Manchester shows

[ptn]

Can you clarify - I have an option to que at a box office ( Sunderland empire) is my local one. Once I get to the front would they have an allocation there or do they pick from a central pot - What I am trying to find out is how are the best seats ( say stall seats allocated to Ticketmaster or the Box offices?

I'm afraid I don't know the setup at the sunderland empire, but if they are working as a Ticketmaster ticket centre, they will be working from the same pot as the call centre/website/other ticket centres.

I've just had a look at the Sunderland Empire's website and they are a Live Nation venue, which means they can take bookings for any other Live Nation venue (like the Opera House. We currently sell for Live Nation, and the S. Empire website says their phoneline will trip through to Ticketmaster when it is busy. This all strongly suggests to me that they will be working from the same system as we do.

Before I left work, I had a look and the allocation was showing on our systems. Ticketmaster seem to have the large majority (about 80-90%) of the seats, and pretty much all of the good seats (front stalls, from circle), so assuming the Empire is selling from the same pot, they will have access to these good seats. Seems to me it's a good bet for you to book with them if you can get to the front of the queue.

[laughinlen]

Touts are already selling tickets for Manchester

http://www.worldticketshop.com/concerts ... manchester

What a feckin' god awful world we live in.

Ta Ken

Never mind that....e-bay are selling the pre sale passwords!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[rhona]

ptn - thanks for the info and keeping us up to date "from the inside." It is appreciated! x

[annie blue]

ptn, anywhere in Leeds that would have the TicketMaster 'pot' of tickets? I've taken the whole day off to book tomorrow. Thanks for the info btw, you're a star

[ptn]

I wouldn't worry too much about this because they are selling tickets for Bruce Springsteen priced at £193.45 each (standing) and I saw these at Ticketmaster last night at £55. So I think they are just fishing to see if anyone would pay that much...then they would buy at less than that....and send them to you and trouser the profit!!!

I really hate touts. The scary thing is the number of calls we get from people telling us they've been ripped off. The worst was a call my friend took where someone had bought some two tickets for the Rolling Stones. They had been advised that they were 'best in the house' in row AA (there was no row AA at this venue), but when they got to the gig, it turned out they were sat pretty much as far away and as high up as could be. They paid £1000 for these tickets.

I can understand why people buy from touts - if you really love an artist, you will often be willing to pay over the odds to see them play - but it's a problem that as long as people are willing to buy from them, they will bulk-buy tickets when they go onsale and force the prices up.

If you don't manage to get a ticket from an official source, I'd recommend trying Scarlet Mist (http://www.scarletmist.co.uk/). It's a website for people to advertise spare tickets for events at face-value only. Its becoming a common practice for fans to buy a coupla more tickets than they need, then sell them at face value on scarlet mist or ebay to counteract the touts, which is nice.

If you really must buy from a tout, make sure to get a visual confirmation of the tickets (a photo showing the seat numbers etc) and get the booking reference number - if you have this reference, you can check the seat location with the original vendor.

Ticketmaster have a department dedicated to looking out for touted tickets (our policy is that resale at above-face-value can cause cancellation of tickets). I've heard of people getting booking references from touts, then giving these references to us to get the tickets cancelled. I'm not sure how often this happens, but it sounds fun!

[ptn]

ptn, anywhere in Leeds that would have the TicketMaster 'pot' of tickets?

Apparently there is a ticket centre in Leeds. Info is halfway down the page here: http://www.ticketmaster.co.uk/etc/northeast.html

Glad I could be of service to you guys. I know how crap it can be to miss out on an artist you love, so I figure anything I can do to 'share the wealth' can't be a bad thing

[annie blue]

thank you ptn. in your very professional opinion what do you think is the best way - online or at the agent in Leeds???? i could be down there early but i notice they open at 10 - not much chance of getting back home in time to book on t'web if plan a fails. oh the agonies of it all, i just wish i had my tickets in my mitts. this is like christmas eve when i was a child

[John J]

Ticketmaster uk have got the Manchester gigs listed,
but all sites now indicate 3 shows only

[stan]

as much as we love LC,beat the touts and dont buy off them they are money pinching vermin.

[harryboro]

Hi ptn

Many thanks for your info. I will go to Sunderland Civic bright and early, Will the local Ticketmaster Box Offices ( Darlington as an example) be a better bet than the internet??

[ptn]

what do you think is the best way - online or at the agent in Leeds????

That store is only open at 10 on a Monday. It says they open at 9 on Tue-Sat, so they should be okay for getting tickets.

The advantage of a ticket centre is it's like being face to face with a call center agent. What they have on their screens will be the same as we do in the call centre, so if you get to the front of the queue for 10am, you'll essentially be skipping the phone queues. Once the agent has the tickets held on the screen, they're pretty much yours.

It's pretty much the same thing for internet - the website can take a lot more bookings at once, so it's technically faster, but as someone said above, on busy mornings like tomorrow, it can get so busy that the whole thing slows down. There's also a 'timout' thing on the website where you have to make the booking in a certain amount of time, otherwise it will put the tickets back out for sale. It's there to stop people putting loads of tickets onold and blocking others from the good tickets, but it can catch people out - this is why we recommend setting up an account before the onsale time.

I think I'd recommend a ticket centre, but it's totally dependent on how busy it is there (and how fast the staff are ), so I wouldn't like to guarantee anything. Maybe nip down there earlyish to scope it out and, if needs be, nip home and get them online?

Or - the ultimate - go to a ticket centre armed with a mobile phone and a PDA - try all three options at the same time!

[Rmb4hawk]

One day a real rain is going to come and wash all the touts off the streets!

Does all this mayhem remind anyone of the ending of Titanic?

You're all acting like Billy Zane, paying extra so he and Rose can get one of the lifeboats.

What happened to women and children first. I can't talk though, I think deep down we look out for our own survival. And in times of the flood we are all looking to take refuge on Leonard's Arc; two by two, harah, harah.

All I can say is may the best man win. And to the losers (and there will be some), better luck next time. He has already given us so much.

Thank you Leonard

[hydriot]

I've just tried a dry run for Manchester, pretending I want a top-price ticket for Evita, and it was worse than random. After I rejected a ticket and tried again, five times it offered me the same ticket again: A26 - in the front row but way over to the left.

If the silly computer is going to do that to me tomorrow, I would prefer to book face-to-face, because hopefully the human-being will know how to circumvent such antics.

[hydriot]

I'm afraid i don't know why the 19th isn't on sale tomorrow.

Leonard is playing on 19 June too. It appears that the entire seat allocation has been purchased by the Guardian, which is going to make those seats available on 4 April ... so, a second bite of the cherry.

[thepartisan]

Tickets for Manchester Opera House go on sale, via Ticketmaster, Friday 14/03/08 @10a.m.
I last saw Leonard live @ the Manchester Apollo in '82. He was magnificent & he did 7 (SEVEN) encores !!! HE'S MY MAN !!!