Royalty Points Review

[North Somerset Royal]

Firstly, thanks for the feedback (more welcome, of course) I was getting worried when there were only 3 responses from the first 300 views!

Here's my feedback:

There's a strong desire for more reward for attending away games. I can't see completely separating home and away royalty points as being practical. The club don't do 'away season tickets' any more but maybe there is a role for a 'certified genuine away supporter' priority for those who go to most away games but might miss out on Brentford or Fulham. But I can't imagine that happens to many people.

I really like the idea of Royalty Point inflation as a way of getting over the expiry issue! What rate of inflation would you propose? One point (ie 10% in the first year, decreasing thereafter) per annum?

The point about big games / new fans is a good one but I think it applies more to Wembley games or big home cup ties where the pressure on tickets is not so great and the new fan should have a reasonable chance of getting in.

Claiming away ticket stubs for cash-on-the-gate is impractical on a regular basis (we asked). Categorising away games by distance likewise - and not everyone starts their journey from RG1. Middlesbrough Royals would be filling their boots.

Closing the loophole of Mr 3000 points passing on his ticket to Mr 500 points doesn't seem practical either - and passing on might be considered as a benefit of having 3000 points (not to be condoned of course). It's a benefit that can only be used once per game.

More comments on the actual 5 ideas in the OP would be appreciated also.

There is no point in having a priority system unless there is a spread of people across the various points levels. The problem with all 5 ideas is that they would result in pushing more people into the higher band levels and making the scheme less effective. However I do wonder whether the scheme has outlived its usefulness and as a previous poster suggested we might just as well revert to the system used by many clubs which is ST holders get first dibs and then general sale. If the club wanted to stagger sales for high demand games they could sell to Upper West ST holders on day 1, then day 2 Lower West, 3 North, 4 East.

[Royal Lady]

If we have, for example, 10,000 ST holders, they wouldn't all get a ticket on day one anyway - unless it was Wembley.

Amongst people who have STs are newer ST holders and a lot of long-term ST holders and they should be receiving the benefits - due to having spent a lot more money up front over the years and continuing to go. If you don't renew your ST at the beginning of a season, maybe then is the time to cut the points? I dunno.

[handbags_harris]

Just throwing this into the ether, not sure about the practicalities of it but at least everybody would know where they stand:-

Instead of 5 and 10 points (or whatever it is) for home and away games, every match counts for 1 point regardless of whether home or away. This includes all PSF's, maybe even throw Madejski-based development/reserve squad games in there too in order to offer the incentive to attend those matches. In essence, if you pay to watch a Reading FC match at whatever level, you get a point for your loyalty.

Then between the club and STAR, a decision is made on how far back the points go, so say a rolling 10 year period. Then, quite simply, the number of points bears a direct correlation to the number of games attended over that 10-year period, and so the most loyal fans over that period of time get rewarded with higher priority for high demand games.

One trump card that should never be toyed with - STH's should always get first dibs. That has been a mainstay of the STH deal for decades. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Once current STH's period of priority has expired, say 24 hours, you then go directly to the points-based system and downward step-sell on a 24-hour basis.

After 10 years the oldest season's points get scrubbed, ready to be replaced with new points. We're 10 years in to the system now and it'd be a big exercise to convert, but the purchase history is there for all to see so all you'd need is a simple algorithm to count the number of matches attended. Bear in mind you couldn't simply divide the number of points, you'd need to take into account the fact that points are given for STAR membership, away season ticket holders I believe got additional points when AST's were available, and notwithstanding the often-amended point-scoring system that in the early days was just 2 points for an away game and 5 for a home, before the change to the silver (5), gold (10) and platinum (15) set-up of the first two PL years.

Going forward, STH attendance is counted, it wouldn't simply be enough to buy a ST, you'd need to attend matches as well. Stay away, lose out.

[PieEater]

Handbags wouldn't a rolling 10 years just increase the number of people with maximum points?
i.e STH of 12, 11 and 10 years suddenly become one band of 10 years.

