Event Industry News

Folk Festival ticket fiasco

FOLK Festival organisers are taking a ticket company to court after it failed to hand over £618,000 from internet sales.

Cambridge City Council has launched a High Court bid to get hold of the cash from SecureTicket UK, which was contracted to sell tickets online for last year’s event headlined by kd Lang, Joan Armatrading and Billy Bragg.

The company ran internet ticket sales in 2007 satisfactorily and was chosen again in 2008 following a competitive tendering process. But money from last year’s ticket sales has never materialised.

It has also emerged that an independent review is to take place to see whether more could have been done to protect the council’s money and to look at how other suppliers for the festival were chosen after concerns were raised by internal auditors.

The council was criticised over how it bought in toilets, showers and marquees for the event. It is the second financial blow to hit the council in recent months after it invested £9 million in collapsed Icelandic banks.

The world-famous Cambridge Folk Festival, held in the grounds of Cherry Hinton Hall, has suffered a series of problems with ticketing.

Internet sales were introduced in 2007 in a bid to end massive queues.

Cllr Ian Nimmo-Smith, leader of the council, said repeated efforts had been made to get the company to pay up without success.

He could not say how much legal action would cost or how the council’s budget would be affected if it failed to get the £618,000.

The High Court will hear the case on January 21.

Cllr Nimmo-Smith said:

“We have been very badly let down and we are not going to wait any longer.

That is why we are taking legal action. I am determined we do all we can to get our money back.

“There is no question that SecureTicket UK has failed to meet its contractual commitment to pay us.”

He said he was also mindful of the findings of internal auditors on other matters related to the folk festival. He wanted to know what else could have been done to avoid the present situation.

Cllr Lewis Herbert, leader of the opposition Labour group, said: “This failure to protect public money could cause lasting damage to Cambridge.”

No-one from Hampshirebased SecureTicket UK was available to comment.

Source: cambridge-news