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Food

Company Accused of Scamming Hundreds Out of a Prosecco Ball Pit Party

“I find the whole situation and explanations a bit bizarre. It all sounds very suspect, really.”
Photo via Flickr user Jeremy Keith

We might be in the midst of December party season, but spare a thought for those hedonistic revellers who bought tickets to Prosecco and Balls, a novelty drinks party held in an adult-sized ball pit at various locations across the UK. They recently found out that what was surely the event of the year had been cancelled.

Imagine the pure outrage. A night of sipping mid-price sparkling wine in a children’s soft play area! Cancelled! And after you’ve got the kids a babysitter, practised staying afloat in piles of spherical objects, and nailed the perfect sportswear-meets-sticky-night-out-in-Tiger-Tiger outfit.

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Sadly, this was the reality for those hoping to attend the Prosecco and Balls UK Tour from Liverpool-based events company Prime Live. As industry website The Drinks Business reports, people were left confused after the ball-pool-and-wine nights in Shrewsbury, Belfast, and Southampton last month were cancelled with little notice or explanation. Many took to the Prosecco and Balls Facebook page to vent their frustration, including Rachel Coy, who only found out about the cancellation after arriving at the event. She wrote: “We’ve driven two hrs to get to the Buttermarket [the venue] to discover it is completely closed. We didn’t receive an email confirming any cancellation from you.”

Katherine Evans, another unhappy customer, expressed her rage in a Joycean, stream-of-consciousness comment on the Facebook event page. She wrote: “If it’s false why was it such an awful Event are you merely incompetent then? Not sure that’s better!”

MUNCHIES also spoke to Laura Ault, who had a ticket to the Shrewsbury event and still hasn’t received a refund, despite being promised one by Prime Live over Facebook. She told us: “Forty-eight hours before the event was due to go ahead, they posted on Facebook to tell us that the event was going to be rescheduled. We decided we didn’t want to go and they offered us a full refund within six to eight working days. The days went by and we’d received no money. So we messaged the Facebook page and were ignored.”

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After hearing nothing more from Prime Live, Ault reached out to the ticket sales company, Fatsoma. She continued: “We then received another email [from Fatsoma] to say that we weren’t getting our refund and that we’d have to contact the bank to get our money back as it was out of their hands.” Ault has still not received her £14.50.

This isn’t the first time that Prime Live has failed to fulfil expectations. In November, The Lancashire Post reported that the company mysteriously cancelled a Day of the Dead Event in Preston. According to The Drinks Business, ticket holders for both events have contacted the National Fraud and Crime Reporting Centre.

Prime Live, however, has denied the claims of wrongdoing. Posting last night on its Facebook page, it said that a “hate group” formed with the intention of sabotaging its events had reported the company to “various legal bodies, including Trading Standards and the police.” Supposedly, both the police and Trading Standards “deemed [the] company to be of good intentions and good faith towards [their] customers.” It also claimed to have received death threats from disappointed ticket holders.

Becky Spruce, another person hoping to attend the ball pit party, told MUNCHIES she was less than pleased with the company's Facebook post. She said: “The comments were not very apologetic and I got the sense they wanted their customers to feel sorry for them. I wouldn't say I am angry, I just find the whole situation and explanations a bit bizarre. It all sounds very suspect, really.”

MUNCHIES reached out to Prime Live for a comment but had not received a comment at the time of publishing.

Emily Brough, another disappointed ticket holder, told us that despite being informed that she would receive a refund from the company, she was still waiting on the money. She said: “I commented on [their Facebook post] and within an hour they had deleted my comment. They blocked me so I couldn’t add another comment or message the page. So I now have no way of contacting them to get my money back.” Guess Prime Live have really *taps mic* *clears throat* dropped the ball on this one.