ADA (Americans with Disability Act)

The US Department of Justice has revised the Americans with Disabilities act effective March 15, 2010 with a compliance date of March 15, 2011. We have three sources for this documentation that we invite you to read:

• The full act at Title III Places of Public Accommodation (nicely formatted) -and/or-
• online documentation for section 36.302 (text that can be copied) that also has a fair bit of information regarding commentary on the act and the lawmakers subsequent interpretations and intentions -and/or-
• an excerpt concerning ticketing from the act that we have provided below. Do not make this your only reading as it is only intended to highlight some key portions regarding ticketing and does not include other intents or goals of lawmakers that are in the full text of the act.

Please make your own action plans after reading the documentation and adapting it to your venue. Concepts and suggestions presented here are only our interpretation and intended as guidance only. Please use these concepts with Theatre Manager to implement an approach for your venue consistent with the guidelines and any grandfathering that the act may imply.

Purpose of the ADA Act

The key purpose of the act is to provide equal (neither better, worse, nor different) ability to buy tickets through all avenues and see events. This means you may be affected by this act in the following manners:

• For all ticket sales there must be equal opportunity to purchase tickets. This means same hours, methods and terms. If you have web sales, you must accommodate sales of accessible seating online.
• If you provide maps and brochures to the public, you will need to provide equal level of specificity to the diagram regarding accessible seats. This means online sales maps must mark or designate those seats.
• If you have multiple prices in your venue, you may need to change the price that an accessible seat can be sold for so that there is proportionality in the price of the seats allocated for accessibility.
• You may have to increase the number of seats that you set aside to accommodate selling tickets to people with accessible needs. The act is specific about:
  • a minimum of 3 companion seats for each wheelchair seat, if you would sell 4 tickets to a normal member of the public -or-
  • the ability to buy up to the same number of seats as anybody else (if more than 3) -and-
  • companions must be in the same row or as close as possible to the accessible seating area.
  This capability is adjusted in the best seat algorithm in Theatre Manager.
• Ticket holds are a part of managing a venue. You need to formulate your policies and use some Theatre Manager reports to help identify holds
• The ADA act stipulates how venues may investigate situations where there is good cause to believe that seating has been purchased fraudulently. You can require patrons attest that they are using accessible seats properly by acknowledging the terms and conditions of all sales prior to checkout.