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After wondering where the refund was for a $100 deposit she had paid for a pair of season tickets for a proposed CFL franchise in Halifax, Sherry MacIsaac recently turned to the refund website’s chatbot.
The bot told her it didn’t have “specific information about the status of individual requests or timelines for refunds,” so she should contact the customer service team for help.
But that was a problem. The refund page has no contact information.
“It really just doesn’t seem like there’s been a sincere effort to make these refunds happen,” said MacIsaac.
At least 6,000 deposits were made at $50 per seat before the Schooners quietly shut down operations in 2023.
Last year, the proponents behind the franchise promised to set up a refund website after some fans asked what happened to their money.
MacIsaac submitted her request last November and has not received her money back.
She’s not alone. CBC News has spoken with around a dozen people who placed requests through the website, but have not received their refunds.
“My expectation was … it’s sitting in a trust account somewhere and if this bid doesn’t go forward, then it’s all just going to go back to the hands of the people who had paid … for those season tickets,” said MacIsaac, who grew up in Nova Scotia, but lives in Hamilton.
She planned to visit Nova Scotia for some games with her husband, but hand out the remaining tickets to family and friends.
Anthony LeBlanc, a former CEO of the Phoenix Coyotes, was a founding partner in Schooners Sports and Entertainment and the public face of the operation.
He did not respond to interview requests for this story but told CBC last fall that it would take 30 to 60 days for people to receive a refund after submitting their request.
The CFL maintains an Atlantic Schooners website. While updates on the state of the franchise are several years old, the site still pulls in fresh stories from the league’s website.
The league has distanced itself from the Schooners’ operation, with a league spokesperson providing an 11-word statement to CBC last year. “The season ticket deposits were collected by Schooners Sports and Entertainment,” they wrote.
LeBlanc told CBC by email last year that when Schooner Sports and Entertainment shut down, the company had no assets or liabilities, and had been offering refunds to season ticket holders for five years.
Prior to the refund website’s launch, some people CBC spoke with said it was unclear how they could get refunds, while others said their efforts to get refunds went unanswered.
LeBlanc said the effort to bring a CFL franchise to Halifax involved “significant and material financial obligations, all of which were honoured.” He said Schooner Sports and Entertainment partnered with organizations that included architectural, public relations, government relations and marketing firms.
David Ramsay of Hammonds Plains, N.S., got an insider’s pitch when the franchise was trying to get off the ground. He was working at the Chronicle Herald when some of the franchise proponents — including LeBlanc — met with the newspaper’s editorial board around 2018 to talk about their plans for the team.
Ramsay was asked to sit in on the meeting because he had previously lived in Saskatchewan, where he had been a season ticket holder for the CFL’s Saskatchewan Roughriders and served as the deputy editor at a Regina newspaper, which included overseeing the sports department.
Ramsay said the proponents seemed sincere, had a good plan in place and had thought out different contingencies.
“They were as prepared as anybody could be, I think, without having $100 million to build a stadium to get a team here,” said Ramsay.
Ramsay placed a deposit for four season tickets.
He placed a refund request through the website last fall, but has not received his money back.
Ramsay said if he’s not too concerned if he doesn’t get a refund.
“I would have loved to have a team here and sacrificing $200 as part of their process of maybe getting one here was a bit of a loss leader for me,” he said.
Bill Ellsworth lives in Calgary, but spends his summers at his cottage near Peggys Cove, N.S. He went splits on a deposit for four tickets with an in-law, with the aim of distributing unused tickets with family and friends.
Ellsworth filed a refund request last November. While he called the monetary amount “small potatoes,” he thinks there could be a larger consequence at hand.
“It’s just disappointing that the fans have been ignored and it’s going to make it harder and harder for the next time a CFL team wants to come in and generate fan support,” said Ellsworth.
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