Why NCI Students' Union came back to Scope
NCI Students’ Union used Scope, then spent a year with other ticketing companies. Students had to create accounts before they could buy, complaints came in every day, and the union’s numbers dropped. So they came back, and student engagement picked up straight away. Now a €5 night means a €5 ticket, a few phones run the door, and every ticket query goes to Scope.
Tre Robert and Rachel GoskerNCI Students’ Union
- €5
- tickets, booking fee included
- 1,000
- students through one narrow corridor
- 5–10
- minutes for Scope to reply
A year away
Rachel Gosker spent two years at NCI Students’ Union as Communications Officer, promoting every event and making sure students could get tickets. In the first of those years, that meant Scope. “It was very engaging for students to be able to purchase tickets quickly and cost-effectively,” Rachel says.
The next year, the union moved to other ticketing companies. “Unfortunately, the purchasing of tickets just wasn’t as easy for students. They were having to create accounts, and they couldn’t just go in and enter their bank details and have the tickets in their Apple Wallet.”
The new companies were harder to get to know, too. At Scope, Rachel says, a text got a promo code “done within the space of five to ten minutes.”
“We went to a different company, and it had a negative impact on our student numbers. So ultimately we made the decision to go back to Scope, and immediately we’ve seen improvements in our student engagement.”
Tre RobertPresident 2025/26No accounts, no daily complaints
When NCISU chooses a ticketing platform, it starts with two questions: how easy is it for students to buy, and how easy is it for the union to create tickets? With “so many events you have to create tickets for,” Rachel says, “it can be very long and tedious.”
The account wall was the biggest problem elsewhere. Students were required to create accounts to buy, “and the company really pushed that onto students,” Tre says. The complaints followed: “Why do I have to create an account? This is so long.”
On Scope, students don’t have to sign up for accounts or mailing lists. They buy, the ticket arrives by email, and it can sit in Apple Wallet next to their bank cards. “It makes our lives so much easier as well,” Rachel says.
“Our students find it incredibly easy to use Scope, and to be honest, we’ve never had one single complaint about the platform. When we were with other ticketing providers, we received complaints on a daily basis.”
Tre RobertPresident 2025/26A campaign week, from a phone
For a campaign week, the team sits down and plans the events first. Then the Communications Officer, Rachel’s old job, designs the posters and creates the ticket links on Scope.
Even the artwork saves time. Scope’s posters are the same size as Instagram’s, Rachel points out, so one design does both jobs. “You don’t need to make multiple posters. You just use the one that you’re posting online, and the whole thing is created once you put in the few details.” The link goes in the union’s Instagram bio, and QR codes on posters around campus send students straight to the tickets.
Most of it happens on a phone. “You don’t even have to log on. Face ID opens the app and you’ve got all your ticket sales,” Rachel says. “You can create more events in the space of a few minutes.”
“I believe the word we’re looking for is convenience. It’s fast. It’s practical. If I’m on the bus, I can close an event quickly with the click of a button on my phone, rather than stopping, taking out the laptop.”
Tre RobertPresident 2025/26€5 means €5
“Affordability is definitely a massive thing,” Rachel says. Most Dublin clubs charge €15 to €20 on the door. NCISU keeps its nights far cheaper by building Scope’s low booking fee into the ticket price.
“If our event is five euro, we will make sure the tickets are five euro, including the booking fee.”
Rachel GoskerPresident 2026/27With Scope, Rachel adds, the booking fee is the only cost. Other companies charged the union every time it put an event up.
That matters in a cost-of-living crisis. “Students obviously don’t have a lot of money,” Tre says, “so students want to pay as little as possible.” Tre calls working with Scope “probably one of the best decisions we’ve made as an executive team.”
A thousand students, one narrow corridor
The door is where a ticketing app earns its keep. At one event in the Academy, the union had to get a thousand students through a narrow corridor, some with cracked screens, some with their brightness turned right down.
“With the Scope scanner, it never lags. It’s quick. And we’ve got a little flashlight should we need it. We can always keep that queue of 1,000 students flowing effectively, because we want to go and enjoy our night too.”
Tre RobertPresident 2025/26The scanner runs on the committee’s own phones, so two or three people can work the door. When a Dublin nightclub’s policy meant only its own staff could scan tickets, the union got a temporary account set up for them, with access to that one event, and the club’s door team scanned students in themselves.
Customer service, handed over
Refunds used to land on the union. With previous providers, students came to NCISU for refunds so often that “it was almost impossible trying to deal with that,” Tre says. “Whereas now with Scope, we redirect the student immediately to Scope, and Scope look after all refunds.”
The same goes for tickets passed on to a friend, or a mistyped email address. Students can reach Scope’s support day or night, on whichever channel suits them. Before, Rachel says, the advice for a student who couldn’t make it was: “Put it on your Instagram, see if you can sell it and hope for the best.”
“Having the ability to outsource our entire customer service to Scope, with them having a 24-hour support service, really helps us. It helps us on the ground, being able to put more hands into running our events.”
Tre RobertPresident 2025/26The union gets the same treatment. Scope is on hand in a WhatsApp group, and “always readily available to assist us,” Tre says, “in a way that’s swift and effective.” When the only venue free for one event already had a deal with another ticketing company, Tre asked Scope whether the union could use that platform for the night. The answer came back within five to ten minutes: “I understand. You’ve got to do what you’ve got to do. We’re happy to support you.”
A partnership, not a software
“We have a personal relationship with all the lads on the team,” Tre says. “We interact on a daily basis almost, whether it be about the app or not about the app. They’re always interested in how things are running for us in the student union.”
They listen, too. “If there’s something that we think would be beneficial to see on the app, they take that on board, and they have a look and see if it’s something that they can do,” Rachel says. When Rachel started in the union, “Scope came in and did a whole crash course on how to use the system,” and the union now passes that on to each new committee.
“It absolutely feels like a partnership, as opposed to it just being a software.”
Tre RobertPresident 2025/26
What other students’ unions can take from NCISU
Tre and Rachel have run events at NCISU for three years, and not long before that, they were students themselves.
- Don’t make students sign up to buy. When accounts stood between students and tickets, the union’s numbers fell.
- Price it all in. A €5 night should cost €5 at checkout.
- Make one poster do the work. The same artwork runs on Instagram, the ticket page and the QR codes around campus.
- Hand off customer service. Refunds, transfers and wrong email addresses go to Scope, so the committee can run the night.
- Keep the door on your phones. A few people with the scanner can run it, and venue staff can get their own access for the night.
Tre knows what other unions are looking for. “They’re looking for convenience. They’re looking for effectiveness. They’re looking for affordability. And they’re looking for support, 24/7 support. So I’d be telling them, Scope ticks all these boxes.”
Rachel’s version is shorter.
Rachel GoskerPresident 2026/27If you value your sanity, there’s no other option than going with Scope.
Asked to sum up Scope in one word, they both landed on the same one:
“Effective.”Ready when your committee is.