And that could easily get to 2000 people and make priority sales difficult. As it is now at least it's possible to do some sort of spread.

[Kitsondinho]

I've said it before, it's tough. You want to support the long term fans, but I have mates whose parents never went to football, have had a season ticket on their own for 4 years and have missed about 10 games since then, home and away, who missed out on Brentford. /quote]

The Royalty Points scheme is there to deal with tough situations - but Brentford was particularly tough / unusually attractive:
- early season winnable Saturday game
- closest / most local away game
- a favourite ground with happy memories for older supporters (Stuckey, Senior, Cureton, the Elm Park feel)
- we hadn't played there for 12 years
- small allocation

Fulham away - where we've played 3 times in 8 years - won't be so tough and that's the next pressure point, unless we get something like Maidstone or Basingstoke away in the cup.

Fulham away won't be a problem if both teams keep playing so badly. Also they still have their neutral zone........

[handbags_harris]

Handbags wouldn't a rolling 10 years just increase the number of people with maximum points?
i.e STH of 12, 11 and 10 years suddenly become one band of 10 years.

And that could easily get to 2000 people and make priority sales difficult. As it is now at least it's possible to do some sort of spread.

Not necessarily. Depends on the home/away game split doesn't it? Clearly someone who has attended more away games than home over that period would theoretically immediately benefit to the detriment of home-goers (only a good thing IMO), but from that point onwards you still have the majority of away-goers also benefitting due to the fact that they are more likely to accrue more than 23 points in a season and so end up in a higher buying category. Also, taking the fact that it is highly likely that any high-priority games are going to be later on in the season, those people who lose a lot of points at the 10-year cut off get the chance to rebuild those points throughout the current season.

So putting a bit more thought into it, since the beginning of 2005/6 (2004/5 dropped because it is now more than 10 seasons ago) we have played 461 competitive first team matches taking into account Football/Premier League, FA Cup, League Cup and playoffs. Add on top of that any competitive Madejski-based fixture and first team PSF's you're easily in the 600 game region, maybe even higher, so I see no reason why you can't stagger the points requirements accordingly. the club will have all the figures to hand and therefore know exactly how many tickets could be sold at each staggering.

And anyway, this debate as I see it isn't really been about how the points are distributed for high-demand matches, more about how the points are accrued and the fairness the points accrual system which has been far too heavily weighted in favour of the passive home-supporter since it's inception, the ulterior motive of the club using the flawed logic that supporters are more likely to attend a home game because more points are on offer and so pocket your cash (they get very little for away games, if anything, unless it is a cup game). Much better to reward support in the same way home or away IMO.

[floyd__streete]

FAO STAR:

With the greatest of respect to you all - I know you are well-meaning volunteers who give up their own time - with home support dwindling to pre-first PL promotion levels and away games very rarely selling out.....is this really a priority in the hearts and minds of Reading fans?

I wonder whether some attempt to open a dialogue with our new owners might be a more prudent use of what I realise must be a finite amount of time available to your Board members who predominantly must be full time employed with families etc......

[urz13]

Why?

If I have forked out the best part of £400.00 and committed myself for a year, why shouldn't I get priority? Its not like new season ticket holders get first dibs. Its season ticket holders who have been around for a long time and have probably done quite a few away games who get first dibs.

Not everyone can justify spending half a weekend and a fair bit of money travelling to away games.

3,000 + points for away games only at what, 10 points a game? 300 games and we play roughly 23 away games a season (not including cup), sorry but the points system has not been going for more than 10 years so that would be a rough maximum of 2,300 points.

If someone could confirm if it is 10 points for an away game and how long the points system has been running that would be great.

5 points an away and he used to have a ST.

But you said he does no home games, yet now you say he used to have a season ticket?

Season ticket holders should get priority, as its been said before, they are the ones who are actually giving money to RFC.

And he'd have had to have had a season ticket for probably at least 9 of those years in order to have over 3000 points...... I call BS

[Hendo]

Well my question has gone unanswered so BS could be a good call.

