A Day In The Life

The high school drama teacher, JK,  and I are taking a group of our students to see the stage version of High School Musical in Little Rock on December 9.  We found out about the show in October and I called the ticket handling company to make arrangements.  I talked to a very nice lady who told me we qualified for the group rate of $46.00 per ticket for the Sunday afternoon matinee show.  JK and I collected money from our students and around the first of November I called the ticket lady back to confirm that we needed 21 tickets.  I was super surprised and excited to find out that our seats were in the central orchestra section, eight rows from the stage.  These seats would be $20 higher without the group discount.  On November 13, I had to call the ticket lady once again because our bus driver decided to attend the show and I needed another ticket.  There were no more seats available in the central two rows where JK, myself and our students would be sitting, but the ticket lady got the bus driver seated fairly close to the rest of us in a section to our left.  I mailed the ticket lady a check for $1,012.00 for our 22 tickets on November 13. 

Yesterday I received an email from the ticket lady in which she stated that the $46.00 ticket price was actually for evening performances NOT matinee performances.  She also said that we were seated in the VIP section and if we wanted to keep those nice seats eight rows from the stage, we would have to pay an additional $5.00 per ticket.  I couldn’t believe what I was reading!  I had talked to this lady not once, but three times about our tickets.  In each conversation we had discussed the date and time of the show and the price of the tickets.  Not to mention, I had received an invoice which plainly stated we owed the ticket company $1,012.oo for 22 tickets at $46.00 each for the Sunday, December 9, afternoon matinee performance.  It just wasn’t fair to charge us more or move us from our VIP section seats.  I stomped around my room and ranted and raved for awhile then set about replying to her email. 

I began my reply by saying I was very sorry the ticket prices had been misquoted.  I recounted each conversation I had had with the ticket lady over the phone ( good thing I took notes for each phone call) .  I mentioned the invoice I had received.  I summarized by saying that my students and chaperones were expecting seats in the central orchestra section and I respectfully submitted that we be allowed to keep these seats without paying any additional dollars because we had paid the quoted price for said seats.

I was pleased to receive another email from the ticket lady late yesterday afternoon.  She agreed that the price had been misquoted (by her) and that we should have the seats we had reserved for the original price we were quoted.  She said she would make up the difference in cost since she had made the mistake. 

So everything is hunky dory, right?  Then why do I have this little niggling feeling of guilt that the ticket lady is having to fork over $110.00 out of her own pocket to make up for her own mistake?