Lizbie1 Posted July 10, 2019 Share Posted July 10, 2019 (edited) Before we get too excited, I see that the cheapest available seats for Sleeping Beauty in the Amphitheatre Total Ballet package are £59.40 (equivalent to £66 before the 10% discount - there are five cheaper bands). Edited July 10, 2019 by Lizbie1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bridiem Posted July 10, 2019 Share Posted July 10, 2019 1 minute ago, Lizbie1 said: Before we get too excited, I see that the cheapest available seats for Sleeping Beauty in the Amphitheatre Total Ballet package are £59.40 (equivalent to £66 before the 10% discount - there are five cheaper bands). Thanks, Lizbie1 - that's helpful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Posted July 10, 2019 Share Posted July 10, 2019 5 hours ago, ninamargaret said: I looked today and have bought the extreme side stalls circle without any problems. Just to be clear ninamargaret, by “extreme side stalls circle”, you don’t by any chance mean the fabled seats we used to buy? The ones on the far sides of the Stalls Circle we could buy before the noise of the orchestra became an issue and a curtain (usually) is drawn over these two areas, only for those seats (sometimes, rarely) to be released shortly before - or even sometimes during - a run of a “quiet” show. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninamargaret Posted July 10, 2019 Share Posted July 10, 2019 no, the ones I have bought are just before the fabled seats! Incidentally, all of these on both sides were fully occupied last night. Obviously, Mozart is bearable!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richard LH Posted July 11, 2019 Share Posted July 11, 2019 (edited) Rather strangely, for Manon (and only for Manon as far as I can see) one block of 5 stalls circle seats, B71 to B75, have been priced much lower than usual - £30 (or less if part of a package). This compares to £95 for the equivalent B seats on the other side of the auditorium, and £85 for the C seats behind. Understandably a lot of these have been taken now, but a few currently remain for some of the casts, and would be a good bargain. Edited July 11, 2019 by Richard LH 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnS Posted July 11, 2019 Share Posted July 11, 2019 Extraordinary - and another needless hit to Box Office revenue. One of the risks of having a dynamic pricing policy, with different prices for each production rather than a reasonably standard grid, is the greater chance of cock ups. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bridiem Posted July 11, 2019 Share Posted July 11, 2019 35 minutes ago, Richard LH said: Rather strangely, for Manon (and only for Manon as far as I can see) one block of 5 stalls circle seats, B71 to B75, have been priced much lower than usual - £30 (or less if part of a package). This compares to £95 for the equivalent B seats on the other side of the auditorium, and £85 for the C seats behind. Understandably a lot of these have been taken now, but a few currently remain for some of the casts, and would be a good bargain. Thank you, Richard LH! I'd resisted booking for the Morera/Bonelli cast given the huge amount I was already spending in this booking, but I knew I'd be tempted to try and get a ticket for it nearer the time. So I checked and there was one of these stalls circle seats left! Job done. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dawnstar Posted July 11, 2019 Share Posted July 11, 2019 2 hours ago, Richard LH said: Rather strangely, for Manon (and only for Manon as far as I can see) one block of 5 stalls circle seats, B71 to B75, have been priced much lower than usual - £30 (or less if part of a package). This compares to £95 for the equivalent B seats on the other side of the auditorium, and £85 for the C seats behind. Understandably a lot of these have been taken now, but a few currently remain for some of the casts, and would be a good bargain. I'm very envious of the people able to take advantage of this. I bet there won't be any left by the time the general booking opens. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onemouseplace Posted July 11, 2019 Share Posted July 11, 2019 3 hours ago, Richard LH said: Rather strangely, for Manon (and only for Manon as far as I can see) one block of 5 stalls circle seats, B71 to B75, have been priced much lower than usual - £30 (or less if part of a package). This compares to £95 for the equivalent B seats on the other side of the auditorium, and £85 for the C seats behind. Understandably a lot of these have been taken now, but a few currently remain for some of the casts, and would be a good bargain. Thank you - I have nabbed one for Cuthbertson/ Ball. I wasn't planning on seeing Manon this season, but this seemed a bit too good to miss! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninamargaret Posted July 12, 2019 Share Posted July 12, 2019 (edited) Please see the Friends Office response to my query about the availability of Stalls Circle seats for those buying packages. Would have been nice to be told! Wonder if there's any change in amphi seats? "Thank you for your email. There has been a change in the range of seats available to book as part of a package. I will pass on your feedback regarding sharing this information. " Edited July 12, 2019 by alison To reduce font size Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 FOR THE ATTENTION OF ALL FRIENDS OF COVENT GARDEN (WE MIGHT ASK WHETHER WE WANT TO GO ON BEING FRIENDS, THE WAY THE ROH TREATS US) For those Friends who are currently trying to buy rehearsal tickets (9.15am on the morning booking opens) please note that ***yet again*** there is a warning alert that purchasing tickets has been suspended for technical reasons. This is only on (so far as I can see) one of the website pages so if you are desperately refreshing elsewhere you won't see it. How many times does this have to happen before the various teams involved are replaced with people who can commission, maintain and run online ticketing systems professionally? 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonbfisher Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 Unbelievable that this should happen AGAIN! Halfway through trying to sort out and plan purchases it all grinds to a halt. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RuthE Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 And unsurprisingly they've also hiked up the prices of many of the tickets... 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizbie1 Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 45 minutes ago, RuthE said: And unsurprisingly they've also hiked up the prices of many of the tickets... Yet the Rehearsal FAQs still say that ticket prices “range between £5 and £23”. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 26 minutes ago, Lizbie1 said: Yet the Rehearsal FAQs still say that ticket prices “range between £5 and £23”. I paid £24 for one this morning! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bridiem Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 5 minutes ago, Geoff said: I paid £24 for one this morning! Perhaps a ticket tout has hacked the ROH website. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizbie1 Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 24 minutes ago, Geoff said: I paid £24 for one this morning! There were certainly some available for £30 when I looked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anna C Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 I have a choice on general booking day, bulk buy beta blockers or send my access booking form in by post and hope for the best. Given the ROH’s “technical issues” for the last two seasons, I’m thinking the latter option may be best. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizbie1 Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 Given that the booking system fell over for Friends+ and Rehearsal booking but not Friends booking, I wonder whether special provision (in the form of additional servers or capacity) was made for the latter but not thought necessary for the former two. So General booking may yet run smoothly, though no-one should count on it - lessons don’t appear to have been learned so far. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alison Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 I thought the whole point of the ROH system was that it relied on additional cloud computing power (sorry, I'm not too good on the technical terms for IT) to cope with the busy days? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RuthE Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 3 minutes ago, alison said: I thought the whole point of the ROH system was that it relied on additional cloud computing power (sorry, I'm not too good on the technical terms for IT) to cope with the busy days? It already did so in the last version of the website, which fell over far less often and was much more user-friendly. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizbie1 Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 1 minute ago, alison said: I thought the whole point of the ROH system was that it relied on additional cloud computing power (sorry, I'm not too good on the technical terms for IT) to cope with the busy days? I don’t know how far the booking system still relies on legacy equipment or systems - and migration to cloud is seldom straightforward - but yes, one of the main benefits of cloud hosting is that it can “auto-scale”, i.e. add additional capacity without being told to. If the switch to cloud has happened, however, I don’t get the impression that this feature has been applied here - there are various reasons why this might be so. Has anyone seen anything of substance about the ROH website/IT infrastructure refresh? I’d be interested to read it if so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MJW Posted July 18, 2019 Share Posted July 18, 2019 I see that everyone else had problems this morning booking rehearsals and it wasn't down to my employer's website! After refreshing the rehearsals page after 9am to book, everything disappeared. After 5 mins of frantic refreshing I was eventually able to get in the queue only for it to "pause" for about 15mins. Thankfully I was able to get a good seat in the Balcony for Sleeping Beauty (which came as a surprise as I thought Friends rehearsals were limited to the amphitheatre. Obviously not). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Posted July 23, 2019 Share Posted July 23, 2019 (edited) Just received an email aimed at Friends. The relevant section reads: >>We’re aware that some Friends have experienced issues with buying tickets online in this priority booking period; we are sorry for the inconvenience caused and are working to resolve the issue. To give yourself the best chance of buying tickets quickly, Friends are advised to avoid refreshing the rehearsals page or attempting to buy tickets before booking opens at 9am. Simply go to the website after 9am, ensuring you are logged into your account, and then click the buy buttons without refreshing. You'll then be taken to select your seats as usual. Oh, so now we understand: ROH have spent months, maybe years, redesigning (and so they boast, testing) their new website - but then we, the paying customers, just won't use it right. Naughty us for trying to use the internet and online purchasing as works elsewhere. Definitely nothing to do with lousy design, testing, implementation, maintenance or monitoring, and certainly nothing to do with the quality of ROH staff (paid by the tax payers' purse). Is it me or does this fall into the category of blaming the customer? Edited July 23, 2019 by Geoff 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizbie1 Posted July 23, 2019 Share Posted July 23, 2019 3 minutes ago, MJW said: Sort of relevant to the discussions - received this message earlier today - We look forward to opening booking tomorrow morning for Autumn Season rehearsals, allowing you to book additional tickets up to the maximum of four tickets per Friend across the Autumn Season. We’re aware that some Friends have experienced issues with buying tickets online in this priority booking period; we are sorry for the inconvenience caused and are working to resolve the issue. To give yourself the best chance of buying tickets quickly, Friends are advised