SWINDON Town fans have cried foul after it came to light travelling Reds will have to pay more for a Wembley ticket than opposition fans.

While Swindon Town FC outsourced Johnstone Paint Trophy final ticket sales to a firm called Ticket Zone, which charges fans a booking fee on top of each ticket, rivals Chesterfield FC kept sales in-house and have not levied the same extra fees.

Thousands of Robins supporters tried to get hold of tickets for the game on March 25 when they went on sale exclusively to season ticket holders at 9am yesterday.

But some were beset by problems with internet bookings as their season ticket number was not recognised or the system crashed before purchases could be confirmed.

Among them was Dave Leggett, who said: “Why should we pay more for our tickets than Chesterfield fans have to?”

Another was Steve Fisher, 55, of Oakhurst, who bought three £46 tickets and had to pay an extra £10.50 in booking fees.

He said: “I’m quite disgusted that it’s happening. I think Town fans are getting stung.”

Season ticket holder John Rouse initially tried to get through on the phone before trying online – but after he had filled in his credit card details the website crashed and he had to call Ticket Zone again.

He said: “I got through and they confirmed I had booked two tickets on my season ticket. They also said I had booked two further tickets on my son’s season ticket.

“I asked for a refund and also to be reimbursed for the telephone calls. I spent the best part of two hours on the telephone at 10p a minute, which means I spent £12 and wasted precious time just to make what should have been a simple and enjoyable purchase.”

Responding to the complaints Mark Isaacs, the operations manager for Swindon Town FC, said there had been problems with the website and missing season ticket data.

He said the club’s box office could not have coped with the demand for tickets, with more than 7,000 calls taken in the first two hours.

“There were a few problems to start off with,” he said. “Anyone with any issues has been ringing through and being dealt with. There was an issue with season ticket numbers as data had not gone across to Ticket Zone – that’s being sorted.

“There have not been any major issues and there have not been many people calling with problems – maybe a dozen or so about missing data. The website was not loading properly in the first quarter of an hour but that’s all.

“To be honest it has gone really well. Compared to what could have happened it has gone very smoothly. It’s certainly gone better than the play-off final.

“The booking fee is for Ticket Zone to cover their costs of managing the whole booking process. The club does not get any of that.”

Rachel Turner, who works in the Chesterfield ticket office, confirmed the League One club were not charging bookings fees and the only additional charge was £1 for credit card purchases.

The Adver contacted Ticket Zone but no one was available to comment.

If any fans continue to have issues with booking their tickets they should contact Ticket Zone customer services on 0871 223 2300 (option 2).