Ticketed events begin Feb. 12 with ski jumping. (ATR/B.Mackin)(ATR) The biggest ticket sale in Canadian history began at 12:01 a.m. PDT on Friday when applications were accepted from Canadian residents for Vancouver 2010 tickets.
VANOC hopes to sell more than 1.6 million tickets to the Games and raise $215.4 million.
The deadline to register in the first phase is 11:59 p.m. on Nov. 7. Applicants will be notified by Dec. 5 whether they were successful. Where demand outstrips supply, an automated lottery will be used to allot tickets. VANOC has pledged 70 percent of tickets will be available to the public. The Olympic family allotment has been capped at 30 percent.
"It’s not a race, it’s about taking your time and planning your experience," said VANOC Vice President of Ticketing Caley Denton.
Phase one participants get a chance to top-up their orders with remaining tickets in December. A second public phase is planned for February 2009. A parallel process for United States residents also began Friday via CoSport.com.
VANOC is reissuing warnings to consumers to buy from authorized agents after thousands of people were victims of an international ticketing scam at the Beijing Olympics.
The resale of tickets for higher than face value is not illegal in Vancouver, but Vancouver 2010 tickets come with a no scalping condition.
Executive Vice President Dave Cobb conceded VANOC cannot do much to enforce that term, beyond ensuring that Olympic family tickets do not wind up on the resale market. Secret shoppers will be employed to monitor the secondary ticket market.
"If they violate the terms of those agreements we can simply invalidate their entire allotmentThe Paralympics schedule ends with Alpine events on Feb. 21. (ATR/B.Mackin) of tickets through the barcoding system," Cobb said.
Denton said VANOC will also analyze ticket sales data through the system provided by sponsor Tickets.com before allocating tickets to ensure that ticket brokers are not abusing the system.
"We can look for trends and things we’re not comfortable enough and decide how we can react," he said. "It could be one IP computer address that’s got a whole bunch of orders coming from it."
Events have limits of four or eight tickets, depending on demand forecasts. The most in-demand events are expected to be figure skating, speed skating and hockey. VANOC has set a maximum 50 tickets per order and only one order will be accepted per Visa card.
Denton said national Olympic committees and Games' partners were informed of their allotments in the last week. He characterized the overall reaction as "understanding, but disappointment" because not all requests were fulfilled.
"We set that line in the ground a year ago and wanted to get as much tickets in the hands of the public as we can," he said.
Vancouver 2010 tickets range from $23 each for women’s hockey to $1,021 each for the opening ceremony. Service charges are $3.71 to $16.72 per ticket. There are no discounts for the $130 to $1,177 multi-event packages, but they will be processed before individual orders.
Tickets will be delivered next fall.
Written by Bob Mackin in Vancouver
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