How are people doing with their plans?

But the point is that with a TST ticket, you can't be sure of the venue in advance.

Let's suppose you have a Mexico TST 7, and they are drawn to play in group A. You cannot know where your 4th game will be until the group stage is over. For example, let's say Mexico doesn't qualify out of the group and Brasil is the winner of the group. Your ticket for the 4th game, under your TST, would be to see Brasil play on 26 June in Port Elizabeth. Same if Mexico wins the group. However, what if Mexico finishes second in the group? Now you are entitled to a ticket for 27 June in JoBerg. JoBerg stadium is nearly twice as large as Port Elizabeth, so there is no possible way they could print out one ticket in advance to accomodate both contingencies, since the categories are dramatically different sized, and they could never give you a seat.

Similarly, the next two rounds are also up in the air until the group stages are over. You might end up with your quarterfinals and semis in Port Elizabeth and Capetown, or in Cape Town and Durban, depending on how the group stages go. The only knockout ticket that will be known in advance for a TST7 is the final.

 

Can anyone add any helpful comment as to how Airlines work out their flight prices? I appreciate the demand is strong but the prices with Virgin and SAA seem to go up and down a number of times each day and literally hundreds of pounds at that. I have spent far too much time looking at these sites and you have to be very careful what you end of buying.

 

I can't shed any light on the airline pricing, but like, Ric-Braz, I found myself spending way too much time looking at their websites and attempting to find itineraries to avoid the high prices for London-Cape Town (via Dubai, Amsterdam, Istanbul etc). On Monday a somewhat lower price for the LHR-CPT non-stop price showed up (on SAA) and I just booked it. It was the K class on the way down but the very expensive/gauging Y on the return. Still cost 1300 GBP which is way more than I budgeted but I'm beginning to doubt whether we will see anything close the 800 GBP or so that I was expecting. I had sent emails to BA asking when they would be offering fares beyond the June 3rd date outbound date they've been showing for ever and they have avoided that question. I suspect they will follow SAA pricing and I imagine they will be able to fill their flights at those prices.

 

We gave up with CT as it was £3,450 then reduced to £2,775 then this morning £1,800 then this afternoon £2,775. I cannot fathom it out at all. Virgin changes even more dramatically every time you visit their site. I do hope BA play this bloody silly game and reduce their stupidly high fares betweeen JO & CT.

 

I'm flying to Joburg. If the prices are more than £700 which is far more than they usually charge, then I'm not going. I'll fly out in April and pick up the tickets and flog em.

 

Thomas Cook has reasonably priced BA flights there now (dont get too excited, only a limited number of options that prob dont coincide with games)

SAA prices seem to have come down. Can get a week in June for £700 if you get the right week. Cape Town now at £1300 return max, when was £1800. If the airlines are price fixing they are doing a dam good job of confusing us into thinking they are not!

 

I wrote a post about it in my blog at www.WorldCupCSR.wordpress.com but here's the short of it:

My wife and I just bought round trip tix on Egypt Air from London to Joburg for about 700 USD per person. I called the Egypt Air London sales office and booked through the phone with a person (old school style) because the Egypt Air web site wasn't helpful and neither was their NYC sales office. We figured getting to Joburg was going to be the big callenge so we just bought the tix from London figuring we could get tix from NYC to London easily sometime over the next year.

Hope this is helpful for some folks. But this process was really frustrating, I tell you. Good luck!

 

BA Flights out. Just got mine, and cheap too. G ofor it.

Just hoping they dont go bust before June!!

;-)

 

What airline did you get tix on?

 

Oh yeah - and congrats on booking your tix!

 

THANKS ALOT MAN....The whole planning experience has been very frustrating so far. However, I just read your post and quickly called AAdvantage desk.
I am a platinum member with over 250000K miles. I just booked a one way flight from MIA - LHR - JNB all in first class for 100K. In the past I have only used those miles for upgrades, I guess they are coming in handy at the right time.

100K is worth $2500, so 100K each way is $5000.
I just checked the dates I want on FIRST, it costs $16277. So I am getting great value as well.

I just couldnt be any happier as of now.

Thanks NH for the heads up, everybody was telling me if I didnt call on the first day I would not find any award availability.

Good luck all

 

What is cheap? I have not found anything cheaper than Virgin so far. Still confused by the CT/Joburg link as SAA normally have 12-15 flights a day but are not listing any of them over this period. Any thoughts?