[Zana Badawi]

I find it quite ironic that the Royalty Points system exists to make a decision on who gets priority on Away game tickets, and yet it is Home attendance that is the prime factor in that decision. Although I recognise that its a selling point for the ST, surely the bigger selling point is the reduced attendance fee, and the sense of commitment to the club. Not only should Home and Away games be equalized in number of points; but the only factor stopping me saying that away fans should get priority is that Home fans give more money directly to the club.

All the other points from STAR I don't care about. Royalty Points generally only become an issue for a handful of league games a season and only if we're on a cup run. If you want a ticket for an Away game, you can usually get one. I will, however, say its ridiculous to allow somebody to just give away 100 points on their card when this could equate to attendance of 20 away games. That gives even more power to the old lags, and given that STAR could be accused of being old lags, you could say they are feathering their own nest again. We shouldn't be afraid of treating new fans as good fans. Of course, we also all know that these popular local games/big cup matches get a bit day-trippy, but I suppose that's a different discussion.

[LWJ]

Star any comments on these suggestions?

Though tbh the way the points are going il probably buy a season ticket next year and not attend just to keep my points ticking over.

[Will95]

Well my question has gone unanswered so BS could be a good call.

Like I said I just know of the guy and my mate who was telling me about him clearly was BSing so apologies there. But I do know someone, 2300-odd points, enough to have a ticket for Brentford, no longer has a ST, who couldn't go, and that sucks.

[Hendo]

Yeah it sucks. But that's life, get on with it.

At the end of the day, he is £400.00 better off than I am.

[melonhead]

happy with current system.

quite like idea 3 though.
not keen on the rest as I find them to be wrong headed

[STAR Liaison]

FAO STAR:

With the greatest of respect to you all - I know you are well-meaning volunteers who give up their own time - with home support dwindling to pre-first PL promotion levels and away games very rarely selling out.....is this really a priority in the hearts and minds of Reading fans?

I wonder whether some attempt to open a dialogue with our new owners might be a more prudent use of what I realise must be a finite amount of time available to your Board members who predominantly must be full time employed with families etc......

Appreciate your sympathy, Floyd, but we are actually doing both these things at the same time. Has to be said we're getting more back from HNA though

We are also doing this in response to intimations from the club that they would be looking at the scheme some time so, obviously, it's better to have our input before they tell us what they've decided to do.

[STAR Liaison]

I will, however, say its ridiculous to allow somebody to just give away 100 points on their card when this could equate to attendance of 20 away games. That gives even more power to the old lags, and given that STAR could be accused of being old lags, you could say they are feathering their own nest again. We shouldn't be afraid of treating new fans as good fans. Of course, we also all know that these popular local games/big cup matches get a bit day-trippy, but I suppose that's a different discussion.

Jeez, this one ( #4 ) is a hard sell!! With this idea there is a LOSER for every winner - it's the new fan who would be likely to be benefit at the expense of the older fan. I E - Old lag takes 500 feathers from own nest and gives them to shiny new fan.

Anyway if the bright and brainy people that constitute the HNA massive don't get / like it that's got to be curtains.

[STAR Liaison]

Thanks again for all the responses and some very interesting ideas. Here’s my sum-up of the state of play:

# Idea 1 – equalise the number of points gained for attending home and away matches – 10 points for each – applies only to away tickets bought from RFC Ticket Office

This is the idea / issue that provoked most response. Strong support for the idea of equalising home and away points from both HNA and STAR members.
There is also strong enough backing to look at the idea of separating away support / away ticket priority from home support so that current loyal away supporters aren’t disadvantaged. Any mechanism would need to fit in with the generally held belief that current season ticket holders should have top priority.
We need to find out how many fans are affected by this / how often. If it’s a small number it might be possible to find a solution on the scale of the Northern Royals idea.

