Ryder Cup 2020 Ticket Process

[Jimmy Mac]

Anyone have success buying tickets?

 

While I think it was done with good intentions, this is one of the most annoying ticket buying process I've been through.

 

* Had to register to be selected to have an opportunity to purchase. Okay, but it seems EVERYONE was selected.

* Have to monitor email for months to see if selected...

* The once selected, have to monitor email two days before purchase date to get a special code ...

* Then I have to check into a virtual waiting room and keep my browser active for a full hour ...

* Then out of the waiting room and into a virtual queue with no real idea of what my position in line is ...

* Currently have been waiting just under 1.5 hours, the little status bar is not even half way across the screen ...

* Half an hour ago all the matchday tix sold out. Just this moment all the weekly sold out. Presumably, the practice rounds will sell out in another half hour.

* It's fine that I couldn't get tix ... but did they really have to make me sit here monitoring my computer for 2.5 hours?

[Jimmy Mac]

Well, I waited it out ... just under two hours in the waiting line ... it finally kicked me into the ticket order page ... where every type of ticket is sold out. Sigh.

[Windlaker_1]

Same here...about an hour 15 minutes...sold out except for Practice Days.

[jwhite86]

A friend of mine was able to secure 2 Friday tickets through the website. I knew it was going to be a cluster, good thing I had an alternate method and have had tickets for a month

 

 

[biggys]

Same here. Very annoying. How hard would it be for the PGA to copy the Master’s model? Wasted 2 1/2 hours of my day for nothing.

[TBone0576]

Must have gotten really lucky. I only waited in the room for a few minutes, got right in and grabbed 4 practice round tickets.

[Golfintuna]

It took me about 15 minutes and ended up getting 2 week long passes. Was not the original plan but you only live once

[skajaquada77]

Did you guys get any kind of receipt or confimation email? I waited about an hour, got in, bought 4 Thurs tickets, saw the charge coming thru my credit card but never got any email or confirmation, the browser just went back to the shopping cart page. So other than a charge on my credit card, I still don’t know if I got tickets. WTF

 

 

[RTEM5746]

It seems ridiculous to me the way the whole process was run. As I was in the queue I could see tickets going up for sale on StubHub at the usual obscene prices. If one person was only able to buy 4 tickets how come there are guys selling them in bunches of 8+ stubhub and the "official" resale partner Primesports? The whole thing was just a scam so Primesports can gouge people for as much money as possible for the tickets, shameful.

[RTEM5746]

> @TBone0576 said:

> Must have gotten really lucky. I only waited in the room for a few minutes, got right in and grabbed 4 practice round tickets.

 

I think you did. 12 guys in my group and not one of us even got out of the queue!!

[BirdieDoc]

Do you guys think with so many people scalping the tickets now the tickets should be in the names registered like airline flights?

 

Any impact on younger generation of golfers since at this point most tickets are north of $400 for a round? I always thought these events and the Olympics are what makes a lot of people fall in love with the game due to the atmosphere.

 

We were the group that got in, went to buy, and was booted off the server once we submitted. It seemed very screwed up that they would give enough codes to screw 80% of the people (I saw a report of 200k access codes given)

[JaNelson38]

> @BirdieDoc said:

> Do you guys think with so many people scalping the tickets now the tickets should be in the names registered like airline flights?

>

 

It should be, but it wont happen...all that's happening is the league involved will get involved with a third-party "verified re-seller" and get a cut of the scalped tickets. You see it all over the board now in other sports...Ticketmaster Ticketexchange with the NFL and the NBA. Stubhub with many colleges. The PGA of America obviously had an agreement with this PrimeSport place where they got a large cut of the tickets, are able to sell them at ridiculous prices under the guise that the event was "sold out", and the PGA of America will now get as much or more money for those tickets than they would have by selling them outright. It was an absolute joke of a selection "process" that was really nothing more than directing people to go to this third-party re-seller. Sure, and handful of folks got tickets. The corporate sponsors get everything they need. The scraps are left for the third-party seller to fleece the public for 5x the face value so the PGA of America can make a killing.

