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Music

24th Sep 2018

Ticketmaster being sued over allegedly colluding with ticket touts

Carl Kinsella

Ticketmaster

Have you ever been screwed over by scalpers?

Ticketing giant Ticketmaster is being taken to court as part of a class action lawsuit that accuses the company of colluding with ticket scalpers.

An undercover report conducted by the Toronto Star and Canadian state broadcaster CBC appeared to reveal Ticketmaster operatives admitting that they work with touts through their TradeDesk platform.

Two law firms, Merchant Law Group LLP (Canada) and US law firm Hagens Berman, are taking legal action against Ticketmaster on behalf of a multitude of client.

A statement on the Hagens Berman website: “Reports indicate that Ticketmaster accepts kickbacks by secretly facilitating ticket sales through scalpers at a higher cost, collecting profits from both the original and secondary sales of tickets.

“Ticketmaster has actually facilitated the sale of tickets to the secondary market in order to receive a second cut on each ticket — one that is even more than the cut Ticketmaster received on the original ticket sale.

“Our firm hopes to achieve relief for the many Ticketmaster customers who purchased inflated resale tickets through TradeDesk and an injunction forcing LiveNation to end its secret scalping scheme.

Hagens Berman believes that those who unknowingly paid high prices for scalped tickets facilitated by Ticketmaster deserve compensation for the wrongdoing and profiteering of this corporation.”

Ticketmaster has issued a statement denying the allegations:” It is categorically untrue that Ticketmaster has any program in place to enable resellers to acquire large volumes of tickets at the expense of consumers.

“Ticketmaster’s Seller Code of Conduct specifically prohibits resellers from purchasing tickets that exceed the posted ticket limit for an event. In addition, our policy also prohibits the creation of fictitious user accounts for the purpose of circumventing ticket limit detection in order to amass tickets intended for resale.”

Topics:

Ticketmaster