Racing operator backs CRM

Northern Racing is using CRM-based ticketing and billing system to reduce fraud

Racecourse operator procures £1.2m CRM system

Racecourse operator Northern Racing is using a customer relationship management (CRM)-based ticketing and billing system to reduce fraud, streamline processes and create more targeted marketing campaigns.

The company, which runs nine UK racecourses and hosts 13 per cent of the UK’s annual horse racing fixtures, wanted to improve its property management and marketing capabilities.

Bull Information Systems is providing the £1.2m system based on wired and wireless sales point infrastructures at the courses, integrated with Serendipity Interactive’s Eventmaster ticketing software.

The company is using the technology to issue encrypted tickets, which are checked by handheld wireless scanners, eliminating visual-only checks of expensive tickets that are easy to forge.

‘We were relying on hanging badges supported by spreadsheets, so we had a list of people and staff having to check badges on thousands of people pouring through the gates in the space of an hour and a half,’ said Tony Kelly, Northern Racing’s financial director.

Each course ticketing system is hosted on Bull’s NovaScale resilient servers with wired and wireless Cisco infrastructure connecting to touch screen till points, wireless card scanners, and membership and general card printers.

Each racecourse’s billing system is supported by central business continuity servers. Phase one of the rollout at three sites was completed last autumn.

‘We print 750,000 tickets in a year and save seven pence per badge with the new system. I can log onto my PC and see data such as who has paid what, how many received complementary badges and busy times – all data we did not have before,’ said Kelly.

Installation at the remaining six courses will be completed by June.

‘Once it is live across the whole group, from a back-office point of view, we can do things such as look at consolidated reports of hospitality sales, use data to differentiate between race-based and conference customers, and centralise group accounting,’ said Kelly.