Hamilton Cancellation Line- Page 13

[vdirects]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:06pm

My understanding is they are VIP tickets or house tickets

 

That too. I know for a fact standing room tickets are reserved for friends and family and sold when they go unclaimed. I heard the same thing about most tickets being Row J. Maybe standing room is reserved for cast and orchestra family and  Row J goes to whoever Lin or a director or higher up wants to invite. So ultimately "cancellation tickets" are a culmination of a lot of leftover tickets: Unsold VIP, Ticketmaster cancellations, Unclaimed lottery tickets, and probably other situations.

Updated On: 2/17/16 at 09:06 PM

[Matt Rogers]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:08pm

vdirects said: "My understanding is they are VIP tickets or house tickets

 

 

 

That too. I know for a fact standing room tickets are reserved for friends and family and sold when they go unclaimed. So I think ultimately "cancellation tickets" are a culmination of a lot of leftover tickets: Unsold VIP, Ticketmaster cancellations, Unclaimed lottery tickets, and probably other situations.

 

"

Interesting. Thanks so much.

[thinkoflaura]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:09pm

Claudia Draper said: "My experience this weekend -- wonderful

 

I hired a line-sitter for Saturday, the 13th.  He arrived at 4am.  I replaced him at 9am.  We were 3rd in line.  4th & 5th tickets.   I paid him $140.00, $25.00 an hr + tip.  It was freezing, but it was crazy fun sharing the experience with everyone in line.  We got into the matinee at 1:45pm.  4th row ctr. 166.00 a tickets. add 70.00 per ticket for line-sitter., a total of $236.00 + tax-- so about $250.00 each.  A steal.  The show was perfection, not one understudy - well one swing- but no-one else.  It is a masterpiece.  It was worth it !!  

 

BTW - Lin Manuel Miranda came out the fire door at about 11:15am, into our group of 8 people trying to get out of the wind.  It was such a surprise, we all just said "wow, hi...  He said something like "OMG..you people be crazy in this cold.. but, Thank You and good luck"  and walked quickly up the street.    that kept us going..

 

"

that's an inspirational story!!!  thank you!

a couple questions:  were the 2 people ahead of your line sitter, line sitters too?  what time did they get there?  

how many people got tickets behind you, do you know?

i hear stories about them coming out and offering $450+ premium seats, I assumed those would be 4th row center... did they offer that first and then no one accepted so they reduced the price?

congrats!  i hope we can be so lucky when we come to nyc next month.  we have one day/attempt to make this happen (a wednesday so two shows at least!) but so worried we'll get shut out!

[Hellob]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:17pm

@Hellob. I started to respond, but as I read on, your tone became more and more unneccesarily rude. So I'd just say thanks for responding.

 

 

TL,dr You're a crybaby 

 

 

"

 

[vdirects]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:36pm

@Hellob

 

stay classy

[Hellob]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:50pm

aymr said: "Look. I just want to point out something about getting a line sitter.

 

 

 

There might be something you don't know about the situation. I have multiple chronic illnesses, including a muscle disorder. I have suffered badly for my trip to NY two weeks ago, though I wouldn't trade it for the world. But I've missed work days and I've been dragging myself around on a cane, which thankfully is rare for me these days.

 

 

 

I really really wanted tickets to Hamilton when my mother and I were in town, but sitting outside at 5 after getting to bed late after a late show, and sitting in the ground for up to 10 hours, would have definitely left me too ill to navigate the airports home. I got out there myself at 9, soon after I woke up, but I believe being able to hire someone for those few hours was the difference between me making it home without wheelchairs or not, and I likely would have had to see the show on strong meds to deal with the pain, because as I'm sure most people here would decide I would have sat it myself if I had to just to see the show.

 

 

 

I'm sure not everyone who gets a line sitter is in my situation, and I'm sure some of you feel I should have not had tickets if I couldn't be there myself. But I'm glad I saw it, and in my mind the extra money was worth it for my health. Those who can't afford it can sit themselves. 

 

 

 

I just want to say that there might be a backstory to the person hiring that line sitter you would never know.

 

"

You don't have to explain why or justify hiring a sitter. It's your right to do what you want. While I'm 100% sure you did it for health reasons, it's no one's business and don't let these whiners make you feel like you owe anyone an explanation. They remind me of people who feel like they can comment about what people on food stamps buy. I'm glad you got to go and get home safely. If someone feels like a ticket holder who used a sitter doesn't deserve the ticket then that's their problem. Xo 

[Hellob]

Posted: 2/17/16 at 9:56pm

vdirects said: "@Hellob

 

 

 

stay classy

 

"

You're rather oblivious to the idea that you want an entire system to change bc you don't think it's fair. It's illogical and improbable for reasons I outlined. As far as classy, aren't you the one who implied that I was shady on the ticket swap post like I'd swap fakes and then ignored my pm calling you out? So you have nerve talking about class. 

