Eden Festival

[Sound guy Si]

Hi There

This isn't actually a technical issue but just a warning to any companies who get asked to supply anything for the Eden Festival based in the borders of Scotland.

This festival has a history of non payment to its suppliers and unfortunately last year we were scammed by them as well. Unfortunately we were warned too late by the previous years supplier of their dubious payment history.

If your company or you know of any company being asked to supply this event I would whole heartedly advise them to steer clear, My company Smalltown Audio is owed thousands of pounds from this event and I also know the monies are still owed to lighting/sound companies from pervious years

[brainwave-generator]

Hi There

 

This isn't actually a technical issue but just a warning to any companies who get asked to supply anything for the Eden Festival based in the borders of Scotland.

This festival has a history of non payment to its suppliers and unfortunately last year we were scammed by them as well. Unfortunately we were warned too late by the previous years supplier of their dubious payment history.

If your company or you know of any company being asked to supply this event I would whole heartedly advise them to steer clear, My company Smalltown Audio is owed thousands of pounds from this event and I also know the monies are still owed to lighting/sound companies from pervious years

 

I don't wis to urinate on your bonfire, but if you are going to take any kind of court action against them to recover your money, posts like this can be counter-constructive in court.

 

If you don't want to take court action (I'd be dubious as to why not), sure, spread the sh... , but if you want to take legal proceedings it's better to stay clean as a whistle until it's all sorted.

[rickylights7777]

Sadly legal action against these people just does not work. "The Tribe of Galloway" Ltd is made up of two directors who have dropped off the face of the Earth (apparantly living in a van somewhere in England)

 

The ability to actually find the two directors is practically inpossible. The festival still holds the same name but is now under a different organiser(s) although the "volunteers" who happen to be there every year are the same. Without naming names or mentioning other companies there are 4 large scale UK hire companies who have lost thousands on this festival.

 

Every year they have managed to get away with it and even though I have recieved e-mails promossing that this year will not follow the same path I am dubious as to whether this is true or not. Pretty much every company who is owed money has given up as it is impossible to sue someone who claims to be nothing to do with previous years and has no legal paper trail as a Director. The only thing the festival keeps every year is the name with different companies and backers changing each year.

 

Companies house still has "The Tribe of Galloway" as a tarding company but as I said when the director(s) are in a lay by somewhere the M6 its difficult to sieze anything especially with an empty bank account as they no doubt have.

 

If you happen to have any equipment going to this festival it simply needs to be money up front otherwise you will never hear from them again.

[paulears]

The trouble is of course that the new organisers, who may well be outstanding members of the community with excellent reputations and credit ratings get tarred with the dirty brush that belongs to the dodgy characters living in the van.

 

So is it really fare to the organisers of the current festival to warn people they may not get paid? Indeed, legally speaking, would anyone advising such action be guilty of defamation, or even possibly libel?

 

We've had experience of this kind of thing before and it's very important to make sure that you publish facts - so if the company has not been dissolved or liquidated, they could be attempting (could be, note) to pay off their creditors - and if posts here prevent this from happening, the losers will lose again.

 

It is VITAL that anything said is 100% accurate, or it can become very messy. In our other recent topics, it is horrible to keep receiving information in posts about the same person doing it again and again and again, but many of these posts end up being removed because they cannot be substantiated. If people get taken to County Court - the outcome is public - but if a firm has not been paid, the actual details are rarely leaked by the person or firm owed, it's usually a friend of a friend who lets everyone know - and sometimes the info is a bit less accurate than they're aware.

 

 

I'd strongly advise anyone who comments here to think very carefully if what they are about to post is going to be helpful to the people putting on this years event who may be struggling. Word of mouth in the area usually makes certain the bigger hire companies are well informed, but consider this. How many of these firms do you ever see warning people about dealing with the non-paying company? Very, very few for legal reasons. If the actual losers in the deal do not complain publicly, perhaps we should so the same.

 

Please be careful.

[kerry davies]

Welcome to the joys of the Festival circuit. The best way to avoid these things is to build up the network of contacts with companies working in the industry, it will not prevent non-payments but it will help.

 

If anyone wishes to be community spirited and warn others on BR it would be only sensible to make a very bare statement of fact without attaching any additional "advice". E.G. Fred Bloggs and Co of Bloggsfest in Guatemala failed to reimburse me, Joe Public of Public Event Productions for work as a dwile-flonker during 2199.

 

FWIW the event concerned is run by a new CIC in a flatEdinburgh???) on behalf of an events company set up last November See and the registered address is shared by Montpelier Chartered Accountants, 226 King Street, Castle Douglas DG7 1DS, 01556 504064. ‎

 

Note that CIC's are NOT charities but can be the "trading arms" of a charity and are allowed to pay their directors whatever amounts the directors themselves decide.

[Sound guy Si]

Unfortunately this has happened to my company a few times now and I have found that taking legal action against these people is a long winded affair that usually ends up with the claimant being paid some ridiculous amount of money in a payment plan.

 

With regards to the facts of the event, Smalltown Audio was promised half payment mid way through the event, this did not happen, and again the organisers were given the benefit of the doubt by myself and let the event continue, once the event was over we then had to wait a further 7 hours on site, making us late for the next event, only to be given a fraction of what was due.

 

Again I stand by what I have previously stated, this event has a history of non payment to its suppliers, and my posts here are purely to make other companies aware of it prior to the event.

[ImagineerTom]

The most important lesson to learn with festivals is to get paid the bulk of your money upfront. The Promoters get the ticket revenue up front (I'm aware of the quirks of cashflow from ticket agents but this is irrelervant - if they have the money "on deposit" with Ticketmaster then their bank will be prepared to give them an OD against it) so if BEFORE the festival opens they are unable to pay the bulk of your fee then it means they don't have the money and are very unlikely to ever have the money.