to avoid refreshing the rehearsals page or attempting to buy tickets before booking opens at 9am. Simply go to the website after 9am, ensuring you are logged into your account, and then click the buy buttons without refreshing. You'll then be taken to select your seats as usual. We hope you enjoy our wonderful Autumn Season at the Royal Opera House and look forward to welcoming you here very soon. I'd be interested to hear whether anyone who attempted the recommended strategy had any more joy than those who didn't. When faced with an error message last week (and when Friends+ booking opened) I tried from another device and got the dreaded "queue paused" page. Unless they have a new process in place, I suspect they sending this message in an attempt to avoid having everyone hitting the booking pages simultaneously and bringing their servers down. (You'd think the Queue-it application could be configured to manage this, but apparently not!) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizbie1 Posted July 23, 2019 Share Posted July 23, 2019 4 minutes ago, Geoff said: Is it me or does this fall into the category of blaming the customer? That was my first reaction I think we're at the stage where they should relax the apparent obsession with controlling the message - we're not stupid. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alison Posted August 19, 2019 Share Posted August 19, 2019 Ugh! The Calendar filter. Wouldn't you expect, if you filtered on a specific date, that the results would be the performances taking place on that specific date (so, say, links to matinee of A at 12.30, performance of B at 7 pm, Linbury performance of C at 7.30)? Is that too much to hope for? Instead, the results are links to the performance page of each production etc. that's on that day. So you then have to click on each production A, B, C, and then scroll your way down the list of dates to find your specific date to find when they're on and who's appearing. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bluebird Posted August 19, 2019 Share Posted August 19, 2019 (edited) 1 hour ago, alison said: Ugh! The Calendar filter. Wouldn't you expect, if you filtered on a specific date, that the results would be the performances taking place on that specific date (so, say, links to matinee of A at 12.30, performance of B at 7 pm, Linbury performance of C at 7.30)? Is that too much to hope for? Instead, the results are links to the performance page of each production etc. that's on that day. So you then have to click on each production A, B, C, and then scroll your way down the list of dates to find your specific date to find when they're on and who's appearing. The old calendar pages are still there. Here's the October one: https://www.roh.org.uk/events/calendar/2019/10 You can use it to navigate to other months and/or years. Let's hope they don't remove these old, user friendly page! Edited to add that you're not able to look at one day at at a time but, if you click on a particular event, the details you're looking for will appear. Edited August 19, 2019 by Bluebird 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnS Posted August 19, 2019 Share Posted August 19, 2019 I keep hoping the old calendar is made available on the new website as it really is so helpful - if I’m planning a trip I want to see what's on around the time of a trip (and ideally who’s scheduled to perform) so I know what I can fit in and whether to stay one or two nights. I don’t think that’s asking too much. Without the old calendar it takes ages moving between webpages. Has anyone found a way of accessing the treasure trove of past news articles - all seemingly lost since the new ‘News’ design? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bluebird Posted August 19, 2019 Share Posted August 19, 2019 51 minutes ago, JohnS said: Has anyone found a way of accessing the treasure trove of past news articles - all seemingly lost since the new ‘News’ design? I have a few old 'news' pages bookmarked (see below). Maybe a technically minded member of the forum could work out a way of navigating from these to other news articles? https://www.roh.org.uk/news/whats-it-like-to-direct-opera-and-ballet-for-the-screen https://www.roh.org.uk/news/after-the-rain-dance-highlight-the-pas-de-deux https://www.roh.org.uk/news/your-reaction-romeo-and-juliet-in-cinemas-and-on-bp-big-screens-2015 https://www.roh.org.uk/news/your-reaction-what-did-you-think-of-verdis-don-carlo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnS Posted August 19, 2019 Share Posted August 19, 2019 Many thanks Bluebird. If I follow one of your links, I can then search the old website which is good, although I find some pages identified from the search are not then accessible - ‘page not found’. It all seems poor to me that the new website still only provides a fraction of the functionality of the old website, albeit I quite like the new design. If you take out all the old links which are not offered on the new website and are available only because of previous bookmarking which posters have kindly shared, I’d have thought the new website gives less than 5% of what used to be available. The new website was set up months ago but I don’t get any sense that much has happened to sort problems. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JNC Posted September 26, 2019 Share Posted September 26, 2019 Am I missing something or have ROH taken of the pricing maps for Winter performances (Onegin/The Cellist/Swan Lake) which have definitely been on there until quite recently for the last few months or so (presumably since casting was announced?). Why have they done this? The pricing map facilitates for me to think about budgets and where I would like to sit in advance which makes booking much smoother. I hope this is a temporary mistake and not the way things will be going forward? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alison Posted September 26, 2019 Share Posted September 26, 2019 That's how it looks to me. Maybe yet another facet of the "let's discourage our audiences from booking" campaign? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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