[Hack n Tuck Inc.]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 3:48pm

Thanks to all who answered my questions from last week.  The two-tickets-per-person limit obviously was essential information to have, given my situation! 

 

Many of you mentioned having two "bodies" in the line to be able to get two pairs of tickets.  Can the body be a minor, i.e. can my 13-year-old daughter stand in line with me and "buy" any tickets that come available to her after I've already bought two, even though it will be obvious that she's with me and I'm paying? 

 

Relatedly -- can minors enter the digital lottery?  I believe I saw a post or comment somewhere that said they could, but if you click around long enough on the lottery web page you will find some fine print that says "18 years or older."  If my daughter has her passport or school ID and is fortunate enough to hear win the lottery, will the box office release the tickets to her even though she's obviously not an adult?

 

Thanks again for entertaining these questions -- I don't want to upset anyone or be accused of gamesmanship!

[dramamama611]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 3:59pm

I can't answer your questions, but not a single thing you asked is inappropriate.  Gotta ignore the whiners.

[Anakela]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 3:59pm

Relatedly -- can minors enter the digital lottery?  I believe I saw a post or comment somewhere that said they could, but if you click around long enough on the lottery web page you will find some fine print that says "18 years or older." 

 

This is a really good question - I've personally seen two small children (as in 8-10 years old age range, definitely under 1 win at two different in person Hamilton lottos, and lots of teens/tweens entering the in person lotto, but you're right, the Terms and Conditions on the digital lotto page do say open only to persons 18 years or older.

The one time I did the cancellation line there were under 18 year olds waiting on line in front of me, and they did buy tickets, so unless that's changed I don't think there will be a problem there.

[Chrissoth]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 4:00pm

Hey All, 

My first post, hope everyone gets in and loves the show and wishing you all happy memories.  

1) Can anyone tell me how to get into this lottery I see you mentioning as well as wait online? 

I'm coming soon to NYC with my daughter who has said she'll wait on the cancellation line for me as a birthday gift -- is it too much to ask?  We're going to mainly shoot for a Wednesday to have two bites at the apple...hope to see you there!

[tamra2]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 4:23pm

Chrissoth said: "Hey All, 

 

My first post, hope everyone gets in and loves the show and wishing you all happy memories.  

 

1) Can anyone tell me how to get into this lottery I see you mentioning as well as wait online? 

 

I'm coming soon to NYC with my daughter who has said she'll wait on the cancellation line for me as a birthday gift -- is it too much to ask?  We're going to mainly shoot for a Wednesday to have two bites at the apple...hope to see you there!

 

"

https://hamiltonlottery.broadwaydirect.com/show/hamilton/

[NJ_BroadwayGirl]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 5:14pm

Hi and welcome. I can't speak to the cancellation line but the lottery, which was linked to in a previous post, is digital and gets thousands of entries. If you really want to see the show you can certainly enter it but your odds are not good so you'll want to do cancellation line. You can also watch for resale tickets to drop in price at the last minute.

[vdirects]

Posted: 2/19/16 at 7:31pm

You must be  18 or older to enter and win the digital lottery. That's because Hamilton uses a third party service which  has its own terms of service and uses credit cards to make purchases (you have to claim the ticket by paying online, you can't claim the ticket at the box office after you win), and in general you must be 18 to enter into legally binding contracts.

 

But anyone can stand in line and buy a ticket. They don't ask for ID when you use credit cards. You can give your daughter cash or your card and she can buy the ticket. People stand in line and swap with their children all the time.

 

It's best to just bring at least $200 in cash for each ticket you want, for this reason and also, sometimes people will try to scalp their tickets to people in line and will obviously want cash or paypal. So you never know.

Updated On: 2/19/16 at 07:31 PM

[Alodell]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 6:40am

Hello everyone! I'd like to share my Cancellation line experience from this weekend. I'm from Seattle and myself and two of my friends took a trip to New York this weekend to try to see Hamilton. We flew in Friday morning and got to the line by about 7 am but since there were already 5 people in line (each wanted two tickets) we decided to try for Saturday instead. We were told by the first person in line on Friday that they got there at 3:30 am so that was our plan for Saturday. 

Saturday morning we got in line right at 3:30, we were joined by the next person at 3:45 and by 4:30 there were 5 people in line. By the time the box office opened at 10 am there were 30 people in line. At about 10:30 they came out with 1 ticket for the Sunday show we passed because we were leaving Sunday morning but someone about half way through the line bought it. At 12:30 they came out with the first two tickets for the 2 pm show so we bought those. There were three of us total so we were waiting for one more ticket. At about 1:20 they came out with the next set of two which we took 1 then the person behind us took the other! In total about 7-8 tickets were given out for the 2 pm mostly within the last 30 minutes before the show started. 

