Movie-goers save time by printing tickets at home

The internet is proving to be a convenient way to print cinema tickets from home.

Before the attacks on September 11th, some theatre owners in the New York area had been offering their customers ways to not only pay for their tickets online but also to print them out. While this concept may not be new in Europe, it is only now catching on in the United States.

A Santa Monica, California, company called Fandango was formed more than a year ago to facilitate these transactions. It is 50 per cent owned by seven movie exhibitors: Loews Cineplex Entertainment, Regal Cinemas, General Cinema Theatres, Cinemark Theatres, Carmike Cinemas, Edwards Theatres and Century Theatres.

These theatre companies represent 14,000 of the 33,000 movie screens in the country. Fandango introduced the print-at-home ticketing technology on July 16th and some of its partners are implementing it.

Loews, Cinemark and Century are offering the print-at-home capability in 14 cities, including New York, San Jose, Tucson, Orlando, Chicago and Las Vegas.

"The response from movie-goers has been tremendous," said Mr John Singh, a spokesman for Fandango.

Some theatres are actually seeing 60 per cent to 70 per cent of tickets being printed at home, particularly for a special event like the opening night of the Planet of the Apes film in July, which saw Fandango's highest volume of ticket sales ever.

So far, 40 theatres that represent about 275 movie screens across the country accept tickets printed at home.

"It's perceived as a time-saver and a way to control movie-going," Mr Singh said.

For example, rather than dropping off a child at a cinema, a parent could actually pay and print the ticket at home, ensuring he knows what film the child will see.

To date, take-up has "exceeded what we expected", Mr Singh said, even though the print-at-home capability is "not an easy system to install", he added.

There is no additional work on the part of the consumer, but the theatre must make a technology commitment.

After a movie-goer picks a title on screen at www.fandango.com, a ticket-shaped icon appears that reads: "Print at home available at this theatre". Once the consumer opts to pay for his ticket by credit card, he can print out the ticket using his home computer and printer. The ticket prints out as a barcode on a piece of paper.

Fandango charges a service fee of between $0.75 (€0.83) to $1.50 depending on the theatre.

At the cinema, there's no need for the person holding the barcode to queue. He/she can go straight to the person who collects the ticket stubs.

This attendant would have a hand-held barcode scanner that would scan the printout and dispense the appropriate number of ticket stubs. The barcode is only read once and can be used for any number of tickets. In addition, the scanner is connected to the point- of-sale system at the front office so, when scanned, the number of seats available at a particular showing is reduced.

What Fandango and its theatre owners are trying to seize upon, Mr Singh said, are those people who visit theatres and hate waiting in line.

"Our system helps to reduce their waiting time because they already have their tickets to the movies," he said. "It's a great way to marry the technology with a pre-existing business."

Down the road, theatre owners could also introduce staggered pricing, say to offer discounted prices on weekday nights. In the future, consumers may also be able to buy their tickets up to four weeks in advance - up from one week at the moment.

As yet, Fandango does not offer wireless capability - just the online system and a toll-free telephone number. A person can dial a 1-800 number from their mobile phone, order their tickets, key in their credit card number and pick up the tickets by swiping their credit card through the kiosk at the cinema.

Fandango's competitors include Moviefone, owned by America Online, and MovieTickets.com. Moviefone toyed with the idea of offering the print-at-home capability but, after trying it at two theatres in Denver, dropped the idea.

This leaves Fandango as the only company doing it on a nationwide basis. It is also testing Fandango Express with Century Theatres in San Jose. This would allow movie-goers to print their tickets at home, walk into the theatre where they could buy popcorn using a special express line at the concession stand and to get first pick of seats in the cinema. "Print- at-home has been nothing but a success," Mr Singh said.