The SC&T representing fans' concerns

[phantom]

In response to current issues being raised with us recently, members of the Supporters Club & Trust alongside SLO Jerry Tocknell met with Football Club CEO Phil Alexander and Head of Communications Dave Barton on Friday.

A brief summary is provided below but we once again encouraged the Club to engage in more meaningful collaboration with supporters along the way rather than simply publishing faits accomplis. It was agreed to hold a follow up meeting in the coming weeks.

Kits and training wear 
Feedback on kits and training wear was articulated, including replacing the robin crest with the bird, colour, collar, price and colour of training kit, poor quality, lack of stock…

Questions were raised as to the lack of away kit so close to the season and the lack of communication from the Club on this. The Club took away an action to come back to us with further details including release dates.
We reminded the Club to consider colour blindness in their choice of kits.

Disabled parking
The Club confirmed that the disabled parking charge increase of 30% for the coming season will be reversed and remain at last season’s levels. It affects about 20 people who will be contacted directly.

Fees on away tickets and coach travel
Fees for away match and coach travel are managed by Bristol Sport across all sporting codes. We agreed with the football Club that our away travel is probably one of the best value in the league but stated that additional fees should be per transaction and not per ticket and if per ticket should be included in the ticket/coach price rather than added.

Digital Season Tickets
Digital tickets were used for the first time at the open training session. We noted that it was good that the Football Club gave fans access to players, especially for younger fans. All digital tickets worked well on the day with 1,200 people gaining access.

The Club did acknowledge some problems once people were inside the ground with long waiting times to see players.

The Club will have ambassadors around Ashton Gate before matches to provide support and generally improve the digital access experience for fans, which was we welcomed.

We fed back that it was welcomed that supporters had the choice of requesting a physical card which has had a take up of c. 30% which is high in comparison to other Clubs but considered that it should reduce as people become more comfortable with the electronic cards. It was noted that supporters couldn’t have both a physical and electronic card which may cause some confusion if not clearly communicated.

Supporters do still need to be advised of how to transfer digital tickets to family and friends.

Fan-led review
Finally, in relation to the Fan Led Review we reminded the football club that we need to get ahead of any regulator imposed fan consultation process. Many of the issues discussed in this meeting might have been headed off by prior fan consultation.

TAKEN FROM: Representing fans' concerns - Bristol City Supporters Club & Trust

[Red Skin]

Thank for the update. Good to hear the digital ticketing went well.  

[W-S-M Seagull]

If the head of communications doesn't communicate, then what is the purpose of his role? 

[Rocky]

Every year the club says they'll get better at comms, doesn't ever happen.

We've got @JerrySLO but I think he's hamstrung by the same issues, lack of comms from relevant departments!

What was their response to the O'Neills situation?  we'll probably never know 

Edited August 1, 2023 by Rocky

[Tony Tootle]

@phantom Seeing as nobody has ever heard from him publicly, what was your impression of Phil Alexander?

[W-S-M Seagull]

5 minutes ago, Rocky said:

Every year the club says they'll get better at comms, doesn't ever happen.

I've mentioned before that I believe the club are far too loyal to staff that don't do a good enough job. 

[Bristol Rob]

29 minutes ago, phantom said:

Kits and training wear 
Feedback on kits and training wear was articulated, including replacing the robin crest with the bird, colour, collar, price and colour of training kit, poor quality, lack of stock…

Questions were raised as to the lack of away kit so close to the season and the lack of communication from the Club on this. The Club took away an action to come back to us with further details including release dates.
We reminded the Club to consider colour blindness in their choice of kits.

 

This is only telling us half a story. 

What was the reaction from those from the club when you said that the new kits and training wear had met with significant comment, were they surprised, were they in agreement and did they expect negative feedback, or was it all one big surprise? 

[Rocky]

7 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

I've mentioned before that I believe the club are far too loyal to staff that don't do a good enough job. 

That’s a harsh take. I’m sure those on the ground are doing a good job, it’s those that steer the ship that possibly need a wobble. That could include two who can’t discipline / sack themselves. 

[phantom]

Just now, Tony Tootle said:

@phantom Seeing as nobody has ever heard from him publicly, what was your impression of Phil Alexander?

