Fringe organisers launch inquiry into ticketing fiasco
Joke system leaves promoters baying for blood
Posted in Management, 11th August 2008 12:54 GMT
Watch Now : Virtual Machine Movement with Hyper-V
Officials at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe are to launch an independent inquiry into the failure of its box office system.
Tickets for the Fringe – which runs from 3-25 August – were supposed to be available from 10 June. However the festival’s new box office system suffered several major technical cock-ups that forced organisers to repeatedly suspend sales, much to the annoyance of punters and promoters.
Glasgow-based Pivotal Integration Ltd provided the new service. But, as we previously reported, the firm failed to cope with customer demand for the festival’s 2,088 shows and some people waited more than seven weeks for tickets to arrive that is if they turned up at all.
The Times reports today that the Fringe will undertake an inquiry into the disastrous implementation of its box office system.
Members of the Fringe board are attending a meeting for reps from 200 venues across Edinburgh now to discuss the debacle that left many shows oversold and some customers without tickets.
Curtain Compensation call
Some promoters – those who ordered the inquiry – are understood to be seeking compensation from the Fringe after the failure of its box office system. It is expected that the board will announce a new temporary general manager to oversee the final two weeks of the festival.
In the eight weeks leading up to the Fringe technical problems crippled the newly-installed box office system, preventing tickets from being printed or posted to customers. That meant that advance sales were removed from many venues’ budgets, meaning promoters took a direct hit from the technical blunders.
It’s expected that tens of thousands of pounds in compensation will be claimed. One promoter, Laura Mackenzie Stuart of Universial Arts claimed that the Fringe was on the brink of “financial ruin” following the cock-up.
“The failure to plan and successfully implement [the new box office system] indicates a fundamental lack of relevant expertise amongst board members. This has resulted in the Fringe Society reaching a point of potential financial ruin,” wrote Mackenzie Stuart, who is chairman of Associated Independent Venue Producers (AIVP), in an open letter to the 14 directors of the Fringe board.
“AIVP's intended plan of action is to unite with the broad range of Fringe stakeholders, including performers, promoters and venue managers who are in agreement with our position. Such extreme action is a measure of the fear and anger felt by AIVP members.”
However, Fringe director Jon Morgan, according to the Times, dismissed such suggestions but admitted the organisation would “take a hit”.
What remains unclear at this stage is whether Fringe officials plan to axe Pivotal Integration’s box office system. Despite repeated attempts, we have been unable to make contact with the software company. El Reg hopes to have more on the meeting’s outcome later today, so check back for an update. ®
Watch Now : Virtual Machine Movement with Hyper-V
COMMENTS
Risk Management...
did not exist? No contingency plan? Even a call center to manually take ticket sales would have been a good contingency plan, and foot the bill on the vendor for the cock-up. This of course assumes that they have a solid contract with "performance measurement" terms and conditions properly spelled-out. Were the requirements specifications for this new system suitable for the job? Too much common sense to consider, I guess.
@RW
Often in IT, being a good code monkey often translates to management that you should be an architect since there is no-one specifically qualified around.
How many job adverts have you seen and thought, "There is at least 3 separate jobs in there" ... sysadmin, developer, desktop support, system architect etc...
How Long Before People Learn...
Not to give work to companies with damned silly names.
Mine's the one hanging on the door marked "Solutions".
Was EU funding involved?
Not so long after the Maastricht Treaty came about, there were suggestions that a significant amount of the EU funding which was being provided to promote integration was being creamed off.by organised criminals via grants to promote Scottish Tourism. The word 'Mafia' was mentioned by some, although this can be used with a variety of different meanings.
Clearly it can sometimes be difficult to distinguish between the effects of nepotism, incompetence and organised crime. It would be interesting, though, to have more details about government funding for this debacle.
Personally I'm opposed to the growth of the EU bureaucracy and the centralisation of powers that it entails. But I think that even my opponents, those that are genuine about the project at least, agree that misuse of tax revenue undermines the implicit consent of the taxpayer who provides it.
@RW
Moreover, putting an important IT contract out to tender and then taking the lowest bid is a sure recipe for disaster: you get exactly what you pay for.
And yet no one seems to get that small fact.
Top 10 SIEM implementer’s checklist
The new Office Garage series:
IT infrastructure monitoring strategies
