Central to the public relations battle Manchester United is currently fighting against ticket touts, this has been the ongoing Club Manchester Manchester Manchester Manchester Manchester. In the United Kingdom, resale of tickets is outlawed entirely. Companies based overseas are taking advantage of loopholes in this law to cheat. Manchester United has calculated that touts now have 10-15% of its 47,000 season-ticketted seats. This is a really unacceptable access for true fans that would really love to be able to watch these games.
For major clubs, this is a huge issue. Meanwhile, the biggest teams from the north and every single team based in London are prime fallbacks for ticket touts. Overseas fans, unwilling to deal with Manchester United’s punitive ticketing system, will shell out the high dollar amount for tickets. This has alarmed some of the club’s management, who are working hard to shield their hardcore supporters from the predatory practices of their new overlords.
In a bid to tackle this problem, Manchester United have employed a number of tactics. For example, the club announced that season ticket holders relinquish an average of 5,000 – 7,500 tickets per game for “repurposing.” In addition, this gives the organizers the opportunity to redistribute those tickets to true fans who didn’t get one the first time around. On September 20, during a Premier League match against Chelsea, Manchester United successfully reclaimed 2,000 tickets that had been returned by season ticket holders.
To better enforce its policies, Manchester United has suspended more than 4,500 active users from buying tickets. Of these, 35 tickets were flagged as having been promoted. Furthermore, the club has hired temporary staff to purchase tickets on the secondary market in order to prevent touting behavior outright.
“At times, these checks annoy some fans,” stated a source from Manchester United, “but at the same time fans are telling us to do more to make sure away tickets are going to the fans who deserve them.
Furthermore, the club’s policy requires that any ticket downloaded over four times may be subject to blocking at the turnstile. During the initial five home games of the season, Manchester United either blocked or canceled approximately 22,000 tickets in an effort to maintain integrity in its ticketing system.
The fiscal consequences of ticket touting are significant. Incredibly, one loyal supporter forked out a whopping £900 for a ticket. They were completely excited to see Manchester United’s barnstorming 4-1 win over Liverpool, right. One other backer had paid over 800 pounds just to get a ticket to watch the 2-2 draw at Tottenham. These ridiculous prices serve as proof of how far fans are willing to go to get guaranteed access to matches.
The club’s leadership is aware that they are just now starting to gain some level of consensus about who should be held accountable for their season ticket holders. Now Manchester United is truly gaining ground. They’re passionate about ensuring that tickets aren’t going to all of their most dedicated fans.
“We occasionally carry out targeted checks on a proportion of away tickets to ensure that the ticket holder is who it is supposed to be,” said a source from the club. There aren’t a huge number of all of these, but there are always a few examples where tickets have been sold on at grossly inflated prices, gouging the fans who purchased them and depriving normal matchgoers of a spot. Our away ticket allocations are very popular. We owe it to our most loyal fans—the ones who turn out every week, rain or shine, win or lose—to ensure that tickets are given to them.