It was the first time I had spoken either to Phil or Dave, I found them both very professional in their replies to us, but one thing that personally struck me was they gave me the impression that they were not aware of how strong a feeling there was about the backlash about the kit issues

What I would say is they both listened to all the feedback that we gave, whilst listening to our views they certainly took on board concerns that we raised, it was recognised mistakes had been made in some items as detailed in the opening post above and it was promised more care would be taken on certain decisions in the future - it doesn't take a genius to guess what the club recognise they have gotten wrong.

It was a good open meeting, lots of views were put forward from all sides, and even when there were disagreements people listened to why a certain view was had and was discussed further for clarity

Personally I hope that this is the first of many meetings of this kind, because it really felt like there were issues the club were not aware of but giving the SC&T the opportunity to represent the fanbase to me is important so there is a two way process in getting messages across in the future. To Phil's credit he did recognise if this meeting was already a regular thing the majority of items discussed would have been sorted a long time ago and not grown into bigger problems.

Phil acknowledged that he was still relatively new to his role, and listening to him explain not only his role within Bristol City but also how having to work within the Bristol Sport umbrella actually surprised me how complicated things were now for our football club

I know going forward the SC&T are aiming to be more visible in what they do, and are also very aware of concerns raised not just on OTIB but also on other social media platforms about members not being up to speed with what is going on

Obviously there were parts of discussions above that can't be publicly shared but I believe it gives a good overview of what was discussed and hopefully reassures our fanbase that people are listening and will raise there concerns where applicable

[bcfc01]

23 minutes ago, Red Skin said:

Thank for the update. Good to hear the digital ticketing went well.  

My experience of that was not good.

There may well have been 1200 entries through the turn stiles, but when you have stewards using their card to let people in (which at least one steward was doing for dozens of people as I watched) it defeats the object of testing the digital cards and can give a false positive to the club.

My digital card didn't work (I knew it wouldn't as contactless doesn't work on my phone) and when I asked the steward what I should do (just to see if there was any help for people), he said "dunno mate, I can let you in if you want". A lady did interject and say to go to the ticket office which I didn't do as there was no point.

From my experience and observations it wasn't a well run exercise and staff were not properly trained for it.

[W-S-M Seagull]

10 minutes ago, phantom said:

It was the first time I had spoken either to Phil or Dave, I found them both very professional in their replies to us, but one thing that personally struck me was they gave me the impression that they were not aware of how strong a feeling there was about the backlash about the kit issues

What I would say is they both listened to all the feedback that we gave, whilst listening to our views they certainly took on board concerns that we raised, it was recognised mistakes had been made in some items as detailed in the opening post above and it was promised more care would be taken on certain decisions in the future - it doesn't take a genius to guess what the club recognise they have gotten wrong.

It was a good open meeting, lots of views were put forward from all sides, and even when there were disagreements people listened to why a certain view was had and was discussed further for clarity

Personally I hope that this is the first of many meetings of this kind, because it really felt like there were issues the club were not aware of but giving the SC&T the opportunity to represent the fanbase to me is important so there is a two way process in getting messages across in the future. To Phil's credit he did recognise if this meeting was already a regular thing the majority of items discussed would have been sorted a long time ago and not grown into bigger problems.

Phil acknowledged that he was still relatively new to his role, and listening to him explain not only his role within Bristol City but also how having to work within the Bristol Sport umbrella actually surprised me how complicated things were now for our football club

I know going forward the SC&T are aiming to be more visible in what they do, and are also very aware of concerns raised not just on OTIB but also on other social media platforms about members not being up to speed with what is going on

Obviously there were parts of discussions above that can't be publicly shared but I believe it gives a good overview of what was discussed and hopefully reassures our fanbase that people are listening and will raise there concerns where applicable

I'm confused. Surely Bartons job as head of communications is to be on the pulse about the issues the fans are speaking about and feeding that back to the powers that be? 

I just find it unbelievable that he was unaware of these issues.

20 minutes ago, Rocky said:

That’s a harsh take. I’m sure those on the ground are doing a good job, it’s those that steer the ship that possibly need a wobble. That could include two who can’t discipline / sack themselves. 

I'm ruthless. If someone is not doing a good job then there is always someone else that will. 

[ExiledAjax]

18 minutes ago, phantom said:

To Phil's credit he did recognise if this meeting was already a regular thing the majority of items discussed would have been sorted a long time ago and not grown into bigger problems.

