Just received the attached reply to an email I sent the club earlier in the week re: refunds from Henry Cox, Head of Supporter and Club Engagements. Thought it might be helpful to share this on this Message Board, pending some more formal response from the club, preferably from the CEO!

Thank you for your email. I hope that you and yours are keeping well during this difficult time.

You raise a number of queries that I hope am able to answer below, largely relating to refunds to your match tickets and Season Ticket Membership.

At this stage, the Gallagher Premiership has seen the postponement of matches only. Tickets and therefore memberships for these matches will still be valid for the re-arranged matches. Should the matches be cancelled, the Club will contact all Members and ticket buyers to give the option of a refund for the relevant events depending on the number of rearranged matches they are unable to attend. Members will also have to option to sell using the free ticket resale website.

At this stage, we ask Members to please hold and the Club will contact them as soon as we have further confirmation from PRL.  We fully understand that the current circumstances are raising questions from sports fans, not just at Harlequins but across the world. Rest assured that when the time comes we will have the appropriate conversations with our supporters and Members regarding refund options.

Similarly, while we are currently hoping that the 2020/21 season starts as planned, as you mentioned this is yet to be confirmed. Therefore all renewing Members will have the option of cancelling their 20/21 Season Ticket Membership up until the first match of the season for a refund, which hopefully provides you with some security. If Government advice means that we are unable to honour some of the 20/21 season, we will of course have similar conversations around refunds for any cancelled matches.

As I hope you can understand, these are very difficult times for all and also difficult to predict. As soon as we have clear direction from Premiership Rugby on match cancellations we will have further conversations with our Members.

I hope that helps answer your questions. And in the meantime I hope you and your family are keeping well.

Kind Regards

Henry

Head of Supporter and Club Engagement

Thank you for posting that letter.  It is very helpful and a great shame it has taken someone to ask the question before the information was forthcoming. 

So the approach to membership renewal is to carry on as though nothing has happened.  Only if PRL cancel the 20/21 games will a discussion about refunds for that season take place.  I guess you pay your money by 9th June and hope for the best. As I have said elsewhere this is the proverbial ostrich sticking its head in the sand! 

How about... "We recognise the financial challenges some members will be having at this time.  We also recognise the considerable uncertainty regarding sporting events in the near future.  In view of this we will suspend the current membership renewal until the Government and PRL give a clear indication of how the forthcoming season will be organised.  All seat allocations will remain as they are pending a relaunch of the membership process"

The dilemma for members is that if you don't renew by 9th Jun your seat will be lost for someone else to move into.  Alternatively pay and lose the cash out of the bank in the hope that there will be a return sometime in the future. 

 

Well the club probably figure if they stop everything, cancel all season tickets, refund everyone the money - then happy punters! But said punters may not be so willing to dive in for next season and the take up might be much less when season ticket renewals restart, leading to all sorts of problems. Better for the club to play a wait and see game, keep the punters and see what it all looks like by June 9th.

I would agree with this.

Cashflow is the reason that most businesses go bust (rather than poor business models, etc.).  I suspect that they will need the cash from from next season's memberships to be able to pay out this season's refunds.

Making any sort of announcement could spark panic. In reality, the future is so uncertain.
They probably have genuinely no idea what will happen either. Keeping the club afloat is probably their main focus at the moment.

They could send out an email with some "empty words".  E.g. We are monitoring the situation closely and will inform . . . .blah, blah, blah.  But, they would have to be very careful to make sure that the email was in fact meaningless and they didn't commit to anything.

I'm sure that PRL will make an announcement when there is a decision.  Until then, we will all be in the dark.

Norbiquin - thank you for posting the email.

Kiss goodbye any plans to rebuild The Stoop.

Well possibly not, if the club goes bust I am sure some nice houses/flats will be built on it, stoop towers anyone?

Oh centre. The Stoop has been separated from the club so if the club goes under, The Stoop is safe and a new Harlequins club can play there.

I may well be wrong but I understood that the separation of ownership was to ensure that the demise of the rugby club would not impact the real estate value of the Stoop.

Not saying the clubs going bust but the ground development will stop. Agree about flats on the site and maybe Harlequins moving out of town.

What a time for David Ellis to have left the club.

Ground in Reading looking for a tenant....... lol