Hollywood over Napier? Elton John's second Mission Concert rescheduled

Elton John has had to reschedule one of his Napier concerts. Photo / File

Air New Zealand has promised to waive service fees customers who were travelling to the now-delayed Elton John concert in Hawke's Bay on February 8, 2020.

A spokesperson for the airline said it had introduced special flexibility fares for those travelling to the concert.

"As a gesture of goodwill, customers have the option to cancel their flights and hold their fare in credit for up to 12 months.

"Service fees associated with the change will be waived but any fare difference when booking new flights will apply."

Elton John's second concert at Mission Estate Winery in Hawke's Bay on February 8 has now been pushed out a week to February 15 due to "an unforeseen scheduling conflict".

The first concert in Napier of his Farewell Yellow Brick Road New Zealand tour, on Waitangi Day, will go ahead as planned.

The reschedule is set to cause problems, with ticket holders from outside Napier having likely already booked flights and accommodation for the event.

A Mission Estate statement put on its website on Wednesday and then deleted said members who could make the new date would be able to indicate in a tick box they could attend.

However, if the new date did not work, ticket holders could cancel their bookings and receive a full refund, the statement said.

Both of Elton John's concerts sold out in an hour in February, leading to a flood of complaints from punters frustrated they were unable to secure tickets.

A Mission Concert spokesperson said due to contractual requirements they were unable to make comment until 5am on Thursday.

At 5am on Thursday the concert crew would provide full updates regarding bookings and other information, the Mission spokesperson said.

While nothing had officially been said yet, the change in schedule could involve next year's Oscar Awards ceremony.

It is scheduled to be staged on February 9 and with Elton John presently preparing to release his own film he may have been invited to perform at the event.

It would mean he would play Napier on Waitangi Day, then jet off to the US, then return for the February 15 show, rather than spending a full week enjoying the Hawke's Bay region.

One person who was coming to Hawke's Bay for the concert from Auckland, Linda Smeele, said she and her family were feeling frustrated at the reschedule.

Smeele said she had friends coming from Australia, and the reason they chose the Hawke's Bay concert, rather than Auckland, was because the concert at Mission Estate was an experience.

She said the first step would be to see whether they could change their accommodation, then if they could re-book their flights.

Another concert-goer, Garth Boggiss, said he was frustrated by the lack of communication from Mission Estate.

He was coming from Tauranga for the concert, so said he was lucky not to have to re-book flights, but was definitely concerned about accommodation.

He had already emailed the Air B&B he is booked at, to pencil in for the following weekend, so as to not miss out to anyone else.

It is the second time he has had trouble attending the Mission Concert. He had planned to see Neil Diamond perform in 2018 but that was cancelled due to health problems on Diamond's part.

Art Deco Masonic Hotel spokesman Graeme Woolf said there were no guarantees all guests would be able to re-book for the next weekend, because February was already a busy tourism month in Napier.

He said his advice is to wait until it has been confirmed the concert is postponed and then re-book as soon as possible.

He said the hotel would not be contacting guests to ask whether they wanted to change their dates - guests would have to contact the hotel.

Elton John tour includes: Forsyth Barr Stadium in Dunedin on Tuesday, February 4, Mission Estate in Napier on Thursday, February 6 (Waitangi Day), Mt Smart Stadium in Auckland on Sunday, February 9 and now, in Napier again on February 15.