FFS we had regular meetings (every 6 weeks or so) with Gould and Barton - regular meetings which Alexander decided not to continue. Those meetings began in late 2021, originally to discuss the fan-led review, but other items were always touched upon and Gould and Barton were always open to discuss things. There have also previously been meetings to discuss the results of the fan survey.

If he said he wants to start those again then great, but don't give him the credit for recognising that they're useful.

7 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

I just find it unbelievable that he was unaware of these issues.

He isn't. I've posted before about my direct communication with him on the subject of the Robin on the third kit.

[Bristol Rob]

18 minutes ago, phantom said:

It was the first time I had spoken either to Phil or Dave, I found them both very professional in their replies to us, but one thing that personally struck me was they gave me the impression that they were not aware of how strong a feeling there was about the backlash about the kit issues

What I would say is they both listened to all the feedback that we gave, whilst listening to our views they certainly took on board concerns that we raised, it was recognised mistakes had been made in some items as detailed in the opening post above and it was promised more care would be taken on certain decisions in the future - it doesn't take a genius to guess what the club recognise they have gotten wrong.

It was a good open meeting, lots of views were put forward from all sides, and even when there were disagreements people listened to why a certain view was had and was discussed further for clarity

Personally I hope that this is the first of many meetings of this kind, because it really felt like there were issues the club were not aware of but giving the SC&T the opportunity to represent the fanbase to me is important so there is a two way process in getting messages across in the future. To Phil's credit he did recognise if this meeting was already a regular thing the majority of items discussed would have been sorted a long time ago and not grown into bigger problems.

Obviously there were parts of discussions above that can't be publicly shared but I believe it gives a good overview of what was discussed and hopefully reassures our fanbase that people are listening and will raise there concerns where applicable

Still a bit confused - SCAT had the opportunity to feedback concerns re the kit earlier and made a decision not to do that, but still want to represent the fans, so why isn't the club aware of the issues, unless there is a very selective view of what concerns fans are raising and the quest to keep the club on-side is more important than being supporters representatives. The comment from Phil that 'if this meeting was already a regular thing....' - They are, so that's no excuse for either the club to not be aware, or if they are unaware, why?

And as for things that can't be publicly shared - again, if this was a meeting 'by the fans, representing the fans' then as fans, why should there be anything confidential about anything that was discussed? 

All starting to sound like a bit of 'them and us' clique - happy to have the reasons explained, but it seems odd that the head of communications is seemingly able to communicate with some people, as long as they in turn don't then communicate what they've been told. 

For clarity, this isn't me trying to shoot individual down, I just don't understand why communication on both sides is so poor. 

 

[frenchred]

I just refuse to believe they were unaware of the fan backlash, that's just a kop out and it appears the scat accepted it

[W-S-M Seagull]

8 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

He isn't. I've posted before about my direct communication with him on the subject of the Robin on the third kit.

So why did he give Phantom the impression that he wasn't aware of the strong feelings about the kit issues? 

[ExiledAjax]

Just now, W-S-M Seagull said:

So why did he give Phantom the impression that he wasn't aware of the strong feelings about the kit issues? 

I don't know mate. I couldn't make the call on Thursday.

[phantom]

2 minutes ago, Bristol Rob said:

Still a bit confused - SCAT had the opportunity to feedback concerns re the kit earlier and made a decision not to do that, but still want to represent the fans, so why isn't the club aware of the issues, unless there is a very selective view of what concerns fans are raising and the quest to keep the club on-side is more important than being supporters representatives. The comment from Phil that 'if this meeting was already a regular thing....' - They are, so that's no excuse for either the club to not be aware, or if they are unaware, why?

And as for things that can't be publicly shared - again, if this was a meeting 'by the fans, representing the fans' then as fans, why should there be anything confidential about anything that was discussed? 

All starting to sound like a bit of 'them and us' clique - happy to have the reasons explained, but it seems odd that the head of communications is seemingly able to communicate with some people, as long as they in turn don't then communicate what they've been told. 

For clarity, this isn't me trying to shoot individual down, I just don't understand why communication on both sides is so poor. 

 

Concerns have been fed back as @ExiledAjax mentions above, but this was the first time both parties met "officially" to discuss a number of concerns that had been raised to the SC&T.

