Safety measures introduced by Ticketmaster and Australian Open ensured a successful event

To keep the Australian Open tournament COVIDSafe, the Australian Open and Ticketmaster introduced various measures to ensure fan and tennis player safety.

Notwithstanding having no crowds for days six through to ten of the grand slam event due to a COVID-19 snap lockdown, the Australian Open which took place in February has been deemed a success.

100,000 fans were able to attend the tournament and Ticketmaster’s innovative products helped to make sure everything was executed efficiently and in line with COVIDSafe protocols.

Measures included dividing the venues into three zones to aid social distancing, ‘fan pods’ to allow groups of up to six fans to sit together, and nearly 100% digital tickets. Digital tickets meant that organisers of the event were able to connect with all fans regarding contract tracing. 96.4% of tickets across the 2021 Australian Open were scanned on a mobile device.

Regarding ticket sales, Ticketmaster detailed a thorough communication plan for customers on the COVID-19 safety measures at the Australian Open, including SMS and emails to keep fans notified of changes as they occurred.

Rob Pickering, Director Ticketing and Travel Tennis Australia thanked Ticketmaster “for the great spirit in the way you and your teams are working with ours on how AO21 and the summer of tennis are delivered. It’s certainly testament to our much-valued long-term partnership.”

Ticketmaster’s real-time event day dashboard, TM1 entry, was used to monitor access into the precinct to control crowd numbers and social distancing – which was a large part of delivering a COVIDSafe event.

Staff were on hand to monitor fan congestion and make sure COVIDSafe measures were followed throughout the Melbourne Park precinct. For AO 2021, no ground passes were available, so all tickets had an allocated seat in a stadium and were limited to certain zones to limit movement.

The event was originally meant to take place in late January but was pushed back to February due to the pandemic.

Image Credit: Tennis Australia/ David Mariuz