 

SImply put, in a lottery system, you have a set amount of tickets available for the right amount of people who win the lottery. For example, if you are making 100K tickets available on a given day, allow 25K people in to purchase up to 4 tickets. Then, after that is complete and if there are tickets left over, its first come, first serve for the remaining inventory. Its not that difficult. But all the PGA of America was concerned about was how much money they can rake in, not fulfill the orders of so many people who were duped into believing they were going to be able to purchase tickets.

 

Absurd. Like I said in another thread, I lost a lot of respect for the PGA of America and the Ryder Cup yesterday. And it had nothing to do with me not getting tickets. When they're sending emails out within minutes of "selling out" that this third-party re-seller had tickets for sale, it was clear what the intentions of yesterday truly were.

[links242]

This whole process was askew. Waited for over 2 Hrs and received messaged that the match play tickets are all sold out.

What was the "unique access code" for than?

[jwhite86]

^^ the access code was entered once you were ready to checkout, but no clue why it was sent at all

[JaNelson38]

> @jwhite86 said:

> ^^ the access code was entered once you were ready to checkout, but no clue why it was sent at all

 

the PGA of America wanted your email address for this "unique code" so they could put your email on lists to sell to advertisers and corporate sponsors.

 

$. That's all.

[Miss_Tee]

> @skajaquada77 said:

> Did you guys get any kind of receipt or confimation email? I waited about an hour, got in, bought 4 Thurs tickets, saw the charge coming thru my credit card but never got any email or confirmation, the browser just went back to the shopping cart page. So other than a charge on my credit card, I still don’t know if I got tickets. WTF

>

>

 

I waited in line 45 minutes. I was only able to get practice round tickets. I got a confirmation email about a half hour later. I hope you got an email by now.

 

[MidwestGolfBum]

As @JaNelson38 said, the whole thing smells a lot like a money grab. You don't get that many emails, send out the "Wow, you're so lucky, you got selected for tickets" email (which every single person I know who applied got), only to give the option to buy them from their authorized reseller minutes after "selling out" on your normal ticket exchange. I can only hope that they learn how this is going to annoy the real golf fan and not just say "See, it was a success. We sold out our tickets and made a ton of money." though I have my doubts that is going to happen.

 

I don't care that the event is being held less than an hour from where I live, I won't go after this stunt. Giving my tickets to customers at this point.

[skajaquada77]

> @ladygolfer2 said:

> > @skajaquada77 said:

> > Did you guys get any kind of receipt or confimation email? I waited about an hour, got in, bought 4 Thurs tickets, saw the charge coming thru my credit card but never got any email or confirmation, the browser just went back to the shopping cart page. So other than a charge on my credit card, I still don’t know if I got tickets. WTF

> >

> >

>

> I waited in line 45 minutes. I was only able to get practice round tickets. I got a confirmation email about a half hour later. I hope you got an email by now.

>

 

No email for me yet. I finally got thru their call center, they opened a case and gave me a reference number, they cant confirm if I got the tickets or not and it has been “bubbled up to the experts” since they had lots of problems and glitches with their website. At this point just refund me the money, I will watch from home and I will spend it on a cool golf trip with friends somewhere else.

[BirdieDoc]

> @JaNelson38 said:

 

I agree with everything you said. Just wonder if you think the impact of how frustrated everyone is and the press coverage would change things in the future. I'm on the fence about it. Maybe the same process but more transparency in the future.

 

[MidwestGolfBum]

> @BirdieDoc said:

> > @JaNelson38 said:

>

> I agree with everything you said. Just wonder if you think the impact of how frustrated everyone is and the press coverage would change things in the future. I'm on the fence about it. Maybe the same process but more transparency in the future.

>

 

For me, the optics are that they gave everybody the idea that they were going to be able to get tickets of some kind due to being "accepted" and got the special code, followed by that not being the case but offering me second hand tickets VERY shortly after you mark them all as sold out through their approved third party marketplace. The fact that I waited in their stupid cue to buy tickets for slightly less than 2 hours, only to be told then that every single ticket for the event is gone, followed by an email shortly after that I can buy them marked up sends the message to me that they gave away a bunch of tickets to the approved marketplace (no idea if actually true) and have a back end deal that will allow them to make more money than if they just sold them outright in the first place. This entire system seemed to be set up explicitly for the resellers, not the true golf fan who wanted to go to the event. Being more transparent in that exact thing will make me even less interested in anything they have to offer in the future, be less likely to want to watch anything that they put on, and be even less likely to want to support them going forward.

