To: British Film Institute, Lesbian and Gay Film Festival
From: Disgusted at the Elephant
Re: Your unfortunate booking website
Dear BFI:
We have been remiss at actually coming to the National Film Theatre in the last few years. Renovations, our own busy lives, and basic laziness have meant that we haven’t even bothered to book for the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival in donkey’s years.
This year, we pored over the catalogue and decided on a couple of films. When I went to your website I thought it would be relatively easy to book, given that this is not rocket science and lots of other organisations manage to sell their seats online.
Boy, was I wrong.
First, actually getting to the film one wants to book is difficult. The first film that we wanted to see was the only one that was cancelled in the entire festival. Hard cheese, one might say.
When I went to the second and third ones, even though online booking had only begun around an hour before, nearly all the seats were taken. Of those that were not, two showed as available but caused an error when I chose them. This was Milk, of course, so bound to be popular, but a full NFT1 (the largest auditorium in the National Film Theatre) in less than an hour?
When I went for a third showing of another film, I discovered that the entire theatre had been sold out within one hour. Oh, I tell a lie, there was one seat left. HWMBO probably wouldn’t be interested in this show, but I didn’t want to go without him, so I passed on it. Now, where did I put that shopping basket. Oh, yes, there is a link for it in the heading. I clicked on it. Nothing. Clicked on it again. Nothing again. Looked around for something else. Went back a few screens. Nothing. No way to get to the shopping basket without actually purchasing tickets.
So I “bought” another seat for Milk, got to the shopping basket, removed the seat I just bought, and then continued checkout.
I am glad that I am not responsible for building or testing your website, as it would make me ashamed of my work and I wouldn’t like that. Were someone not as persistent as I am to encounter the obstacles I did, they might just give up and leave lots of seats in their shopping basket, unbought.
There may not be very many seats left for anyone by the time public booking begins in a few days’ time. I suppose this might give you some more members, but it will piss off lots of people who would like to see these films but who can’t afford to join.
Yours, as ever,
Disgusted at the Elephant and Castle
NFT member for more than 10 years.