 

Can someone explain to me why there's almost zero accomodation available in Cape Town during the world cup. Considering the following facts, I can't understand what the problem is:

- its a touristy city of some 2.5 million
- the Green Point Stadium has capacity of 70,000
- many of those 70,000 dont yet know that they will be in Cape Town (TST tickets) and therefore haven't booked any accomodation
- some of those 70,000 live in Cape Town and don't need accomodation

I just don't get it!! How can there be next to no availability with maybe only 15-20k people knowing they'll be in Cape Town in June 2010?? Is it because it is still to early that not all hotels allow booking yet?

 

Yes m8 too early.

 

hmmm... but when I try to book a hotel for May 2010, I have no problem. Hundreds of hotels with availability pop-up.

 

"MATCH Services AG (MATCH) is the professional services company selected by FIFA to provide ticketing, accommodation and event information technology services to FIFA for the FIFA Confederations Cup South Africa 2009, 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa™"

They have bought mostly ALL hotels, guest houses, B&B and they will make them available to the public in the future.You'll have to book through them.

That's why when you select a date before the tournament you get all this choices and during the tourney, nothing.

 

in cape town i booked a hotel called Daddy Long Legs - it's a boutique hotel in the city bowl area and it's about a 2 mile walk to the stadium. i contacted them directly through their website and was able to book my hotel there without a problem.

i mentioned this before on a prior post but try this:

1. get a fodor's travel guide and it will give you hotels in cape town (email and phone) and contact them directly and see what they say.

2. if that doesn't work, then go to www.sa-venues.com - i used this website to book my place in joburg which i thought was even tougher to find accomodations. the booking agent i have been talking to has been very diligent and responsive to all my questions.

3. i heard about MATCH but i haven't used them yet.

PM me if you have additional questions and i can give you actual contact names of people i have talked to if you are continuing to struggle.

be patient - you will find something; just dont' wait until december otherwise you will be proper fuct

 

Just got a response from an inquiry

"FWCAO are also looking to implement a real time sales website so that requests can be complete fully online. The website is expected to be launched during October 2009 and will hopefully provide a smoother and quicker process for our client bookings. "

Patience my friends (and myself)

 

One problem with cape Town is that it is with Johannesburg the biggest city in SA but generally thought to be the safer.... hopefully. Thus many TV, radio companies are basing themselves there and presumably the jolly 'FIFA Family' also so there will be strong demand already.

MATCH have been utterly useless having said they would contact people from 16th July and never did. Then to come out and say they mean October is absolute rubbish. One thing is for certain CT will be very expensive and I am not sure how much will be left for the fans who after all are the ones paying all this money. For one company to hijack all the Hotels is truly awful and how they will cope if Holland play Engalnd in Polokwane I can't imagine.

 

Thanks for the info.

 

Forgot to mention: what a balls-up, as usual. Without the intervention of Fifa we'd be able to sort our World Cup plans out now. Thanks to their help, we're mostly bolloxed. Fantastic.

I really think if this doesn't start getting easier soon, I'm going to give up on this World Cup, and just wait until it comes to Europe again.

 

That's shocking! So basically FIFA has become a cartel?

Thanks. I actually found a couple of places (apartments) that looked reasonable but didn't book them since I didn't know how legit they were. Plus I was hestitant to just take something when other options may pop-up later.
This whole operation sucks! Might be the last WC I ever go to.

Did they do this in Germany too? I know they hijacked the neighbourhoods around every stadium and only sold Budweiser and crappy American food. But I'm not sure whether they went as far as rigging accomodation to line their pockets.

 

I don't know if the same thing happened in Germany with regards to housing. But I do know the reason why Budweiser and American food was available at the World Cup in Germany is because Budweiser was an officila FIFA sponsor of the World Cup. I don't necessarily support or agree with it, for many reasons, but that sort of market saturation was what Budweiser paid for. It's a shame, particularly when the World Cup should be a celebration of the host country's culture (food, drink, etc.), not of the homogenization of the world via globalization. I am hopeful, though doubt it will be different in South Africa, that sponsors, including Budweiser will allow local companies to sell their products in or near the stadiums. This is doubtful particularly in light of a friend's report from the confederations cup that only had budweiser and crappy American food (burgers, hotdogs), available in the stadiums.

Another interesting question will be what SAB Miller, a South African but global beverage company (Miller, Peroni, etc.) does in response to Budweiser's monopolization of the World Cup.

If these topics at all interest you - check out my blog at www.WorldCupCSR.wordpress.com

 

I think that in Germany there was always going to be plenty of accommodation, so even if Fifa did book out a load of hotels there were always others besides.
In South Africa there isn't enough accommodation, which means they're in a position to have a crack at booking it all up and cornering the market.