Football Season Tickets/Fees

[SUOrange44]

I know this was discussed a little earlier. However, I went up to The Dome yesterday to renew my five season tickets for football. As has been talked about previously, you are not being told where your parking spot is going to be, despite paying the money, due to the reassignment of spots due to the Raynor lot issues...That was expected.

However, the $7 administrative fee has always been waived if you renew in person at the box office. I was informed that this is no longer the case and the fee will not be waived.

Obviously not a lot of money but it becomes more and more discouraging. Summing it up, renewal includes an administrative fee, a preferred ticket charge for each seat (higher as of last year if you also have basketball season tickets), a non-waivable administrative charge that was always waived if you renewed in person and full payment for parking with no guarantee where the spot will be.

Add that to a slate of only five home games (2 on Friday and one versus Stony Brook) and it is becoming a little annoying.

SUOrange44

 

[OrangePA]

I know this was discussed a little earlier. However, I went up to The Dome yesterday to renew my five season tickets for football. As has been talked about previously, you are not being told where your parking spot is going to be, despite paying the money, due to the reassignment of spots due to the Raynor lot issues...That was expected.

However, the $7 administrative fee has always been waived if you renew in person at the box office. I was informed that this is no longer the case and the fee will not be waived.

Obviously not a lot of money but it becomes more and more discouraging. Summing it up, renewal includes an administrative fee, a preferred ticket charge for each seat (higher as of last year if you also have basketball season tickets), a non-waivable administrative charge that was always waived if you renewed in person and full payment for parking with no guarantee where the spot will be.

Add that to a slate of only five home games (2 on Friday and one versus Stony Brook) and it is becoming a little annoying.

SUOrange44

Please!

Enough already about the $7 processing fee.

It's three slices of pizza! In Philly it's a beer at a Sixers game!

You spent more money driving to the Dome for gosh sakes!!!

Why don't you think of it as a donation to the program - a way of financing something that is important to the community and to all of us.

But please, stop already with such small matters.

 

[rrlbees]

Please!

Enough already about the $7 processing fee.

It's three slices of pizza! In Philly it's a beer at a Sixers game!

You spent more money driving to the Dome for gosh sakes!!!

Why don't you think of it as a donation to the program - a way of financing something that is important to the community and to all of us.

But please, stop already with such small matters.

I'm sure it's not the $7. It's the principle. What do you think of them charging for parking without saying where you will be? Or collecting an increased preferred cost without a schedule nor even how mny home games there would be? What will people say if we only have 5 home games again next season?

 

[OrangePA]

I'm sure it's not the $7. It's the principle. What do you think of them charging for parking without saying where you will be? Or collecting an increased preferred cost without a schedule nor even how mny home games there would be? What will people say if we only have 5 home games again next season?

Oh please.

Parking is in flux because of the new construction. That's understandable.

And whether it's five home games or six home games, the costs for processing the season are the same.

I can't get worked up over such small issues.

If you worry about the rabbits the elephants will get you every time.

I prefer to worry about the elephants - the move to the ACC, the improved infrastructure, the improved recruiting and the development of the returning players.

The guy spent more on gas money than the processing fee - enough already.

 

[SUOrange44]

LOL...I paid the fee. I kept the tickets and I have made my "donation". It did not deter me...but that does not mean it will not deter others.

I have had football seasons since 1989. I am an SU grad. I have been a member of The Orange Pack/Orange Club and a Dave Bing member for many years. I also have three season basketball tickets.

I kept my season tickets when I lived in Albany. I kept them when I was in Binghamton and I moved back to Syracuse when given the opportunity primarily because of the University.

I am a partner in a firm that has a box at The Dome...Hopefully these are sufficient "donations" in your mind.

My point is that I have and will keep my tickets, pay the fees, etc. I can simply understand the position of many of the others who hemm and haw (sp?) when determining if they will continue to make these investments not simply because of the cost but the response to the fans.

