Y Not Festival: Organisers agree to give 50% refunds
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Johnny Robinson
Organisers of a festival that was cancelled a day early when rain turned it into a mud bath have agreed to give customers 50% refunds.
Y Not organisers previously apologised and said they had no choice, as continuing would have been unsafe.
The weather stopped headline act The Vaccines from taking to the stage while Clean Bandit resorted to a DJ set.
People who went to the event in Derbyshire last weekend complained that other festivals cope with bad weather.
In a statement announcing the refund, Y Not organisers said: "We were hit with extraordinary and highly unpredictable weather both during the build and over the weekend itself.
"There were levels of infrastructure in place to deal with adverse weather, however we reached a point when the forecast was changing hourly and there became a risk that emergency services would not be able to access areas of the site."
The statement said the festival will return in 2018, "putting right what went wrong in 2017".
However, Sean Clayton, a town councillor in nearby Ashbourne who attends the festival every year, has written to Derbyshire Dales District Council urging it not to renew the licence.
"It's not just the cancellation," he said.
"It's the treatment of the attendees, toilets, security and complete lack of organisation.
"I don't believe they should be able to sweep this under the carpet with a 50% refund."
In the letter he also accused staff and volunteers of being rude and unhelpful, which he said contributed to the "carnage".
Tickets for the three-day festival ranged in price from £89 to £114.50.
The third day, Sunday 30 July, was cancelled but some festival-goers and traders were still attempting to leave the site on Monday after the mud made driving conditions difficult.
Thousands of people complained about the event and demanded refunds on social media.
BBC Derby asked people for their experiences of the festival on Twitter.
Izzy Morris tweeted: "Security concerns, lack of preparedness for the weather ruined an amazing lineup and great potential.
"But we did still have a great time but we probably had a better experience than most (e.g. the disabled festival goers had a lot of problems)."
Jason Smallwood tweeted: "Just got home, total shambles, worst run festival i have ever been to. You can't account for the weather but the response was woeful."
Lewis Cotton tweeted: "It's muddy, but anyone can deal with the mud. It's the shoddy organisation this year that's led to this!"
