In a landmark legal case, Alton Towers has successfully prosecuted a ticket tout. The theme park, owned by Merlin Entertainments, took out an injunction to prevent the resale of promotional vouchers for the resort. Tickets touts have been reselling the vouchers, which usually become void on resale, to the public thereby making illegal profits and misrepresenting the vouchers as valid. Michael Sarginson has been sentenced to four months in prison for selling Alton Towers promotional vouchers in breach of the injunction.
Ian Crabbe, Divisional Director, Alton Towers Resort says, “This is an excellent result for us. It sends out a very strong message to anybody else involved in this type of activity that we will not stand still and allow touts to ‘hijack’ our business. The Judge was very clear that a Court Injunction is not something that can be ignored and we will continue to pursue these individuals to the full extent of the law to ensure that they are suitably punished. I also hope that this judgement will highlight the problem to the public as a whole. I do not believe that those who buy from touts fully appreciate the vouchers they are paying for cease to be valid for entry when they are purchased from a tout. More than that, longer term this illegal activity not only negatively impacts our business, but even more importantly puts at risk our long term programme of excellent value promotions, promotions which are designed to benefit many thousands of families who visit the Resort.”
