Nick Cain: It’s not all tickety-boo as debenture holders revolt

Imagine paying £7,000 for a debenture seat which is meant to guarantee you the right to buy a face-value ticket for each and every international match played at Twickenham for a 10-year period – and then being told three years after you’ve forked out the cash that it is not valid for the biggest international tournament held in England.
That is the position that almost 3,000 debenture holders from the 2010 series allocation sold by the RFU have discovered they are in ahead of the 2015 World Cup. According to an action group which has contacted The Rugby Paper, this is due to amendments to the terms and conditions of the debenture agreement at the time the RFU knew their bid for the 2015 World Cup had been successful.
We understand that the amendments, which were authorised when Francis Baron was the chief executive of the RFU, started with the standard debenture wording that each holder has the right to purchase seats for each international match.
However, because it was a stipulation of the IRB that any successful bid must provide them with totally ‘clean’ stadia – which included over-riding previous ticketing agreements by the host Union– a clause was then added stating, “when controlled and managed by the RFU”.
Purchasers of the 2010 series, many of whom were simply renewing earlier allocations, say there was no attempt by the RFU to alert them to the change. The “smart” wording has subsequently been used by the RFU to preclude those debenture holders from buying tickets for the internationals scheduled for Twickenham during the 2015 World Cup.
These include England v Wales, England v Australia, England v Fiji (Oceania 1), two quarter-finals, both semi-finals and the final.
Most people finding themselves in this predicament would be spitting tacks, and these debenture holders are no exception.
Their sense of outrage is underpinned by the fact that they have been spurned by English rugby’s governing body despite their willingness to part with their money to facilitate the RFU’s re-building of Twickenham over the past 30 years.
They claim that debenture holders, who are believed to number 9,000 in total, have contributed £140m so far to the RFU’s coffers. The action group also point to the fact that the RFU are in danger of alienating some of the most staunch rugby fans in England because of what they consider to be sharp practice. All debenture holders are rugby club members – a stipulation for applicants – and many of them are also supporters or benefactors of grass-roots English clubs.
As a spokesman put it, “We are all passionate rugby fans, and we understand that there has to be a premium on World Cup tickets which will put prices up above autumn series and Six Nations tickets. All we want is the right to buy the tickets as guaranteed in our debenture contracts.”
He added, “We believe that by refusing us that right the RFU have broken the terms and conditions, and that they are also guilty of mis-selling by not pointing out a substantial change in the conditions.”
The upshot is that the group is in the process of launching a legal challenge to the RFU with the intention of forcing them to honour what they argue is a binding agreement which cannot be over-ridden by the English Union’s subsequent contracts with the IRB/RWC.
They intend to challenge the RFU’s added clause on the grounds that RWC 2015, the company set up to administer the 2015 World Cup, is “controlled and managed by the RFU”. They argue that it is a wholly owned subsidiary of the RFU with common directors, including RFU chief executive Ian Ritchie and chairman Bill Beaumont. Their contention is that it is therefore bound to honour existing RFU debenture agreements.
This sad state of affairs could have been avoided had the RFU stood their ground against the IRB and refused to be brow-beaten over ticketing to the extent that they have back-tracked on their own commitments.
In 2011 the IRB were incensed by the failure of the New Zealand RFU to deliver totally clean stadia, honouring their commitments to sponsors and debenture holders by allocating them seats.
However, unlike the RFU, the plan was not uncovered by the IRB until it was too late in the day – and when it was the Kiwi administrators toughed it out rather than buckle to IRB pressure.
The 2010 series debenture holders fear that their allocation will end up being sold for corporate hospitality by either the RFU or RWC 2015, or alternatively being given to the IRB as a guest allocation.
There is concern also among the debenture holders from allocations prior to 2010, who have been told they are eligible for tickets, that the quality of seats they will be allocated for World Cup matches will be inferior to those that they receive for autumn or Six Nations Tests.
It is deeply worrying that the RFU, having made a massive effort to curb the activities of ticket touts in recent years, have put themselves in a position where their own debenture holders are questioning whether the Union, instead of being whiter than white in their dealings with them, have put profit first.