We also entered all of the available lotteries while we were there and in an amazing turn of events my friend won the lottery for the 8 pm show as well!!!! We ended up getting to see it twice in 1 day once from about the 20th row (from the cancellation tickets) and once from the front (from the lottery). 

Hopefully this helps anyone looking at doing the cancellation line! From talking to the line sitters this was a lot worse than they have seen recently (likely because of the Grammy win). I will say that the line sitters from Same Ole Line Dudes were incredibly nice and helpful to everyone in line (including of course the people they were line sitting for) so if you are considering doing the line sitting definitely look them up!!

[vdirects]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 9:06am

A total of 9 people got in for the matinee Saturday at the times Alodell says. For the night show at least 4 or 5 tickets were sold literally starting at 8 p.m.

 

Add this to the reasons I don't like the line sitters LOL: The line-sitters have just made it a policy to stop telling people what time they arrived. It used to be that arriving a couple hours before box office was good enough, but as the show got more popular, people started lining up at around 5 and 6. The line sitters' big thing was to at 3 a.m. to be the first in line and practically guarantee their clients seats. However, people always want to know when everyone got in line and the line sitters would tell them. Well, word got out that to beat the first in line or be one of the first, you have to be there at 3 a.m. because the line sitters are almost ALWAYS there at 3 am. Saturday was one of the first times the line sitters got beaten from the first few spots, and by a very loud, snappy GROUP of young women. So the line stitters aren't telling anyone when they get there anymore. 

 

Also part of their business model is to be nice and friendly so people are less inclined to be upset with them or complain (which reading the forums is obviously genius and working for them). There is a line monitor who is a real hardass, but one line sitting company staff is like best friends on a first name basis with him and he lets them get away with a lot but cracks down on any other line-sitter or scalper. So I wouldn't be fooled by them being nice.

So thanks to the line sitters, they've created a culture where people are going to start camping out at midnight or the night before, especially as the show gets more popular with Grammy and Tony buzz and tour hype. Not that that wasn't inevitable at some point.

Updated On: 2/21/16 at 09:06 AM

[dramamama611]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 9:09am

Not the first time this has happened.  And this would have happened line sitters or no.   

[icecreambenjamin]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 9:51am

I apologize if this question has already been answered, but if you are able to get tickets, do you pay full price.

[Baiseur82]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 10:02am

icecreambenjamin said: "I apologize if this question has already been answered, but if you are able to get tickets, do you pay full price.

 

"

Yes full face value of whatever the tickets cost is. For example when I got my tickets from the cancellation line I paid $177

Updated On: 2/21/16 at 10:02 AM

[lunch]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 3:15pm

Also part of their business model is to be nice and friendly so people are less inclined to be upset with them or complain (which reading the forums is obviously genius and working for them). There is a line monitor who is a real hardass, but one line sitting company staff is like best friends on a first name basis with him and he lets them get away with a lot but cracks down on any other line-sitter or scalper. So I wouldn't be fooled by them being nice.

 

------

Well, I think the [good] line sitters are friendly because it's their personality and because being friendly is ALWAYS a good practice, in any business. .  I don't think it's a contrived technique.  If it has the side effect of creating good will with the theater security, so be it.  

 

"

 

Posted: 2/21/16 at 4:18pm

I don’t have a horse in this race as I’m not looking for Hamilton tickets but it is my completely unsolicited opinion that Hamilton should prohibit line sitting. It’s basically a form of scalping (people paying above face value to secure a ticket) except it’s a form that Hamilton can completely control. What if Hamilton offered a line skipping service where you paid money to go to the front of the line? People would complain about that. This, in effect, is the same thing.  It clearly violates the spirit of waiting in line. It’s true that Hamilton has no incentive to prohibit it but it has no incentive to allow it either as the tickets will be sold either way. I personally would prohibit it but sadly Hamilton appears to disagree or at least is apathetic.

 

If they won’t prohibit it though, I really don’t see why Hamilton doesn’t just offer the fee to let people skip the line. Once they allow line sitters, it’s not a “fair” system anyway and any moral high ground and sense of egalitarianism disappears. Sure, it’s already incredibly profitable, but why would Hamilton let the line sitters make the money instead of them?

