London 2012 Olympics Tickets Hotels and Tours: Broken Clocks and Bungled Tickets

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The countdown clock in
Trafalgar Square.

While everyone is up to their ascots in Britain about the broken London 2012 countdown clock and problems with summer games tickets, I have a more positive story. London Olympics' organisers now give tours of the Olympic Village but the tickets are very hard to come by. In fact, I was on a waiting list for a spot in early April and never thought I'd get "the call". But call me they did. The woman on on the phone was both friendly and organised. This is rather unremarkable but when you think they called me on March 15 when London 2012 tickets starting going on sale, it's rather remarkable. So London 2012 organisers get a thumbs up from Spyns.


But my call back aside, things took a decidedly negative turn this week for the London 2012 gang. London 2012 organisers were left red-faced over two embarrassing incidents as they marked 500 days until the Olympics. Official timekeeper Omega confirmed the countdown clock stopped working only a day after it was unveiled in a grand ceremony in Trafalgar Square. And London 2012 chiefs claimed there was 'no glitch' with the ticketing website despite some fans being unable to finish their orders due to an error with card payments.


The clock was the centrepiece of celebrations to mark 500 days to go to the 2012 Games, which it counts down in days, hours, minutes and seconds. Monday's launch was attended by organising committee chairman Lord Coe, Mayor of London Boris Johnson and heptathlon world champion Jessica Ennis among others and today's technical problem is a major embarrassment for Omega. A statement from the company read: 'We are obviously very disappointed that the clock has suffered this technical issue. 'The Omega London 2012 countdown clock was developed by our experts and fully tested ahead of the launch in Trafalgar Square. We are currently looking into why this happened and expect to have the clock functioning as normal as soon as possible.' The clock, which is 6.5 metres high, five metres long and weighs around four tonnes, took 10 people two days to assemble.


Meanwhile, sports fans with Visa cards which expire before the end of August found the official website, which went live at midnight on Monday, could not process their orders. London 2012 said that the website and ticketing guide clearly states that in order to process your application, Visa cards must expire no earlier than August 2011. This is because while people are applying now for tickets, they will be paying for them between May 10 and June 10 and will need their card to be valid during this period.


I believe we should cut Olympic organisers a bit of slack. Selling 6 million London 2012 tickets, building an entire Olympic village (from scratch), and doing the many other things required to put together the games is enough pressure without everyone whingeing about a clock. But it is a shame the clock stopped on its first day of operations. Big Ben has always kept perfect time. Shame on you Omega.

Spyns is an active travel company based in Whistler, BC (Canada). For more information about Spyns and our package tours to the 2012 London Summer Olympic Games, including London Olympics hotels, London 2012 tickets, and summer games VIP access, please visit our websites http://www.london-olympiad.com/ http://www.london2012-tours.com/ and http://www.london-tours-2012.com/ or call us toll-free at 1.888.825.4720.