# Idea 2 – add 2 points for every time your season ticket is actually used to go to a home league match

Not much comment on this idea – but what there was generally favourable. But see also response to #5

# Idea 3 – allow an adult with enough points to buy 2 tickets at the same time, with the other for a ‘linked’ junior who does not have enough points

Something in this – and not just for juniors. Suggestions to look at – (1) reserving the seat next to you and if the person with lower points qualifies they buy that seat or (2) combining the points total of two people and dividing it ie Bill has 3500 Ben has 2500, total 6000 / 2 = 3000 so they can both buy at the 3000 mark.
I’m not sure either of these are practical and (2) suffers from same issues as #4 below

# Idea 4 – allow a transfer / donation of some Royalty Points to a person with a lower number of points so long as the transferor still has more points than the person who gains. This could happen once only per season and during the close season only. (For example Bart has 1800 points and Lisa has 1250 – Bart transfers 260 points so he has 1540 and Lisa has 1510 and now they are likely to be in the same bracket to buy tickets at the same time.)

This seems to radiate unfairness and has no support.

# Idea 5 – bigger points incentive to attend Cup matches (say 20) combined with low priced match ticket

Few views offered and mixed when they were. One poster made the point people should go if they want to and not feel forced – same might apply to #2 above – “I’ve paid me money, what more do you want?!”

The idea of expiring Royalty Points after a certain number of years

This was met with paroxysms of rage in some quarters but the idea of inflating the value of Royalty Points over time is a clever and gentler way of addressing the issue which I think did have some support on this thread and should be looked at.

[floyd__streete]

Appreciate your sympathy, Floyd, but we are actually doing both these things at the same time. Has to be said we're getting more back from HNA though

Heartening to hear. You must let us know your progress.....or otherwise.

[Zana Badawi]

I will, however, say its ridiculous to allow somebody to just give away 100 points on their card when this could equate to attendance of 20 away games. That gives even more power to the old lags, and given that STAR could be accused of being old lags, you could say they are feathering their own nest again. We shouldn't be afraid of treating new fans as good fans. Of course, we also all know that these popular local games/big cup matches get a bit day-trippy, but I suppose that's a different discussion.

Jeez, this one ( #4 ) is a hard sell!! With this idea there is a LOSER for every winner - it's the new fan who would be likely to be benefit at the expense of the older fan. I E - Old lag takes 500 feathers from own nest and gives them to shiny new fan.

Anyway if the bright and brainy people that constitute the HNA massive don't get / like it that's got to be curtains.

Your example shows a transfer of 260 points which is 52 (FIFTY TWO!!) Away games. You cant justify that sort of transaction between anybody. I appreciate that I may have worded it more soundly, and appreciate that the transaction COULD benefit a new starter; but again, your example shows a queue jump, which not all of us can engineer.

And why be so dismissive of somebody who has amassed 52 away games anyway? That is principally the point of Royalty Points - to determine who best to divvy out the tickets to for local derbies and high profile cup games. We all know that history has shown that there are about 1000-2000 STHs who will see one championship away game a season if its played locally, and about 1000-3000 who will watch a big premiership tie in the FA Cup. Experience has also shown us that this particular group of fans are by no means the fans that you necessarily want to have these tickets. Financially they might be, but they also struggle to appreciate the difference between a home tie and an away tie. But why encourage a group of fans to see one away game a year at the expense of non-STHs who watch away games?

And engineering a queue jump to jump over somebody who has been to 52 away games is a second insult to the already established system, isn't it? Many away fans without STs (and I appreciate it isn't a huge number of fans) accept they aren't protected by the current system, but I doubt they'll accept being queue jumped by a family swopping points without leaving their front room.

[STAR Liaison]

^ ^ ^ ^
This reply shows the fundamental problem with the idea - I appreciate the reply and the detail you've gone into but you barely mention the loser in the arrangement - all you, or anybody, can focus on is the gainer getting up the ladder in what is considered an unmerited way.

The example ZB has chosen to make his/her point is the most extreme you can find - 52 away games. I think one home season ticket and one cup match would come to the same total of 260 points but not sound anything like as dramatic.

LESSON TAKEN - anything that smacks in the slightest of queue jumping should be avoided.