Ticketmaster denies ticket scalping scandal accusations

Ticketmaster has been accused of working behind-the-scenes with online ticket scalpers in an effort to gain more commission revenue. If accusations are proven true, the company would be violating its own terms and use policy.

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In an undercover story, reporters for CBC News and the Toronto Star went to Las Vegas to investigate the potential scalping scandal. Through talking with spokespersons for Ticketmaster and associated reselling sites, the journalists uncovered some pretty hefty stuff.

The journalists claimed to find that Ticketmaster doesn’t do anything to stop ticket scalpers. The reporters also said that Ticketmaster actually aids them through resale services such as Trade Desk.

Ticketmaster has since denied the claims.

The act of ticket scalping is notorious for ripping off fans and customers. Scalpers often buy many tickets at one time and then resell them at higher than face value, thus making a very large profit.

In the case with Ticketmaster, the accusations violate the company’s own set of policies and terms of use. The site says that they only allow customers to buy eight tickets at a time to prevent scalping. While this idea is great in theory, scalpers can easily buy more with bots and multiple accounts.

Despite these efforts, journalists claim that the company has a hand in operations that happen behind-the-scenes. By using sites such as Trade Desk, customers, or scalpers, can buy a ticket and immediately relist it.

It is also worth mentioning that Ticketmaster gets commission from first selling the initial ticket and then again when a verified ticket is resold via Trade Desk. Trade Desk allows scalpers to post hundreds of tickets at one time.

While on the floor at an industry convention, a spokesperson for Trade Desk unknowingly told Toronto Sun that one of his clients had over 200 Ticketmaster accounts.

“We don’t spend any time looking at your Ticketmaster.com account. I don’t care what you buy. It doesn’t matter to me,” a Trade Desk sales executive said in the story with the Toronto Star. “There’s total separation between Ticketmaster and our division. It’s church and state… We don’t monitor that at all.”

You can watch the shocking story unfold below.

Many musicians have condemned the act of scalping for their shows, saying that it isn’t fair to actual fans who are now unable to afford to see the concert.

What are your thoughts on the Ticketmaster accusations? Sound off in the comments below.