 

When I work for festivals (either as a designer/consultant, or in infrastructure provision via the family business) we're in receipt of at least 75% of our fee 5 days BEFORE the festival opens.

 

The situation is (obviously) slightly different for crew / gang wages but as an equipment supplier to a festival there's really no reason why you should be significantly financially exposed.

 

 

[brainwave-generator]

The most important lesson to learn with festivals is to get paid the bulk of your money upfront.

 

This is the one. It's how we've done it since our first festival where we found out the hard way (not our first festival, just our first bad one).

 

Often festivals find out too late they didn't make as much money as expected. Bar sales too low, merch sales too low, generators used more fuel than they expected, extra security needed due to unforeseen circs... whatever the reason, I can think of several festivals that have literally started the festival a good company and gone bust by the end of the weekend.

 

What I usually ask for is our costs, plant costs, and a 50% down payment on crew up front, with the rest of the crew wages coming in cash on site. This works for us and the promoter, giving them a bit more time to get the cash together, and also being convenient for our crew who don't need to bring any cash with them. If the promoter can't pay, I can send the crew home and at least they've got something to show for it.

 

Unfortunately the nature of my business is that we generally project manage and the kit belongs to a partner, the plant is on hire, the transport is on hire, and the crew are hired... so I really have to get paid up front since I literally cannot afford to not be paid, as I have to spend money to do the job. But you should do it anyway, it also IME makes the client less prone to giving you any hassle, as you're not in a position where you need to ensure you're nice so you get paid. With one of our annual clients, we used to take pay afterwards, and all weekend our telehandlers would be all over the site "do you mind just moving this since you've got the machinery" "could you help get that bus unstuck?" "could you give the PM a tow?" all the usual. We went along with it because we wanted to stay on good terms with them to make sure there was no payment hassle, and it ended up costing us hours of work, and hours of no telehandler. As soon as we went to pay up front, we were able to say "no, we need the tele for our work" and they'd not ask again. I know somebody will point out we could have probably done that before, but on the small festivals especially I genuinely find it's best to stay on the christmas card list of the promoter, if you want to keep the formalities simple!

[RichM]

50% no later than 5 working days before, 25% the moment I arrive on site, remaining 25% afterwards is the terms I now give to small festivals, having been stung in the past.

[Junior8]

As so often Kerry's advice is sound - even if the links have timed out. There is no alternative to paying a few quid for the company info in these cases and doing some simple checks outlined here last year. You have to 'devil' for the real stuff though because there are too many 'serial limited company outfits' about. Look at everything. Two years ago I covered a proposed event where the 'digital signature' on the pdf of the Trade Space form related to a disqualified director who appeared nowhere on the paperwork. No event, no refunds, no surpise. But the plain fact is that if any organiser is unable to pay at least part up-front the event is under-capitalised and must be a risk in the event of poor weather or ticket sales.

 

I am still owed £15 from 1971 by a promoter - it still smarts (and is worth £293 today I have just calculated). After that I took BrainwaveG's approach.

[brainwave-generator]

But the plain fact is that if any organiser is unable to pay at least part up-front the event is under-capitalised and must be a risk in the event of poor weather or ticket sales.

 

Can't disagree with that. Any event which works on an advance-ticket basis (most outdoor festivals do, often as part of license conditions) should have a good amount of it's money up front at least a month before the event. They will try and convince you that they can't pay because the event has happened yet but that's seldom the case, money taken on site, from the promoter's P.O.V generally involves bar and merch. And often not even that, just merch. (Since the bar provider will pay £xyz up front to host the bars, and then take all sales).

 

So another way of looking at this is, beside the above advice, if they can't afford to pay you up front, it is quite unlikely that they will be able to afford to pay you afterwards anyway.

[ImagineerTom]

There is no alternative to paying a few quid for the company info in these cases and doing some simple checks outlined here last year.

 

This is of little real world benefit - often the individual festivals are /actually/ invoiced through a shell company set up for each year (there's complex tax-saving reasons for it) so the true legal entity that "owe" you will have no rating worth looking at. I'd also point out that last year, due to the catastrophic failure of 2 of their festivals one of the biggest festival organisers were running several months behind on clearing their invoices and were actively trying to renegotiate terms with their principle suppliers as they were having to re-finance and (I believe) hedge future events ticket sales to make up the operating deficit on last year. In short; big companies with impeccable credit ratings can almost be wiped out by a couple of poorly attended events and I'll put good money on a couple of promoters (and several major infrastructure providers who are well known names) not making it through this year due to plumiting attendances and significantly fewer festivals this year.

 

There's no (legitimate) reason why the bulk of your money shouldn't come up front if you're providing any equipment or significant services to a festival.

 

 

[Junior8]

This is of little real world benefit - often the individual festivals are /actually/ invoiced through a shell company set up for each year (there's complex tax-saving reasons for it) so the true legal entity that "owe" you will have no rating worth looking at. I'd also point out that last year, due to the catastrophic failure of 2 of their festivals one of the biggest festival organisers were running several months behind on clearing their invoices and were actively trying to renegotiate terms with their principle suppliers as they were having to re-finance and (I believe) hedge future events ticket sales to make up the operating deficit on last year. In short; big companies with impeccable credit ratings can almost be wiped out by a couple of poorly attended events and I'll put good money on a couple of promoters (and several major infrastructure providers who are well known names) not making it through this year due to plumiting attendances and significantly fewer festivals this year.

 

It's better than nothing and may be the only thing you can do in the case of new organizers. Sadly however I think you are right in your other conclusion and it may be that those who've bitten the bullet and cancelled already will be seen to be the most sensible long term, though that will be scant comfort for suppliers with gaps in the diary.