Oh yeah...and my office is about a mile from The Dome so it ain't $7 bucks worth of gas.

SUOrange44

 

[Stern]

I know this was discussed a little earlier. However, I went up to The Dome yesterday to renew my five season tickets for football. As has been talked about previously, you are not being told where your parking spot is going to be, despite paying the money, due to the reassignment of spots due to the Raynor lot issues...That was expected.

However, the $7 administrative fee has always been waived if you renew in person at the box office. I was informed that this is no longer the case and the fee will not be waived.

Obviously not a lot of money but it becomes more and more discouraging. Summing it up, renewal includes an administrative fee, a preferred ticket charge for each seat (higher as of last year if you also have basketball season tickets), a non-waivable administrative charge that was always waived if you renewed in person and full payment for parking with no guarantee where the spot will be.

Add that to a slate of only five home games (2 on Friday and one versus Stony Brook) and it is becoming a little annoying.

SUOrange44

Excellent post. "Discouraging" is the best word for it. I can't tell you how many co-workers and how many people I have run into in recent weeks/months who have bailed on their season tickets this year. And I am talking about good sports fan types and die-hard SU sports fans in general. These little ticky tack things add up and while some people say oh suck it up its no big deal. It is a big deal to some. I had one guy who is a friend of our family I was talking to the other day, he has season tickets for just the last 2 or 3 years, he called up the box office a week or so ago to ask a pretty basic question about maybe moving to the "family section" since he wants to bring his grand-kids this year who are very young, so he asked about some of the rules in the family section, the response he got to one of his questions was, "what do you care about that for." Real customer service friendly right there. I called up with a question back in February and it took 3 phone calls over a week to get the one pretty basic answer I was looking for. They can throw on their little $7 fee, make you pay for parking without telling you which lot, not tell you the one fee is no longer waived, it really gets old after a while. For those of you season ticket holders who are sticking it out and continue to go, I really have a lot of respect for ya.

 

[rrlbees]

Oh please.

Parking is in flux because of the new construction. That's understandable.

And whether it's five home games or six home games, the costs for processing the season are the same.

I can't get worked up over such small issues.

If you worry about the rabbits the elephants will get you every time.

I prefer to worry about the elephants - the move to the ACC, the improved infrastructure, the improved recruiting and the development of the returning players.

The guy spent more on gas money than the processing fee - enough already.

But you didn't answer my questions. Should they be raising donations when there are fewer home games? Should they be raising the ticket cost per game? Should they be selling anything when the consumer doesn't even know what they are buying?

 

[OrangePA]

But you didn't answer my questions. Should they be raising donations when there are fewer home games? Should they be raising the ticket cost per game? Should they be selling anything when the consumer doesn't even know what they are buying?

I did answer your question.

The cost does not change whether it's five home games or six home games.

The cost does go up for any number of reasons that have nothing to do with the number of home games.

Salaries go up. Health insurance goes up. Energy prices go up.

So, a $7 fee for season tickets is perfectly acceptable to me.

As far as the parking is concerned, it's parking and it's near the Dome. It is what it is. None of it is all that good. Gosh, as far as I know, only my dad gets really good parking - I know I have never been able to match him!!

So, lets worry about the elephants and not the rabbits.

 

[rrlbees]

I did answer your question.

The cost does not change whether it's five home games or six home games.

The cost does go up for any number of reasons that have nothing to do with the number of home games.

Salaries go up. Health insurance goes up. Energy prices go up.

So, a $7 fee for season tickets is perfectly acceptable to me.

As far as the parking is concerned, it's parking and it's near the Dome. It is what it is. None of it is all that good. Gosh, as far as I know, only my dad gets really good parking - I know I have never been able to match him!!

So, lets worry about the elephants and not the rabbits.

You're talking in circles man. Nevermind though, you didn't answer any questions you just gave excuses. Bottom line is that the cost to the consumer went up for everything and also the consumer does not know what they are buying. Only the business called SU football would try to do that.

