“True” mobile ticketing and tighter security most wanted tech features for new football season

Football clubs around the UK will be deploying high tech access management system upgrades this summer as the sports industry’s war on rogue ticket touts and the secondary ticket market heats up.

It may be the end of the season for fans, but for TeamCard’s access management squad, this summer is set to offer up an intense fixture list of venue access upgrades and security enhancements.

“Each year, as the football season closes, our team immediately gets to work making things ready for the season ahead,” explains TeamCard CEO Randal McLister. “Clubs routinely make changes to stadium layout over the summer, creating new VIP areas, introducing new access for disabled or new dedicated fan zones around the ground, and all of these changes need to be present in TeamCard’s mapping systems to ensure seamless fan access each match day.”

But demands for “true” mobile ticketing and anti-touting security upgrades are what’s really dominating the agenda for clubs this summer as they intensify their war on rogue, secondary ticket sales.

“Rogue sales cost real fans money and damage club reputation,” continues Randal. “Tickets for high demand matches can be sold for up to eight times their value by touts and secondary ticket sites and these outlets easily escape the security checks and balances drawn up to improve the fan experience as detailed in stadium safety guides.”

Under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, it is an offence for a person without authorisation from a football club to sell a ticket or otherwise dispose of it to a third party. However, resale websites based overseas are able to ignore this law.

Access managers and accreditation managers in football know they can address security and fraud with technology, but at the moment our industry is plagued with misinformation about mobile ticketing. For some, it’s little more than a soft version of a paper ticket stored on a phone. “True” mobile ticketing is equipped with highly secure tokenization. It ensures that fans entitled to access the ground can do so while making unofficial resale next to impossible.

TeamCard’s support squad will be working with accreditation managers and access managers at all our client venues this summer to ensure all systems go for the opening of the 2019/20 season. Close to half a million new TeamCards will be issued to football fans before the Championship and Premiership get started again in August.