[bradski]

We had 5 people trying to get tickets and we were able to get 4 to Sunday. I turn 40 about 2 weeks later and we are going to make a golf trip out of it. The problem now is that everything is booked. Courses, hotels, ect. We are trying to figure out a golf trip around this and are going to struggle to get tee times.

[Jimmy Mac]

It's a really poorly planned money grab if they're turning away 80% of the people trying to buy tickets. Sad to say but they probably vastly underpriced the tickets.

[jschwarb]

That process was an absolute embarrassment. I got the access code in advance but when I heard that virtually everyone else on the planet did, I knew it would be a cluster to get tickets and didn't even bother trying. Then, a few hours later when I got the email that tickets were "sold out, but visit our exchange partner!" I was even more disgusted. Pure money grab by the PGA and I'm glad they didn't get any of mine.

 

Ask yourself how the Masters can run a very fair lottery and the PGA can't. It's because the PGA didn't want to and is perfectly fine with fleecing loyal fans.

[jschwarb]

> @"Jimmy Mac" said:

> It's a really poorly planned money grab if they're turning away 80% of the people trying to buy tickets. Sad to say but they probably vastly underpriced the tickets.

 

I'm not sure. People are overpaying right now out of FOMO but closer to the event I think you'll be able to get in at face if not lower from people that have to sell at the last minute.

 

Tournament days were $200 or so after fees, right? Atmosphere and the event's fame aside, I think that's very top dollar for an event where you really aren't going to see that many golf shots.

[Jimmy Mac]

> @jschwarb said:

> > @"Jimmy Mac" said:

> > It's a really poorly planned money grab if they're turning away 80% of the people trying to buy tickets. Sad to say but they probably vastly underpriced the tickets.

>

> I'm not sure. People are overpaying right now out of FOMO but closer to the event I think you'll be able to get in at face if not lower from people that have to sell at the last minute.

>

> Tournament days were $200 or so after fees, right? Atmosphere and the event's fame aside, I think that's very top dollar for an event where you really aren't going to see that many golf shots

 

I get it $200 is up there. But to maximize your money grab, you raise the price to the very highest level at which all your tickets will sell. Given how quickly they sold out, they might have been able to get another $100 per ticket and still had to turn people away.

[jwhite86]

I wouldn't call the Master's a fair lottery...

[bradski]

> @"Jimmy Mac" said:

> It's a really poorly planned money grab if they're turning away 80% of the people trying to buy tickets. Sad to say but they probably vastly underpriced the tickets.

 

Tickets were around $200 per day per person so i wouldn't say they were underpriced. Sunday came out around $220 per person with all fee's. The think I thought was wierd is that they randomized the people in line for the first hour. So basically it was dumb luck that we got tickets (other htan having 5 people try). I was standing next to my friend and at the same time he was put a ways behind me in line.

[Jimmy Mac]

> @bradski said:

> > @"Jimmy Mac" said:

> > It's a really poorly planned money grab if they're turning away 80% of the people trying to buy tickets. Sad to say but they probably vastly underpriced the tickets.

>

> Tickets were around $200 per day per person so i wouldn't say they were underpriced. Sunday came out around $220 per person with all fee's. The think I thought was wierd is that they randomized the people in line for the first hour. So basically it was dumb luck that we got tickets (other htan having 5 people try). I was standing next to my friend and at the same time he was put a ways behind me in line.

 

 

It's just price and demand ... demand was way too high at the price they sold. I don't want to pay more, but they probably could have jacked the price another $100 and still sold out.

 

I think the randomizing thing has something to do with server stress if you have the site slammed with 250K visitors all logging in at once you can crash the whole site. What was silly was the "Lottery" kinda pointless. I didn't even think of it, but I should have gone into the waiting room on my phone, tablet, computer and every other device and just stuck with the best position. They didn't require a log in until AFTER you left the wait area, which kinda rendered it moot.

 

 

[bradski]

the sunday tickets are going for over $600 right now on ticketmaster. There is definately some demand.

[jschwarb]

> @bradski said:

> the sunday tickets are going for over $600 right now on ticketmaster. There is definately some demand.

 

Not sure that many are selling at that price. Just because they're asking doesn't mean they're getting.