The unofficial AFC Rushden & Diamonds messageboard

[quote="Dougie]And so far as trading standards are concerned, I am pretty sure that they will see this as a matter for the leagues and for the clubs themselves to decide amongst themselves and as a matter area outside their area of involvement / competance. In short, an entirely commercial decision not requiring their involvement.[/quote]

I think they will too, but I'll be asking the question anyway

The main reason for querying it is that the club have said, based on their own official website announcement, that this pricing is as a result of the BSP directive which has in effect been forced upon them. As a consumer I am being adversley affected by that decision, a decision that has been made by someone else other than the club (the supplier of the goods I am buying). The BSP are forcing the club to charge their customers more for an inferior product. Sure I can pay an extra £15 to get a discount, but what of those supporters who only come to 2 or 3 games a season (for example), they will be faced with either paying the fee, or £17 to stand - that is unfair when other people at the game will be apying £17 for a premium seat (this is backed up by pricing policies at many other grounds that prove that pitchside seats are worth more in the eyes of the clubs).

Like I say, it'll be interesting to see what they say eh? I'll let you all know when/if I get a response.........in the meantime, see you all at the scum - I can't get to Bath sadly

You know if you make the point about the directive being the central problem, it might cause Trading Standard to request a copy from the Conference would they be a position to refuse Trading Standards (that's not rhetorical, since I'd be deeply interested to find out)? If they did get a copy, it would be good to hear from a third party on this.

I've no idea about if Trading Standards can force them to disclose anything, but the words "imposed upon us" (which forms part of their announcement posted on Friday 6th August) indicates the club have been forced to do so against their will, if the BSP hadn't imposed this directive I presume we'd be looking at paying £14 (with no membership fee) on the PDB and £17 elsewhere for a seat? Its this unfairness that I will be challenging - how can a group of faceless people dictate the prices a business can charge? But like I say, this is the BSP :lol:

PigmanRDFC wrote:[quote="Dougie]And so far as trading standards are concerned, I am pretty sure that they will see this as a matter for the leagues and for the clubs themselves to decide amongst themselves and as a matter area outside their area of involvement / competance. In short, an entirely commercial decision not requiring their involvement.

I think they will too, but I'll be asking the question anyway

The main reason for querying it is that the club have said, based on their own official website announcement, that this pricing is as a result of the BSP directive which has in effect been forced upon them. As a consumer I am being adversley affected by that decision, a decision that has been made by someone else other than the club (the supplier of the goods I am buying). The BSP are forcing the club to charge their customers more for an inferior product. Sure I can pay an extra £15 to get a discount, but what of those supporters who only come to 2 or 3 games a season (for example), they will be faced with either paying the fee, or £17 to stand - that is unfair when other people at the game will be apying £17 for a premium seat (this is backed up by pricing policies at many other grounds that prove that pitchside seats are worth more in the eyes of the clubs).

Like I say, it'll be interesting to see what they say eh? I'll let you all know when/if I get a response.........in the meantime, see you all at the scum - I can't get to Bath sadly [/quote][/quote]

Purely and simply the decision by the BSP is price fixing - something the OFT is strongly clamping down on at the moment - I wonder how they would view this......

I feel there's a lot of negativity about this subject, so lets try and be positive and come up with some ways of changing it.

I was chatting the other day to AD (Airwair Diamond) at the Bath game. Those of you who have been around the forums for some time will know who I mean. I have also added a few of my ideas to his thoughts.

He suggested that the club start to operate a mini season ticket scheme, where by you can buy say five tickets in a batch for say £75 (debanke). You could also get a batch of ten for say £140. This will then give a you better discount (than £17) and I would expect it would generate more income for the club, as its a more flexible option for the supporter. The club would then raise a few more pounds than they would have if the supporter had opted for the full season ticket.

This would then allow the infrequent/former season ticket holders to get a few tickets at a reduced price or turn up at the turnstiles on the day to pay a higher price for single games the same as visiting supporters. (there could still be ways I'm sure to change it even more)

You could also make the tickets valid for any league game in the season, therefore making it even easier to sort out what games you want to go to. If you then decide to go to more games you can purchase another book of five tickets or pay the higher price on the gate.

Why not go a little further and say you can use your mini book to bring a friend to the same game. More income for the club through other sales, bar and food etc.

Would this be acceptable to the Conference? I would expect so as they have no issues with the 23 game season tickets at a reduced price at the moment.