After recent studies have shown that ticketing company Ticketmaster has been inflating ticket prices for their own benefit, it is now being escalated further. The company has now been named in a class action lawsuit. According to Pitchfork, “The proposed class for the lawsuit is defined as anyone “who purchased a secondary market Ticketmaster ticket from a professional reseller participating in Ticketmaster’s resale partner program and/or using TradeDesk or a similar system operated by defendants, such as EventInventory or eimarketplace.”
As previously mentioned, the recent study found via the Toronto Star and CBC, investigators looked more into the price inflation from a recent Bruno Mars concert that took place at the Scotiabank Arena. “CBC counted more than 4,500 Bruno Mars resale tickets on Ticketmaster, meaning that if Ticketmaster sells every seat in the arena for Saturday’s show, it would collect an initial $350,000 in service fees, plus $308,000 in fees on scalped tickets, for a double-dipped total of $658,000.” There were also key findings in the study, which were that prices can change at any time, prices increase mid-sale, and they collect extra fees twice when reselling tickets.
Fellow ticket buyer Allan Lee is suing both Ticketmaster and TradeDesk for unfair business practices and unjust enrichment with TradeDesk. It might be time for Ticketmaster to roll out some more free tickets potentially, similar to their lawsuit in 2016, with claims that their fees were “deceptive and [suggest] that the fee for UPS delivery of tickets is a pass-through of the amount that UPS charged Ticketmaster for that delivery. .” The company provided free tickets to those affected.