 

[OrangeHeel]

I always thought a large part of the issue with SU is presentation and the appearance of "nickel and diming". You consistently get the feeling that they believe that they're doing you a favor letting you buy tickets. The $7 fee is just a small example. When you add the preferred seating fee to the cost of the tickets plus the cost of parking, the $7 (even if the real cost of processing) seems petty. If they had seven home games (like they should), they could simply charge $1 more per game and waive the fee. It would look better and have the same result as far as revenue.

We all know that there is no such thing as a free lunch -- not even at the Rescue Mission -- but the University could do a much better of making us feel like they value our business. I know that the prices are incredibly cheap by national standards, but that ends up being irrelevant to the issue of customer relations. As someone who between my Dad and myself has had season tickets for roughly 44 of the last 52 years, I'm not going away. But if people don't think that a part of the problem is how the University relates to its fan base, then they are whistling past the graveyard.

 

[Jaycuse1]

I did answer your question.

The cost does not change whether it's five home games or six home games.

The cost does go up for any number of reasons that have nothing to do with the number of home games.

Salaries go up. Health insurance goes up. Energy prices go up.

So, a $7 fee for season tickets is perfectly acceptable to me.

As far as the parking is concerned, it's parking and it's near the Dome. It is what it is. None of it is all that good. Gosh, as far as I know, only my dad gets really good parking - I know I have never been able to match him!!

So, lets worry about the elephants and not the rabbits.

The cost per game does change whether it is five or six home games...you can bet if there were 7 games instead of 6 games they wouldn't of kept the same pricing.

 

[JeremyCuse]

Excellent post. "Discouraging" is the best word for it. I can't tell you how many co-workers and how many people I have run into in recent weeks/months who have bailed on their season tickets this year. And I am talking about good sports fan types and die-hard SU sports fans in general. These little ticky tack things add up and while some people say oh suck it up its no big deal. It is a big deal to some. I had one guy who is a friend of our family I was talking to the other day, he has season tickets for just the last 2 or 3 years, he called up the box office a week or so ago to ask a pretty basic question about maybe moving to the "family section" since he wants to bring his grand-kids this year who are very young, so he asked about some of the rules in the family section, the response he got to one of his questions was, "what do you care about that for." Real customer service friendly right there. I called up with a question back in February and it took 3 phone calls over a week to get the one pretty basic answer I was looking for. They can throw on their little $7 fee, make you pay for parking without telling you which lot, not tell you the one fee is no longer waived, it really gets old after a while. For those of you season ticket holders who are sticking it out and continue to go, I really have a lot of respect for ya.

Good post Stern and unfortunately the reactions and decisions you are seeing from other season ticket holders and fans is the same I am seeing. I dont think OrangePA and others realize that the "suck it up and show up no matter what" attitude isnt flying for a majority of season ticket holders who are on the fence many of which seem to be dropping there season tickets at an alarming rate. I hope a lot of them re-consider over the summer but attendance this year could be the worst we have seen in a long long ime. If we are 0-2 going into StonyBrook there might not be 20,000 there.

 

[Moontan]

What will people say if we only have 5 home games again next season?

Unacceptable.

Those here will likely still renew, yet it will be unacceptable. It really needs to become a 6-, 7-, 6+Meadowlands cycle. Anything less will be "unacceptable".

 

[SUOrange44]

Oh please.

Parking is in flux because of the new construction. That's understandable.

And whether it's five home games or six home games, the costs for processing the season are the same.

I can't get worked up over such small issues.

If you worry about the rabbits the elephants will get you every time.

I prefer to worry about the elephants - the move to the ACC, the improved infrastructure, the improved recruiting and the development of the returning players.

The guy spent more on gas money than the processing fee - enough already.

Sometimes a ton of rabbits equal one elephant...literally and figuratively.

