer or excel spreadsheet be able to quickly count the non-renewals?  I've never ran a ticket office, what do I know.  Just seems strange from afar, but I'm happy to hear they were helpful, polite, clear and that you came away satisfied.


Keep this stuff coming Mets fans!


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1 Response to "Another Mets ticket office anecdote"
jmp said :
January 8, 2010 at 12:32 PM
I'd love to see the Mets upgrade their online ticket offerings, as there are going to be fewer tickets on StubHub this year, and those of us who have relied on StubHub recently have gotten spoiled with their system.

The Mets online ticketing system assumes it knows better than you. You tell it how many tickets you want at a particular price range or range of seats, and it offers you the best seats available. It gives absolutely no flexibility. It gives you no opportunity to express a preference for the first or third base side when talking about tickets that are available on either side. It gives you no opportunity to express any kind of preference.

People have different taste in tickets, and the Mets should use software that allows people to buy tickets based on those preferences. For some people, the best seat available means as close to the field as possible, no matter what side of the field, even in the outfield, while for others, the last row of the upper deck behind the plate is a better seat than anywhere down the line, no matter how close to the field. Some people like aisle seats, others hate having people climb over them constantly.

Those of us who have been using StubHub have seen a better system. StubHub shows you which sections have availability, and which rows within a section. It's not perfect, but it's much better than the system the Mets currently use.

If the Mets wanted to take a quantum leap, they should look at the system used by one of their namesakes. The Metropolitan Opera uses a fantastic online ticketing system that lets ticket buyers choose a section, then see a seating chart showing exactly which seats are available and which are taken for the performance for which they're buying tickets. They even mark some seats as partial view, discounting them accordingly. It gives the ticket buyer maximum flexibility, and respects that just like baseball fans, different opera fans have different seating preferences. (And I always find that among opera fans who like sports, they're overwhelmingly baseball fans.)

Adding that kind of flexibility might actually help the Mets sell a few tickets to people who wouldn't otherwise buy them...

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