Pricing Transparency for Visitor Attraction Ticketing

The Digital Markets, Competition, and Consumer Bill (DMCC) is a new piece of UK legislation aimed at the visitor attraction industry, designed to regulate digital markets, promote competition, and protect consumers.

The DMCC bill was passed in May, meaning you will most likely have already started making plans or changes to your attraction ticketing software. You may be looking at reducing the cost of your entry ticket, but we believe that this could be the wrong approach.

Read on to see our suggestions for adapting ticketing prices for the DMCC bill!

What the DMCC Bill Means for Your Attraction

The new legislation is likely to affect your ticketing model regardless of your attraction’s size and ticketing processes, even more so if your ticketing software operates digitally.

The main change affecting your ticketing process will be the requirement to implement price transparency, meaning that the total cost of a ticket or experience is clearer to the consumer before the purchasing process.

This means that visitor attractions in the UK will not be able to include hidden fees or automatically add upsells to the baskets of customers purchasing tickets without it being clearly labelled and mentioned beforehand.

Plus, you may need to change the way that you offer subscription models, like memberships or annual passes. The DMCC bill will require attractions to provide clearer cancellation terms and communication on any tickets that use direct debits.

These changes ensure that the consumer knows and understands the full costs of their tickets or subscriptions before they commit to making a purchase in the name of consumer fairness.

How to Prepare Your Attraction for the DMCC Bill

Provided that your ticketing system currently implements a clear, transparent purchasing process, you may not need to change anything immediately. However, it will be worth auditing your current ticketing processes to ensure compliance with new price transparency rules.

As the visitor attraction ticketing specialists, here are our suggestions for ensuring a clear, compliant, and competitive attraction ticketing process:

Review Your Current Pricing Model

First things first, you will need to audit your current pricing model to ensure that there are no hidden, mandatory fees in your checkout process and ensure that the final price is indicated to your customers.

Ensure Clear Communication with Customers

Be transparent with your customers about what is included in the ticket price, including any shows, experiences, or additional products that they could enjoy. This will help to build trust with your visitors and improve their experience.

Update Your Ticketing System

Make sure that you have updated your pricing so that your ticket options are accurate under the new rules and consider modernising the way you handle tickets. If you only use paper tickets, consider moving to digital alternatives to help reduce queue times and boost the visitor experience. If you already use digital tickets, consider investigating ways to implement flexible ticket pricing while remaining compliant.

Train Your Team

Make sure that your staff are aware of any legislative and price changes and reinforce what is available for your customers with each different ticket. This way, they can provide confident and knowledgeable customer service.

How You Can Stay Competitive Despite These Changes

While you might not need to make any changes to your ticket prices, many other attractions will, and this is going to create more competition. However, you needn’t reduce your ticket prices to remain competitive – all you need to do is add value to your ticket.

There are several ways that you could boost your revenue while also embracing price transparency, with examples including admittance to limited events or shows, gift shop promotions, or a free return visit within a year. You may even want to provide a discount on memberships or annual passes after the initial ticket has been purchased, or various incentives (like freebies) to encourage sponsorships and adoptions, all to help increase the number of returning visitors.

Getting customers through the door is key, as you can then focus on upselling to boost visitor spend, helping further drive your income. This can be through gift shop sales, food ordering, VIP experiences, and much more.

Work with Vennersys to Boost Income

As the attraction ticketing and EPoS specialists, we know how to help improve your ticketing processes, streamline your operations, and boost your income.

We offer a huge range of innovative attraction management features to help reduce your admin and improve the visitor experience, and we’re also the experts in ensuring that your processes are fully compliant with new legislation. To discuss these changes or to find out what VenposCloud could do for you, get in touch with our team today! Call 01908 735 274 or email contact@vennersys.com and a member of our team will get back to you as soon as possible.