SUOrange44

 

[OttoMets]

Oh please.

Parking is in flux because of the new construction. That's understandable.

And whether it's five home games or six home games, the costs for processing the season are the same.

I can't get worked up over such small issues.

If you worry about the rabbits the elephants will get you every time.

I prefer to worry about the elephants - the move to the ACC, the improved infrastructure, the improved recruiting and the development of the returning players.

The guy spent more on gas money than the processing fee - enough already.

But it's money for nothing. To be served by rude employees, who seem to be supervised by an athletic department that could care less about its customers.

I don't get some of the sound and fury about tickets, games, and parking. But I have a very difficult time continuing to pay money to an athletic department that won't be bothered to reply to e-mailed constructive criticism. The athletic department is, among other things, in the business of customer service. They're very bad at that.

If I want some sullen, unhelpful woman to roll her eyes at me behind a pane of glass, I'll head back down to Washington and stop by the DMV. Syracuse University should strive to do better. And that shouldn't involve nickel-diming people spending hundreds of dollars on their product by way of strange, externalized fees.

 

[OttoMets]

As an adamant skeptic of the parking complaining, I should add that it's not acceptable for SU to require season ticketholders to pay for parking without knowing where that parking will be. If you're looking to make a season-long commitment, you should know what parking spot you're buying. SU knows what lots will be available; there's no reason for them to kick this can down the road.

 

[cusestudent]

But it's money for nothing. To be served by rude employees, who seem to be supervised by an athletic department that could care less about its customers.

I don't get some of the sound and fury about tickets, games, and parking. But I have a very difficult time continuing to pay money to an athletic department that won't be bothered to reply to e-mailed constructive criticism. The athletic department is, among other things, in the business of customer service. They're very bad at that.

If I want some sullen, unhelpful woman to roll her eyes at me behind a pane of glass, I'll head back down to Washington and stop by the DMV. Syracuse University should strive to do better. And that shouldn't involve nickel-diming people spending hundreds of dollars on their product by way of strange, externalized fees.

To be honest I think most students would do a better job then the one's currently in the box office Oh Lord

 

[SUOrange44]

To be honest I think most students would do a better job then the one's currently in the box office Oh Lord

I will say that there are at least two ladies at the box office who are very helpful. One was terrific in assisting me in determining the best seats for my parents who were both handicapped. She gave me suggestions, allowed me to walk around The Dome to confirm they would be acceptable, etc.

Another lady who I had not seen until recently is very knowledg. and friendly. She is the same one who said they no longer waive the administrative fee even in person.

Then there is the one who every time I get into line I shake my head because I have had so many sub-par dealings with. She is the same one who I literally had to argue with to convince her to sell me a ticket to a game for my daughter who was under one at the time I believe.

She told me that there was no ticket required. I explained that there had always been a dispute about "babes in arms" needing tickets and that I was aware of scenarios where ticket takers required the people who sit behind me to have a ticket for their infant daughter.

Long story short, I explained that I was going to buy a ticket one way or another because I did not even want to risk someone telling me I needed another ticket and then first having to schlep my family out of The Dome to a ticket window or to Gate B to fix this issue if she was wrong in the middle of winter.

She grudgingly sold me the ticket but it was the first time I had to plead for one.

SUOrange44

 

[retro44]

the lady over the phone the other day told me they don't go by names on your season tickets,they go by an account number. i told her i was not home at the time so i did not have the numbers,then she tells me they are on my used tickets stubbs,i tell her that they were used at tully's for a free drink...no humor.

i told her where my seats were located,she said they can't go by that. so then i asked her for someone else who might be a little more interested in making the sale of my seasons that i have had for over 25 years like her boss for instance.so she said "where are your seats located" and then says"look i found your name with the seats"

amazing how they can mail you the application,then forget about you after that

 

[Stern]

the lady over the phone the other day told me they don't go by names on your season tickets,they go by an account number. i told her i was not home at the time so i did not have the numbers,then she tells me they are on my used tickets stubbs,i tell her that they were used at tully's for a free drink...no humor.

i told her where my seats were located,she said they can't go by that. so then i asked her for someone else who might be a little more interested in making the sale of my seasons that i have had for over 25 years like her boss for instance.so she said "where are your seats located" and then says"look i found your name with the seats"

amazing how they can mail you the application,then forget about you after that

Sounds like you got the lady I got back in Feb on the phone. They truly are s up there.

