Hundreds of thousands of VIP ticket-holders for the World Cup could be barred from stadia for not having their names on the tickets, German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung reported in its Monday edition.
The German organising committee of the World Cup (WMOK) and Swiss agent ISE, hired by football’s world governing body Fifa to oversee commercial sales of tickets have insisted they are not responsible for the blunder.
ISE said they were only informed one month ago by WMOK of the need to supply individual names for all tickets, in accordance with demands by Germany’s Interior Ministry as a security measure.
”It was too late to do anything about it,” a spokesperson for ISE told the newspaper.
The German organising committee responded by stating it had been a clear requirement, ever since the ticketing procedures were first outlined, that names of individuals needed to appear on each ticket.
As well as names of the fans, tickets also need to show the passport or identity card number of each bearer.
In an effort to solve the problem, ISE is attempting to track down all those tickets sold to VIPs. However German companies who have bought tickets in bulk have refused to supply the names of fans they are destined for. – Sapa-AFP