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Royal Tattoo - Royal Mistake!

artnbarb

1000+ Posts
The main reason we're taking a short detour to Edinburgh this summer is to attend the Royal Tattoo. I love everything about Scotland - the scenery, the accent, the kilts and the pipes!!!! I know they're a love-em-or-hate-em kinds thing, but those of us who love bagpipes really, really love them. So, I've booked the perfectly located Air B&B, have already purchased our tickets to the Tattoo itself - finding the best seat at a reasonable price isn't easy, but I also had to decide what night we should go.

We'll arrive in Edinburgh around 9 a.m. on a Thursday. Won't be able to check in until noon, and for some reason (I don't remember now!) they've asked us to check our luggage at the National Gallery, which is on the way from the train station to the room, so that will work. We can them find a cafe and caffeine up to help us push through the day. We'll probably crash early on Thursday night.

We'll then have all day Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday before flying to Rome on Tuesday. Did I mention that the Fringe Festival is going on - all day, every day - while we're there? Meaning there will be plenty to do, but I still think I'd like to do a walking tour of the city. Our Air B&B host recommended Edinburgh Expert Walking Tours, and they offer 2,3,4+ hour tours of the city, so we can find a nice balance of cost to time to walking up and down steep hills pounding the pavement!

Also recommended was a company that does day trips out of various large cities. All we'd want is a one day trip to enjoy Scotland's magical, stunning scenery. So - there I was, trying to decide what day we should do the walking tour, and what day to do the daytrip, and for some reason I opened the email confirmation for our Tattoo tickets, and right there, right after the part where it said "This is now a confirmed booking with no exchange or refund. To view our terms and conditions please visit https://www.edintattoo.co.uk/tickets-terms-and-conditions " I saw that I HAD ORDERED THE TICKETS FOR ONE WEEK TOO EARLY!!!! £130! OMG. I am so stunned, and so mad, and so embarrassed. I have no idea where or how the date got changed, or if I simply misread the calendar, but I really think it got changed somewhere along the way. I had based our arrival in Italy on Aug 13 to allow us a full 90 days in the Schengen countries, so Aug 13 was pretty set in my mind. Somehow on the Tattoo website I must've selected the wrong date. How I never caught this is beyond me.

I did write to the office of the Tattoo to ask if they have a re-selling site, like StubHub - yeah, I know that's a long shot, but what the heck. I also emailed our Air B&B "Super Host" - this will tell me how super he really is! Perhaps there's some sort of local office to for re-sellers. I hope so. I'm not sure how much longer to wait to order the new tickets - on the outside chance the Tattoo office might actually make an exception........ Anyway, I hope reading this will make you check all the details one more time, slowly and carefully. I guess It would have been worse, but still £130/$166 is painful to lose.
 
After we were standing in early evening after a long travel day at a locked gate for the b&b that I had booked for the wrong day I learned to triple check my bookings, but it can easily happen. I can’t believe it doesn’t happen to us more often.

Sorry to hear this but at least you figured it out before all the tickets were sold out.

Do you think the different date format might have caused this?
 
No, I'd love to blame it on the different date format, but with the dates involved, no chance. This is totally on me.

I heard back from our Air B&B host - he said it was 7 p.m. when he received my message, otherwise he would have just walked to the ticket office to discuss it in person. He felt I might really have a shot at exchanging the tickets. And - he's leaving early tomorrow morning for L.A., so he won't be able to act on my behalf.

I'm waiting until tomorrow morning to see if the office has responded to my email before ordering new tickets - of course it's not possible to buy the seats I want, but I think I can come close.
 
@Kathy , that was my plan - right after I checked my email this morning. I agree with you about the personal touch! Yesterday when I discovered my mistake the office was already closed so I sent an email - I didn't ask for any special consideration, simply explained my mistake, stated that I understood their terms, and then asked what, if anything I could do to sell the tickets.

This morning there were 2 emails from the Tattoo office - the first was a note saying that normally there were no exchanges, but that they would make an exception for me, that the seats would be for the correct day, same section, best available seating. The 2nd email was a revised receipt showing our new seats, same location (end seats), just 2 rows above our original seats. I was impressed and relieved!!!
 

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