There hasn't a regular meeting between the SC&T in a long time with out CEO, but as mentioned above the promise has been made to resurrect these meetings to become more regular

There has always been an open two way comms with Jerry as he attends each SC&T monthly meeting, and he continues to received hundreds of messages a week from people that all want their problem answered as a matter of priority

Regarding confidential items, any meeting that I have ever attended has often had items that can't be minuted, it is nothing sinister it is just the nature of the people around the table. 

For your final point, this has been recognised, obviously the past can't be changed but I would say to judge the SC&T going forward 

[phantom]

1 minute ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

So why did he give Phantom the impression that he wasn't aware of the strong feelings about the kit issues? 

All I can say is that the other two on the call from the SC&T feel the same

1 minute ago, ExiledAjax said:

I don't know mate. I couldn't make the call on Thursday.

PS it was Friday 

[ExiledAjax]

1 minute ago, phantom said:

PS it was Friday 

Probably why I didn't make it! I'll be on tomorrow night unless work changes drastically in the next 24 hours.

[Bristol Rob]

4 minutes ago, phantom said:

Concerns have been fed back as @ExiledAjax mentions above, but this was the first time both parties met "officially" to discuss a number of concerns that had been raised to the SC&T.

There hasn't a regular meeting between the SC&T in a long time with out CEO, but as mentioned above the promise has been made to resurrect these meetings to become more regular

There has always been an open two way comms with Jerry as he attends each SC&T monthly meeting, and he continues to received hundreds of messages a week from people that all want their problem answered as a matter of priority

Regarding confidential items, any meeting that I have ever attended has often had items that can't be minuted, it is nothing sinister it is just the nature of the people around the table. 

For your final point, this has been recognised, obviously the past can't be changed but I would say to judge the SC&T going forward 

So my response to that would be.

"Why haven't SCAT asked Jerry why he isn't doing his job and passing on the issues and concerns to the CEO, given that his role is supposed to be the conduit between fans and the club, and that he has attended every meeting?"

[W-S-M Seagull]

3 minutes ago, Bristol Rob said:

So my response to that would be.

"Why haven't SCAT asked Jerry why he isn't doing his job and passing on the issues and concerns to the CEO, given that his role is supposed to be the conduit between fans and the club, and that he has attended every meeting?"

In my line of work, if something goes wrong we always establish why it went wrong, what mistakes we made which contributed to it going wrong, what we can do to rectify it and then what we're going to do to ensure that it doesn't go wrong again. 

There has been a big cock up by the club over all of these issues and they need to take that sort if action to ensure it doesn't go wrong again.

[Bristol Rob]

1 minute ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

In my line of work, if something goes wrong we always establish why it went wrong, what mistakes we made which contributed to it going wrong, what we can do to rectify it and then what we're going to do to ensure that it doesn't go wrong again. 

There has been a big cock up by the club over all of these issues and they need to take that sort if action to ensure it doesn't go wrong again.

From what I've read we have the following areas where the process could be imporved.

SCAT could/should be better at repesenting fans

SLO could be better at feedback concerns raised by SCAT to decision makers at the club

Decision makers at the club need to commit time to attend these meetings

Communication from the club needs to be improved

Actions that are taken away should also include a follow-up/expected close date. I won't be surprised for example, that before the club come back to SCAT with a release date (which I assume is for the away kit), that kit has already been released and has been commented on by many posters on here.

A lot of this makes me wonder if the club view SCAT as something they just give lip-service to and don't take them seriously. 

[W-S-M Seagull]

4 minutes ago, Bristol Rob said:

From what I've read we have the following areas where the process could be imporved.

SCAT could/should be better at repesenting fans

SLO could be better at feedback concerns raised by SCAT to decision makers at the club

Decision makers at the club need to commit time to attend these meetings

Communication from the club needs to be improved

Actions that are taken away should also include a follow-up/expected close date. I won't be surprised for example, that before the club come back to SCAT with a release date (which I assume is for the away kit), that kit has already been released and has been commented on by many posters on here.

A lot of this makes me wonder if the club view SCAT as something they just give lip-service to and don't take them seriously. 

I know I'm being harsh on him but Dave Barton, as Head of communications should be acutely aware of the issues the fans are upset about. Surely that's a big part of his job?

He should be feeding those issues make to the club. It shouldn't take the SCAT to make the club aware of these issues. It seems pretty amateur. 

