Purchasers from the United States, Australia, Sweden and Canada had to stand outside in temperatures approaching 27C at a college in Paddington because of an administrative blunder by ticket agency CoSport.
Staff at the company, which has the exclusive rights to sell ?premium packages? to seven countries, were struggling to issue tickets that had been bought online.
By 1pm today a queue of more than 200 people was snaking out of the doors of the City of Westminster College?s Paddington campus, where the tickets were due to be picked up.
Some visitors are thought to have left without collecting their tickets because they could not be found, while those who did wait had to cover their heads with coats and umbrellas because of the heat.
John Schrader, 54, from Adelaide, was nearing the college entrance after waiting for four hours to pick up basketball, swimming and athletics tickets.
He said: ?You have several hundred people queuing for four, five, six hours, this is a significant public safety issue. You could have people collapsing or fainting. People are getting dehydrated and are in the sun.
?I feel very sorry for the staff and volunteers because they are the victims of incompetence up the food chain.?
Derek Reimer, 64, from Canada, spoke to the Standard after waiting two-and-a-half hours with his family.
The retired archivist bought tickets to see Canada play Japan in the women?s football in Coventry on Wednesday as part of a trip to Britain to visit relatives.
He had not planned to come to London but CoSport told him he could not pick up his tickets, as planned, in Shrewsbury, where he is staying.
He said: ?The irony is that there are thousands of tickets for sale for this game. I assume we could just walk up and buy a ticket. CoSport has handled things abominably. The only thing they are good at is taking your money.?
David Prais, 48, from Uxbridge, spent more than three hours to collect several tickets, including some for Taekwondo for friends whose daughter is competing for the US team.
He said: ?It doesn?t cast the Olympics organisers is a very good light. Clearly there are people in the queue where one of their first experiences of this country is to pick up their tickets, and what a disaster that is.?
No one from CoSport was available to comment. On its website, the company describes itself as ?the leading provider of consumer hospitality packages and individual event tickets to the Olympic Games.?
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