Please note, the following was originally posted on the Chelmsford City Soapbox by co-chair Gary Foulger.
I thought it would also be useful to outline the reasons we need people to book in advance and why we’ve changed things a bit this year.
We use Jacksons and Roman Coaches for supporters coaches. Both have terms and conditions that allow us to cancel a coach with no penalty seven days before the date of travel. There is then a sliding scale which ends at us getting nothing back if we have to cancel on the day of travel itself. Therefore we have to make a decision based on the number of people who have requested seats a week before.
Unfortunately, in the last couple of years, we’ve had people not turning up on the day as well as fictitious bookings. These are done to boost the numbers to ensure the coach runs, but we end up with the coach running with a very low number of people on it. This happened last year with the coach to Weston. Only 14 people turned up on the day, despite over 20 names being booked to travel. Those that did travel were great, foregoing CCSC discounts and not taking scratch-card winnings, which lessened the blow to Supporters’ Club finances. It was still a bit hit to the coach funds early in the season. To give you an idea of the impact this has, each passenger was effectively subsidised by £52.
Weston wasn’t a one off either – the same happened with Bath.
Ultimately this means the Supporters’ Club has less money to subsidise future coach travel or invest in improvements to the stadium facilities, club, etc.
Clearly this is not fair or sustainable, so this year we have had to change things, resulting in the introduction of advance ticket sales.We are trialling this with the longer journeys as they are the ones that we’ve had more issues with. If it’s successful, we may consider this for more or even all coaches going forwards. Here’s what it means to you:
When we advertise a coach and say that you need to book tickets in advance via the FC shop, you can get your tickets at the links below:
Tickets for Weston – mobile phone users
Tickets for Weston – desktop/PC users
Coaches will only run when we have sufficient paid for tickets seven days in advance of travel.
If we have to cancel a coach, you will receive a full refund.
If you do not turn up on the day of travel, you will not receive a refund.
Where tickets are sold in this manner, you must book and pay for your ticket before travelling. Do not turn up on the day if you haven’t already purchased your ticket.
We will be refining things as we learn, making improvements whenever we can. We are already talking to the FC about getting coach tickets embedded into the CCSC website rather than the FC website. This will make it much clearer that it is the Supporters’ Club running the coaches. When this happens, we’ll publicise links to the site.
We are investigating options for applying CCSC Member discounts, but for the Weston coach, if you are a member, we’ll give you £5 back on the coach while we work on this.
Booking and paying in advance brings other advantages as well. Not only do we have guaranteed paid for seats to ensure a coach runs, but also:
- A CCSC volunteer doesn’t need to carry large amounts of cash with them at away matches
- All the seats are paid for (we have had a couple of occasions where bank transfers fail to materialise)
- No issues with taking card payments on the coach if there’s poor mobile signal or other issue
Whilst I’m doing this post, it seems prudent to remind everyone of the law around coaches to football matches.
- No alcohol is allowed on the coach.
- The driver has the right to refuse carriage to anyone who does have alcohol.
- The same goes for flares or any other kind of pyrotechnic.
- If you are refused carriage for having a prohibited item or turn up to get on the coach drunk, you will not receive a refund.
To sum all this up, if you want to go to Weston on the supporters coach, use the links above to buy your ticket now.
Chelmsford City Supporters’ Club