NewsBreakingOnline

Organisers outline plans for the next batch of Olympics tickets, which go on sale on a first come, first served basis on 24 June Two-thirds of applicants for London 2012 tickets have been left empty handed in the face of “huge demand”, it emerged as organisers outlined details of the sale of the next batch of 2.3m tickets. A total of 21 events have sold out altogether, with only limited availability for others. There will be only 40,000 athletics tickets available, mainly at high prices, when the second phase opens at 6am on 24 June to the 1.2 million applicants who received nothing in the first phase on a first come, first served basis. Around 1.7m of the remaining 2.3m tickets are for the football tournament, which is taking place at large stadiums around the country. Of the 600,000 remaining for other events, the next most are for volleyball and hockey. There will be a further 1m tickets on sale next year to the general public once venue layouts have been finalised. The London 2012 chairman, Sebastian Coe, said he “empathised with and understands the level of disappointment” but said that the commitment to low pricing had helped drive huge demand. “I don’t know if it’s unprecedented, but I would be hard pushed to give you an example of such a demand for any sporting event anywhere in the world in my lifetime,” he said. Although the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (Locog) has to work within the framework laid down by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) regarding ticket allocation, there is likely to be further anger at the distribution of tickets for the biggest events. It has emerged that the men’s 100m final attracted 1.3m applications, but only 30,000 of the 80,000 seats at the stadium will be sold to the British public. The rest of the stadium will be made up of a further 30,000 tickets given to sponsors, hospitality, international sales and international sporting federations, and the rest to the media and IOC officials. Of the 30,000 available to the public, 21,000 went in the first round – half in the more expensive A, B and C categories and half in the D and E categories – and the remaining 9,000 will go on sale next year. Paul Deighton, the Locog chief executive, said that 16m of the 22m ticket applications were for the bottom two price categories. “It all comes back to the number of people who wanted tickets. There were a lot of really affordable tickets and that generated enormous demand,” he said. “The sheer level of demand has left more people disappointed than we would want and we are committed to fixing that as best we can.” There were 1.3m applications for the men’s 100m final, 5m in total for the athletics and 2m for the opening ceremony, including 1.5m who hoped for a £20.12 seat. A total of 1.9 million people applied for 22m tickets in the first phase of the sales process, with 700,000 of them securing a total of 3m tickets. More than 1,500 ballots were held for oversubscribed sessions. “We are determined to do everything we possibly can to get tickets to those people who missed out in the first application,” insisted Coe. He set a target of getting at least two-thirds of the original 1.9 million applicants a ticket by the start of the Games if they wanted one. The ticketing process had come in for criticism from consumer groups including Which? and many applicants for apparently favouring those who could afford to bid for lots of highly priced tickets in lots of sessions. Organisers were also criticised for withdrawing money from the accounts of successful applicants weeks before they learned which tickets they had received. But Deighton said the figures did not bear out the worst fears of consumer groups. He said the average successful application was for four tickets costing £275. Eighty percent of applicants applied for between one and five sessions, with just 5% applying for more than five and “a fraction of 1%” applying for the maximum of 20. “The 3m tickets that were sold will mostly go to different people. Between 2.5 million and 2.7 million people will get to use those tickets,” he said. “We don’t have a situation where there was a small number of people who got a large number of tickets to the detriment of people who didn’t get any.” Unsuccessful applicants will have a 10-day window from 24 June to apply for the 2.3m tickets available in the second round. They will be available on a first come, first served basis. On 8 July, the 700,000 successful applicants will also be offered another chance to buy what is left. Deighton also hinted that Locog, which expects to bring in £400m of its £500m ticket revenue target by the end of the second phase, would have limited the number of sessions and tickets that could have been applied for if it had known the extent of the demand. In the second phase applicants will be restricted to up to six tickets in up to three sessions – apart from those for football, volleyball and the race walk where there are lots of tickets left. “Learning from the demand we had in the first session, we have pared down the event and ticket numbers in this first come, first served second session,” he said. The remaining tickets, expected to total around 1m across all price points and sessions, will start to go on sale from December this year. A ticket exchange service for those who can no longer use their tickets will be set up early next year and organisers will also release tickets that will allow access to the Olympic Park but not to any of the venues. Olympic Games 2012 London Owen Gibson guardian.co.uk