The air of crisis surrounding the Festival Fringe eased today, as the first of this year's tickets landed on eager punters' doormats.  With a reported 140,000 bookings stranded inside a broken-down computer, the weekend's dramatic events raised doubts over the future of the Festival itself.  But is the panic over?  FringeGuru's website editor and co-founder, Richard Stamp, answers the key questions about the box office collapse.

This article was first published on Tuesday, 22 July.  We've updated it on Thursday, 24 July, with the latest news.

What was wrong with the Fringe box office?

In a nutshell, they weren't able to print the tickets they've been selling.  They've been taking bookings for shows since mid-June, and say they've filled about 140,000 seats.  But they're having problems turning those bookings into real tickets people can use to get into the shows.

At the weekend, it all came to a head.  The Fringe was forced to close its central box office for two days, as they struggled to catch up with the backlog.  The Fringe board met in crisis session and the press were full of rumours that the ticket system was on the verge of meltdown.

So has anyone got their tickets yet?

Yes - but only just.  The Fringe at last began posting tickets on Wednesday, and we've had confirmation that the first batches arrived on Thursday morning.  This evening, the Fringe say they've sent out 70,000 tickets in just two days.  I'm so glad I'm not their postman!

So is everything back to normal?

Unfortunately not.  They're posting out the bookings they've already taken, but if you buy tickets now, the only option on offer is to pick them up in person.  That on its own wouldn't be too bad - but they don't have a collection point working yet, and the date when they say it will be up and running keeps slipping backwards.

So how will people get the tickets they book?

That's the million-dollar question.  It sounds like the Fringe is trying to sort out some arrangement for customers to pick up their tickets when they arrive at the venue.  But they don't have any details yet and won't do for a few days.

Does this affect the whole Edinburgh Festival?

Absolutely not - it's only a problem for the Festival Fringe.  Admittedly that makes up about two-thirds of all the shows this year - but it's worth remembering that the other box offices, including the International Festival, Book Festival and the Jazz and Blues, are all running absolutely as normal.  It's a confusing situation, but you can read more about all the Festivals here on FringeGuru.

Is there any risk of the Fringe being cancelled?

No, that simply won't happen.  The absolute worst case would be that the central box office closes and we all have to get our tickets by going to the venue.  And even that's a million miles off, based on what we know right now.

What's led to the backlog?

Back at the start of June, the Fringe tried to launch a new box office system, replacing one they'd been using for about the last ten years.  Something went wrong and their website crashed - in fact, the whole box office closed for about a week.  To get their website back up and running, the Fringe moved over to a temporary system.  But they have to transfer the bookings back onto the "real" system before they can actually print the tickets, and it looks like that step went wrong too.

The Fringe e-ticket tent, near Waverley Station, last year. Will the crowds still be there this August?

This is another thing again.  There have been a few reports, in Internet forums and recently in the local press, of people being charged several times for bookings they made on the Fringe website.  What seems to have happened is that they got an error message from the website and tried again - but their card was actually being charged for each attempt they made.

Now if you're web-savvy you might be rolling your eyes, because everyone always tells you not to keep submitting a purchase if something goes wrong during the transaction.  But it seems that the Fringe website was telling people the sale definitely hadn't gone through, and maybe even actively suggesting they tried again.  So it sounds like some people have a genuine grievance here.

So what's your advice for people who haven't booked their Fringe tickets yet?

I'm very sorry to say it, but I'd advise them to avoid the central box office - at least until the Fringe tells us exactly what's going to happen about collecting the tickets.  It's just too hard to have confidence in the system right now.

But, you can still book tickets directly from the venue.  It takes a bit more effort and you might have to pay a little more in booking fees, but the venues' ticketing systems aren't affected by the central box office woes.  We've updated our article on how to get Fringe tickets to talk about the options.

What about people who have already booked tickets with the Fringe central box office?

Check your credit or debit card statement to make sure you've been charged correctly.  Only a tiny proportion of the sales through the website have been charged more than once, but of course that's no consolation if it happens to you.  If there's been a mistake you need to email This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it and, I'd suggest, also let your card issuer know.

For the great majority of people who have been charged correctly, you're probably going to get your tickets by post and it should happen within a few days.  Very sensibly, the Fringe has been posting them out in order, depending on the date of the first show in the batch.  So if everything you've booked is towards the end of August, you might need to wait longer than the people who are seeing shows next week.

When will we know more?

I wish I knew the answer to that, but I don't.  All I can say is that we'll post the latest news here on FringeGuru as soon as we get it.  And of course, if you'd like us to email you with this and other ticket updates, it's easy to sign up to FringeGuru's Ticket Alert.