[OneTeamInBristol]

Can we all agree to keep the abbreviation to SC&T rather than SCAT?

[Cityboy1954]

1 hour ago, phantom said:

In response to current issues being raised with us recently, members of the Supporters Club & Trust alongside SLO Jerry Tocknell met with Football Club CEO Phil Alexander and Head of Communications Dave Barton on Friday.

A brief summary is provided below but we once again encouraged the Club to engage in more meaningful collaboration with supporters along the way rather than simply publishing faits accomplis. It was agreed to hold a follow up meeting in the coming weeks.

Kits and training wear 
Feedback on kits and training wear was articulated, including replacing the robin crest with the bird, colour, collar, price and colour of training kit, poor quality, lack of stock…

Questions were raised as to the lack of away kit so close to the season and the lack of communication from the Club on this. The Club took away an action to come back to us with further details including release dates.
We reminded the Club to consider colour blindness in their choice of kits.

Disabled parking
The Club confirmed that the disabled parking charge increase of 30% for the coming season will be reversed and remain at last season’s levels. It affects about 20 people who will be contacted directly.

Fees on away tickets and coach travel
Fees for away match and coach travel are managed by Bristol Sport across all sporting codes. We agreed with the football Club that our away travel is probably one of the best value in the league but stated that additional fees should be per transaction and not per ticket and if per ticket should be included in the ticket/coach price rather than added.

Digital Season Tickets
Digital tickets were used for the first time at the open training session. We noted that it was good that the Football Club gave fans access to players, especially for younger fans. All digital tickets worked well on the day with 1,200 people gaining access.

The Club did acknowledge some problems once people were inside the ground with long waiting times to see players.

The Club will have ambassadors around Ashton Gate before matches to provide support and generally improve the digital access experience for fans, which was we welcomed.

We fed back that it was welcomed that supporters had the choice of requesting a physical card which has had a take up of c. 30% which is high in comparison to other Clubs but considered that it should reduce as people become more comfortable with the electronic cards. It was noted that supporters couldn’t have both a physical and electronic card which may cause some confusion if not clearly communicated.

Supporters do still need to be advised of how to transfer digital tickets to family and friends.

Fan-led review
Finally, in relation to the Fan Led Review we reminded the football club that we need to get ahead of any regulator imposed fan consultation process. Many of the issues discussed in this meeting might have been headed off by prior fan consultation.

TAKEN FROM: Representing fans' concerns - Bristol City Supporters Club & Trust

Well thanks fot trying but it still font solve the problem of not having a smart phone 3 grandkids under eleven with no phone how does that get us entry in the ground why dont the club just say we want to charge you extra for havung a season card sent out .

Just now, Cityboy1954 said:

Well thanks fot trying but it still dont solve the problem of not having a smart phone 3 grandkids under eleven with no phone how does that get us entry in the ground why dont the club just say we want to charge you extra for havung a season card sent out .

 

[Bristol Rob]

33 minutes ago, phantom said:

Regarding confidential items, any meeting that I have ever attended has often had items that can't be minuted, it is nothing sinister it is just the nature of the people around the table. 

 

Can understand that where the audience is limited or the discussion is commercial sensitive, but SCAT ask people who might want to attend to get the Teams link from them.

So anyone could in theory have dialled in. 

[James54De]

2 minutes ago, Cityboy1954 said:

Well thanks fot trying but it still font solve the problem of not having a smart phone 3 grandkids under eleven with no phone how does that get us entry in the ground why dont the club just say we want to charge you extra for havung a season card sent out .

 

This has been covered multiple times. You can add all tickets to one phone, then scan through separately. Not difficult. 

[Cityboy1954]

Just now, James54De said:

This has been covered multiple times. You can add all tickets to one phone, then scan through separately. Not difficult. 

Read what i put no one in my party has a phone ffs .

[!james]

5 minutes ago, Cityboy1954 said:

Well thanks fot trying but it still font solve the problem of not having a smart phone 3 grandkids under eleven with no phone how does that get us entry in the ground why dont the club just say we want to charge you extra for havung a season card sent out .

 

You can request a physical card, there's no extra charge this season 

Edited August 1, 2023 by !james

[James54De]

Just now, Cityboy1954 said:

Read what i put no one in my party has a phone ffs .

You didn’t put that. You said you have three grandchildren with no phone. You don’t have a smartphone yourself?