The pandemic has fundamentally changed many aspects of events and experiences, including how fans are paying for them. Many people across the world were financially impacted by Covid-19 in some way, making it more difficult to drop several hundred dollars on tickets to live events. However, payment plans are helping get tickets in the hands of fans during the industry’s recovery, and they will also help fans manage and budget for their onsite event expenses in the near future.
Stephanie Rosa, Festicket’s VP of Sales, North America, shares that 40% of their orders have been paid for by payment plan since the beginning of the pandemic, boosting conversion rates for events that offer them by as much as 35% and increasing the average order value by 74%. Event organizers have the flexibility of choosing the initial deposit amount that they will require as well as the length of the plan.
“We offered both these payment options before the pandemic, but we have seen their usage shoot up since and we believe the trend will continue,” she says. “Festivals such as Coachella, Primavera Sound and BST Hyde Park have all used our payment plans to help boost sales for their 2022 editions, with Primavera Sound even selling out in just ten days after using us as their official payment plan provider.”
The payment plans don’t open a line of credit like other pay-over-time options like Affirm — rather, they are simply automated monthly debits from the fan’s card of choice. Festicket also offers a Pay With Friends feature that allows fans to split the cost of ticket bookings with friends at the time of purchase, which has remained particularly popular for events like all-inclusive destination festivals.
“We can split a single ticket among all the friends in the group,” explains Rosa. “All friends have access to the portal to see who has paid and who has not, and it does not require anyone to be chasing their friends down for a missing Venmo payment.”
This trend isn’t showing signs of slowing down, as Rosa shares that Festicket is still seeing a huge uptick in the use of payment plans for 2022 event bookings. “We’re also seeing fans spending more on their event trips,” she notes, “meaning the opportunity to reduce immediate costs and stagger payments is a hugely appealing one. We expect the demand for events in 2022 to be at an all-time high, and therefore strongly believe payment plans will be a popular payment option for eventgoers.”
When it comes to onsite transactions at events, touchless tech is already changing the game, and point of sale system Billfold is hoping to further revolutionize the space by offering pre-payment plans that allow fans to build up a spending fund before they step foot in the event venue.
“When a guest knows that they’re going to EDC in six months, for example,” says Billfold CEO Stas Chijik, "they can actually start consciously saving up money that then they can spend at the event, which will help them be more conscious of their spending as well. Every month, we would put a certain amount, depending on what they ultimately want to spend, into a separate fund that then they will then be able to use onsite.”
This approach will also benefit venues and event organizers, as fans will show up to the event with money that they know they have available and that they’re ready to spend guilt-free. Chijik adds that organizers — many of which already include a bonus for fans that purchase tickets early — will be able to provide onsite discounts or other perks to fans that utilize the ore-payment plan option.
“More and more people are likely going to be signing up ticketing payment plans, because not everyone has the full amount of money right away when they decide to go to an event,” says Chijik. “And while they're paying for their ticket in portions, they will also be able to add a little portion for onsite spending. When they arrive, they will already have credit in either our wallet app, which we're releasing soon, or on their wristband.”
Should someone not be able to make it to the event or not spend their entire fund onsite, they would either be refunded, or the amount would carry over to the next event that they attend using Billfold’s tech. Chijik hopes to have this technology available by next summer.
“I think that overall, this will drive more responsible spending on both sides — in ticketing and onsite transactions — which is key, because at the end of the day, we don’t want fans to have any kind of buyer’s remorse or drive them into debt, we want to provide a technology that helps people spend responsibly and make them feel good about their spending.”