Tottenham Hotspur Supporters' Trust
  • About us
  • THST News
  • Membership
  • Campaigns
  • Contact
  • AGM
  • Cycle On You Spurs
  • Forum

Season Ticket Renewal Deadline: Joint letter from THST, Proud Lilywhites and SpursAbility

11/3/2022

 
Picture
This morning, the three officially recognised supporter groups at THFC wrote to the Club Board to request an extension of the Season Ticket Renewal deadline from 29 April to 31 May 2022. 
We are reproducing the letter here for full transparency.

Friday 11 March 2022
 
Daniel Levy, Chairman, THFC
Donna-Maria Cullen, Executive Director, THFC
Matthew Collecott, Finance Director, THFC
 
Dear Daniel, Donna and Matthew,

We’re writing to you as the three officially recognised supporter groups at Tottenham Hotspur Football Club to formally request the readjustment of the Season Ticket Renewal deadline from 29 April to 31 May 2022. Since the Club announced the timings, we have each been contacted by many of our respective members with significant concerns around the earlier deadline, and we are aware of numerous fans writing directly to the Club to express those concerns first hand. It is our firm belief that the Club should listen to those supporters and work collegiately with us to reach a mutually beneficial solution.

We note the Club’s rationale for bringing the deadline forward; to allow more time to manage a larger ticketing inventory, to manage seat relocations and to manage the waiting list ahead of an earlier start to the 2022/23 Premier League campaign. We would like to remind the Club of its co-innovation partnership with Ticketmaster and the technical advancements we’ve all witnessed over the last season, especially. Digital home tickets remove the need to distribute access cards each summer, for example, and new software will allow seat moves to be completed digitally as opposed to manually, resulting in a more streamlined process. All of this should compensate for a truncated window this summer.

Times are changing. The effects of the pandemic and the current economic crisis have prompted most businesses to move to a more customer-centric model. Football should not be the exception. Through difficult times, fans have backed the Club. We left 20% of the value of our Season Tickets sitting with the Club during the 2020/21 season, knowing we would not be able to attend matches. During the current campaign, many fans have lost hundreds of pounds on their Season Tickets because they haven’t been able to move tickets on due to the continuing impact of the pandemic. Financially, supporters have time and again demonstrated their loyalty and commitment to the Club, with arguably diminishing returns.

With the highest levels of inflation in over 30 years, increasing interest rates, a 10% rise in National Insurance contributions, increasing costs of diesel and petrol, the annual above-inflation rise in train fares and the upcoming increase in home fuel bills, fans’ finances are going to be stretched like never before. This means that budgeting becomes even more important, and whilst some fans will have saved to be able to pay for the extremely expensive Season Tickets, others will now be faced with a choice of utilising those funds for their Season Ticket or just to heat their home. Therefore, to only allow potentially a ‘2 pay-day’ period in which to pay for Season Tickets shows a worrying disregard for the economic realities facing many of your customers.

Your decision to bring the deadline forward has further brought into focus the value of the package and the relationship between the Club and its supporters. Over the past few years, changes to the concessions policy, the reduction of games offered in the Season Ticket package and continuing changes to the operation of TEX have led more and more fans to question the value of what they are paying for. When you set the highest Season Ticket prices in England, and some of the highest in Europe, it was against a backdrop of the ‘whole package’ on offer. It is undeniable that the sporting element of that package has decreased significantly since that time. And this season we have seen a rise in complaints about the standard of facilities in General Admission areas.

We warned about the optics of the decision to alter the renewal deadline. In the view of many, the Club is asking fans to commit to next season before they know what competitions we are in, who the manager is or who will be in the team. You may say there is a never a guarantee of any of this, but the Club’s decision is being widely seen as a signal that it is not confident the answers to these questions will be positive. And while, as you have pointed out, cup tickets are no longer included in the package, fans do sign up to Gold membership, which commits them to buying tickets for cup competitions. So knowing what competitions they may be watching is part of the equation.

The great pity here is that the welcome decision to freeze Season Ticket prices has gone largely unnoticed because of the reaction to the deadline move. Another opportunity to accentuate the positive missed.

Not only do we believe that adjusting the deadline is an appropriate move in the broader circumstances, we also believe it will be an important step in strengthening relationships between the fans and the Club Board.
​
We ask for your reconsideration of this matter and keenly await your response.
 
Yours faithfully,
 
Tottenham Hotspur Supporters’ Trust Board
Proud Lilywhites Committee
SpursAbility Committee


Comments are closed.

    Categories

    All
    Against Franchise Football
    Atmosphere
    Away Fans
    Board
    Community
    Competitions
    Controlled Parking Zone
    Events
    Financial Results
    Football Without Fans Is Nothing
    Fundraising
    Legal
    Pricing
    Safe Standing
    Safety & Policing
    Season At Wembley
    Stadium
    Stop Stubhub
    Surveys
    THST Updates
    Ticket Exchange
    Ticketing
    Twenty's Plenty
    White Hart Lane

    THST News

    Keep up to date with the latest News from the Tottenham Hotspur Supporters' Trust

    JOIN    THST

    RSS Feed

    Archives

    January 2023
    December 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    January 2013

Tottenham Hotspur Supporters' Trust

About Us
Membership

FAQs
Acknowledgements
Contact
Policies
Picture
As a voluntary, independent, not-for-profit organisation, THST relies solely on membership fees and donations to cover our running costs. All donations help us to deliver more for our members. 
Affiliate members of:
Picture
 © 2014 THST - All rights reserved