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| - As a disabled veteran, I received donated passes for an event here. Upon arrival, I told the box office I was having a hard time walking, and asked that they assign me seats that didn't involve stairs. I made it very clear to her that I was not asking for "preferential seating", just anything with as few stairs as possible. She said the best she could do was put me in seat 1 at the very end of the row.
She gave me the tickets and told me to take the escalators to the left... so after walking all the way down the concourse we found out those were the ones coming down, and the one's going up were on the opposite end. Not one staff member offered help, or asked if I needed assistance getting to my seats. (In contrast, US Airways Center staff have always been amazingly helpful.)
So we finally make it up two escalators only to find out they put me in Section 203, Row A, Seat 1. TOP LEVEL AT THE BOTTOM OF A FLIGHT OF STAIRS. In addition, none of the concession stands were open on that side of the arena.
My kids and I walked to the opposite side of the arena to get something for all of us to drink ($5.75 for a 20oz bottle of Diet Pepsi). When we got there, we noticed over 3/4 of the seats were empty, so I asked to sit at the very top of Section 214 in a bunch of empty folding chairs. Mind you, the seats I was given were in the FRONT row of the top section... I asked if we could sit in the TOP row. I was given plenty of attitude by the usher, but was allowed. However, my two friends, my kids, and I were given dirty looks, and harassed about everything and anything by the usher.
Well, one thing I can say for social media... is that it certainly got SOMEONE'S attention that day. My friends and I started posting about the way we were being treated, and sure enough a supervisor came up and moved the usher to another section. About an hour later, she returned to our section... all smiles.
I understand that some people with disabilities abuse the kindness of others, but when a guy asks to sit in WORSE seats than what he has tickets for... he's probably not one of those people.
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