[lunch]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 5:23pm

spidernight said: "I don’t have a horse in this race as I’m not looking for Hamilton tickets but it is my completely unsolicited opinion that Hamilton should prohibit line sitting. It’s basically a form of scalping (people paying above face value to secure a ticket) except it’s a form that Hamilton can completely control. What if Hamilton offered a line skipping service where you paid money to go to the front of the line? People would complain about that. This, in effect, is the same thing.  It clearly violates the spirit of waiting in line. It’s true that Hamilton has no incentive to prohibit it but it has no incentive to allow it either as the tickets will be sold either way. I personally would prohibit it but sadly Hamilton appears to disagree or at least is apathetic.

 

 

 

If they won’t prohibit it though, I really don’t see why Hamilton doesn’t just offer the fee to let people skip the line. Once they allow line sitters, it’s not a “fair” system anyway and any moral high ground and sense of egalitarianism disappears. Sure, it’s already incredibly profitable, but why would Hamilton let the line sitters make the money instead of them?

--------

Hamilton is not in charge of the line.  The line forms on a public sidewalk.  It's unreasonable, and possibly illegal, to ask the production or the theater to control who stands where or when on a public sidewalk in New York City.

That said, I agree that having line sitters creates an advantage that is not available to all. But so does line waiting without a line sitter. Waiting in line for hours is an option only available to those with time and the physical ability to stand outside for hours.

 

Posted: 2/21/16 at 6:16pm

hamilton is, quite obviously, in complete control over who the box office sells tickets to and there already is someone who monitors the line.

[Hellob]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 6:23pm

spidernight said: "I don’t have a horse in this race as I’m not looking for Hamilton tickets but it is my completely unsolicited opinion that Hamilton should prohibit line sitting. It’s basically a form of scalping (people paying above face value to secure a ticket) except it’s a form that Hamilton can completely control. What if Hamilton offered a line skipping service where you paid money to go to the front of the line? People would complain about that. This, in effect, is the same thing.  It clearly violates the spirit of waiting in line. It’s true that Hamilton has no incentive to prohibit it but it has no incentive to allow it either as the tickets will be sold either way. I personally would prohibit it but sadly Hamilton appears to disagree or at least is apathetic.

 

 

 

If they won’t prohibit it though, I really don’t see why Hamilton doesn’t just offer the fee to let people skip the line. Once they allow line sitters, it’s not a “fair” system anyway and any moral high ground and sense of egalitarianism disappears. Sure, it’s already incredibly profitable, but why would Hamilton let the line sitters make the money instead of them?

 

 

"

Line sitters are employed for all different kinds of things. They stand in line for shoes, phones, samples sales, other tickets, food, etc. People are just upset because now they are waiting for something that some of us are interested in. There's no "spirit" of standing in line. Most of the major lines for anything are scattered with line sitters. I'm guessing the theater probably prefer the sitters because they are more polite and are there to work. They could care less about Hamilton. If the tickets come, great but they aren't going to cause trouble.

A lot of the complaints remind me of the people who begrudge anyone getting a leg up on anything but you have the same opportunity as anyone. You can either get there earlier or hire someone. I don't see how it's scalping since he's not selling the tickets for over value, you're paying for the time and you're never secured a ticket because they can't guarantee anything comes available. I'm sure some people have paid over $100 and didn't get a ticket. 

This board did more to advertise sitters than anything so we created the trend and now we want to end it? 

[Hellob]

Posted: 2/21/16 at 6:25pm

vdirects said: "A total of 9 people got in for the matinee Saturday at the times Alodell says. For the night show at least 4 or 5 tickets were sold literally starting at 8 p.m.

 

 

 

Add this to the reasons I don't like the line sitters LOL: The line-sitters have just made it a policy to stop telling people what time they arrived. It used to be that arriving a couple hours before box office was good enough, but as the show got more popular, people started lining up at around 5 and 6. The line sitters' big thing was to at 3 a.m. to be the first in line and practically guarantee their clients seats. However, people always want to know when everyone got in line and the line sitters would tell them. Well, word got out that to beat the first in line or be one of the first, you have to be there at 3 a.m. because the line sitters are almost ALWAYS there at 3 am. Saturday was one of the first times the line sitters got beaten from the first few spots, and by a very loud, snappy GROUP of young women. So the line stitters aren't telling anyone when they get there anymore. 

 

 

 

Also part of their business model is to be nice and friendly so people are less inclined to be upset with them or complain (which reading the forums is obviously genius and working for them). There is a line monitor who is a real hardass, but one line sitting company staff is like best friends on a first name basis with him and he lets them get away with a lot but cracks down on any other line-sitter or scalper. So I wouldn't be fooled by them being nice.

So thanks to the line sitters, they've created a culture where people are going to start camping out at midnight or the night before, especially as the show gets more popular with Grammy and Tony buzz and tour hype. Not that that wasn't inevitable at some point.

 

"

This board created the culture of line sitters for Hamilton