ACO questions

[Grand_Fromage]

I have a meeting scheduled with the ACO membership department next week.

They have asked for comments on the new set of membership formulae they have planned for 2021, but I'm sure that there will be time to discuss other issues with membership, and I wanted to ask the CA Forum members if you have any burning questions/complaints that you would like me to pass on.

My question to you is, what would be your ideal formula for ACO membership, and how much would you be prepared to pay for it? What current membership benefits are important to you and which are not. I've always encouraged membership of the ACO on CA, and to a greater of lesser extent they listen to what we say. There are language and cultural barriers between Anglophones and French from which many of the misunderstandings and tensions between the ACO and race fans arise. I would like to take this opportunity to improve communications between the CA group and the ACO.

[Lorry]

I joined up when this first started, but gave up years ago.  I enjoyed access to the bar with big TVs (and aircon?) and in particular, the breakdown cover.  The free program, poster and results were good too.  The price was reasonable in those days

As we had a block booking, I was unable to make use of the ticket discounts (we tried) but we did get one (out of 4) members discount for 12 sets of tickets, and the ACO were soon to upset our booking resulting in us using a ticket agent.

At present there is little to attract me to membership.  The discount on a one GA is let down by uncertain access to grandstand and camping tickets.  I've yet to visit the museum. The bar is pretty packed, and a long way to walk.  And the ACO just didn't seem to want to deal with us.

[Grand_Fromage]

One of the cultural barriers that the ACO faces is that of 'business formality'. French people expect to interact with businesses in much more formal way than perhaps we are used to in the UK, particularly over the telephone or in letters and emails. This can lead to them seeming cold and uncaring. It's not a problem that can be solved easily. About 20 years ago the ACO set up a temporary London office to deal with British members. The experiment failed because they staffed it with French people.

[Barry]

Never had any issues dealing with the ACO, but I am used to the formal way they operate as I deal with other French companies making bookings.
I used to be a member, one who didn't get anywhere near breaking even on discounted tickets, but I liked the benefits.
Unfortunately the benefits I enjoyed have become diluted. To be fair one reason is the improvement in facilities for visitors generally, better toilets/showers at the track and on Aires etc, and that I now buy camping tickets from a 3rd party so priority booking is no longer so important.
However the ever increasing price of membership and the overcrowding of the ACO enclosures eventually made me decide it was no longer worth the cost, perhaps the overcrowding could be reduced by limiting the number of other people a member can sign in to the facilities?
After all you can only buy 2 ACO grandstand tickets.
Still miss the ACO grandstand though.

[clkgtrlm1]

Agree that the Pre 2019 Member benefits were much better than the 2019 / 2020 onwards membership!

[TobyAnscombe]

This is key to me: When we started back in 2006 one of our group had membership which combined with the generosity of KPY gave us an unrivaled experience. Fast forward and things are different. I joined so that I can get my lot wrist bands and access to the ACO areas as it affords a bit of comfort (and clean toilets).

The main benefits to me are the access to grandstands/booking (camping and GA normally via Team Langoustine) and once at the circuit access to the Club areas are the major reason; it just lifts the weekend.

I agree with others that the offering is not as good as it used to be; I am happy to maintain the membership but it does feel like we are being squeezed out due to the volume of people that now seem to have access to ACO bars trackside. Perversely I would be happy to pay more if there was a guarantee of availability as being able to watch / listen at a bar trackside is a great way to catch up with people that I've normally not seen since the year before.

[Steve Pyro]

Like other comments, I was a member but stopped around 5 years ago.

My major gripe was the shambles that was the member priority access to the ticket booking website.
The evolving e-commerce platform was a nightmare to log into (membership log in credentials at the membership platform were not mirrored on the ticketing platform) and password resets were not dynamic.

When (if) you finally got in to make a ticket booking, the 'priority' offerings seemed to be to camp in the back of Beausejour or nothing else (no MB, Houx, Houx Annexe etc).

In the end, I cut my losses and spent what I would have paid for membership on the the uplifted ticket agency prices for my preferred camping ticket choices.

[Lorry]

I must agree with the good quality of clean/proper toilets in ACO areas being a bonus.  But then why should everybody else have to slum it.  Its got better, but the queues on circuit are not up to music festival standards nowadays.

I think we tried our best dealing with the ACO on a formal business like level, as you need to be polite to make these peoples lives worthwhile/get the right tickets and we still don't understand why they didn't reply to letters/phone calls/emails and their website was a disaster when honour is so important to them. 

We're now happy to spend an extra £80 per person on tickets through an agency, and can't understand why the ACO are ignoring income of at least 50,000 X £80 (or £4,000,000).  We were happy to fund an intermediary because everybody knows how difficult the ACO are, even to the agents.

Are you in touch with any of the ticket agents?

[Rhino]

Originally bought it for tickets but as we can now only get the ones I want from ticket agencies I haven't been a member for years.

[Grand_Fromage]

Strictly speaking, ACO authorised ticket resellers (agents) are not allowed to just sell you just a ticket. They are obliged to bundle your ticket with some kind of 'added value'. About 20 years ago that meant ferry tickets, hospitality et cetera but I'm not sure what they currently do.

Originally bought it for tickets but as we can now only get the ones I want from ticket agencies I haven't been a member for years.

[enzo]

I agree 2019 membership options much better than new formulae, I managed to retain my old level of membership for one more year due to a clerical error within the ACO. I could not give a monkeys about the social media options and apps etc. I regarded the early access to ACO campsites,discounted tickets for up to 6 people,ACO area wristbands etc as the main advantages for a regular attendee.
I would prefer an option like this to still be available for ardent racegoers and by all means have a digital offering for distant fans etc.

Pass on that a lot of us are very unhappy with the new offerings of less for more € 's