 

[rrlbees]

the lady over the phone the other day told me they don't go by names on your season tickets,they go by an account number. i told her i was not home at the time so i did not have the numbers,then she tells me they are on my used tickets stubbs,i tell her that they were used at tully's for a free drink...no humor.

i told her where my seats were located,she said they can't go by that. so then i asked her for someone else who might be a little more interested in making the sale of my seasons that i have had for over 25 years like her boss for instance.so she said "where are your seats located" and then says"look i found your name with the seats"

amazing how they can mail you the application,then forget about you after that

on the otherhand, i have never given more than my name and they red back my addy and i say yep, that's me. i think it's an individual thing where some just aren't very good.

 

[MikeSU02]

LOL...I paid the fee. I kept the tickets and I have made my "donation". It did not deter me...but that does not mean it will not deter others.

I have had football seasons since 1989. I am an SU grad. I have been a member of The Orange Pack/Orange Club and a Dave Bing member for many years. I also have three season basketball tickets.

I kept my season tickets when I lived in Albany. I kept them when I was in Binghamton and I moved back to Syracuse when given the opportunity primarily because of the University.

I am a partner in a firm that has a box at The Dome...Hopefully these are sufficient "donations" in your mind.

My point is that I have and will keep my tickets, pay the fees, etc. I can simply understand the position of many of the others who hemm and haw (sp?) when determining if they will continue to make these investments not simply because of the cost but the response to the fans.

Oh yeah...and my office is about a mile from The Dome so it ain't $7 bucks worth of gas.

SUOrange44

How dare you come on here and post your credentials as a fan, show you have been a huge supporter of the program, that you are part of a company that is a supporter of the program, donate to the program, are an alum, kept your tickets no matter your locale and speak in a reasoned manner with a valid concern.

You need to even more blindly follow SU and not complain about the "fees". Life isn't is always "peaches and cream" or "puppies and rainbows" or "coneys and Utica Club". Just strap on your boots, come to the games at least 8 hours early, tailgate before and after the game, post to the board while slamming a beer during the game and then talk about how "you know how things are going" in practice, but can't say anything because you will get cuffed and sent to stay in Brewster Hall for a yet-to-be-determined period of time.

/sarcasm

 

[SU2NASA]

Please!

Enough already about the $7 processing fee.

It's three slices of pizza! In Philly it's a beer at a Sixers game!

You spent more money driving to the Dome for gosh sakes!!!

Why don't you think of it as a donation to the program - a way of financing something that is important to the community and to all of us.

But please, stop already with such small matters.

Why not just roll the $7 into the ticket price? For five home games that a little over $1/game for a seat. Having it be a separate charge just annoys people.

 

[maxxyz]

Why not just roll the $7 into the ticket price? For five home games that a little over $1/game for a seat. Having it be a separate charge just annoys people.

No question it is annoying to be nickel & dimed.

I've posted before they could have a number of reasons for recording the revenue as fees. It could be how the money is accounted for internally, it could be a revenue sharing advantage, it could be because it keeps the ticketmaster fees lower (which are based on ticket price). Or any other number of reasons.

I wouldnn't think they would do it for a marketing purpose (e.g. make sure ticket prices appear as low as possible).

Hopefully the schedule will be back up to at least 6 home games next year. Hopefully the parking situation will be settled by then also. Hopefully we will have a winning season, which makes us complain about these things a little less.