Get Your Refunds from the Boston Grand Prix Now

I should've known.  We just can't have nice things...

I bought two tickets and pit passes for the announced Boston Grand Prix Indycar race for Memorial Day weekend in Boston earlier this year.  There had been various wranglings back and forth between the event organizer and various permitting bodies but I always thought that for the benefit of the city a deal would get done and the event would happen.

I was wrong.

Today the organizer pulled out due to yet another last minute permitting hurdle that was put in front of them by the city or city hangers on (http://www.bostonherald.com/news/local_coverage/herald_bulldog/2016/04/labor_day_indycar_race_called_off_in_boston).  Complaints about noise, traffic, disturbance of the landfill dirt that some of the roads were built on, and on and on and on...there were certain left wing NIMBYs who were determined that this event would never happen no matter what its benefits to the city.  Shocker right?

So here we are...the event cancelled, the organizer saying there are other options...one of which is in the Northeast...What are the chances they can pull off the event on short notice somewhere else?  Do I want to go to Providence for the race?  Will it be a shadow of its original proposal and not worth the money paid up front?  Will the organizer collapse and leave me with useless tickets as they work their way through bankruptcy?

Best option for me at this point is to get my money back and see how it shakes out?  So how to do it? I've already emailed (no response yet), called (no answer) and searched in the articles and websites about the event and its cancellation for info on how to get my money back.  Nothing yet.

So best option?  Call my credit card company and charge the purchase back.  Its one of the nice things about using a credit card to purchase something.  If you don't get what you paid for, Visa and MasterCard hold the company that processes the transaction liable for bringing the end merchant (the entity that failed to deliver the goods) into the card system.  That company (the processor) will try to pass that liability on to the original company but if that company goes away (bankruptcy or the like) the liability rests with the processor which is almost always a multibillion dollar company that is forced to make good on these charges by Visa/MC.  So if you/I don't get our refunds...call your credit card company and charge the tickets back and use the money to go see F1 up in Montreal...

UPDATE:  Received an email this morning that refunds for the tickets will begin on Monday and occur in the order they were purchased.  This is good news as it means either Vendini (the company the organizer used for ticketing and box office management) held the funds back in the case of an occurrence like this, or the processing company did, or the organizer itself did...I would watch your accounts to make sure that the money is returned in short order but at least it appears the buyers will be made whole which is different than similar circumstances.  So what should I do with the $493?

2015 Nissan Frontier and Xterra??

Automotive News is one of the most well connected, serious and reliable sources of information within the auto industry.  They are about as dry as dry can be, making the Wall Street Journal seem like Playboy in comparison.  So it is if they report something, I generally take it as gospel.

Which is why I am pleasantly surprised to see them report that yes, the Nissan Titan is being redesigned for 2015 by Nissan but that the Frontier and even more shockingly, the Xterra will be "refreshed" for 2015.  Multiple reports have claimed the demise of the Xterra is imminent.  Its sales have dropped to levels as poor as the Titan and has not seen an update (like all of Nissan's body on frame offerings) of a serious nature since '04/'05.  The Frontier can soldier on respectably as it is the only small/medium pickup on the current market other than the Tacoma and is seeing increased sales to over 60,000 units a year in '13. 

Hearing that they will continue with the Xterra through '15 makes me think that either Nissan believes they can scavenge some sales from Toyota when the FJ ends its production in '14 or that they really are going to produce a next generation model.  My only disappointment is that Automotive News says that the '15 Xterra and Frontier will only be "refreshes" meaning smaller changes to sheetmetal, body cladding and interior options--no major redesign like the Titan.  This is bad news for the Frontier as not only will it continue to have the Tacoma to compete against but the new Chevy Colorado that is being introduced at the '13 LA Auto Show.

Regardless of how good the Frontier and Xterra were back in '04/'05 they are both showing their age--particularly the VERY low mpg Xterra and both need some serious attention from Nissan and they need it now.
2015 Xterra and Frontier...