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Viagogo comments on parliamentary ticketing report
By Chris Cooke | Published on Monday 28 April 2014
Secondary ticketing firm Viagogo has joined its rival Ticketmaster in hitting out at the All Party Parliamentary Group on Ticket Abuse’s previously reported paper on the secondary ticketing market.
As previously reported, the newish APPG, led by MPs Mike Weatherley and Sharon Hodgson, published its paper on the ticket resale market last week, revealing plans to table amendments to the upcoming Consumer Rights Bill in a bid to make new regulations for the secondary ticketing market law.
The resale division of Ticketmaster quickly criticised the proposed new regulations, arguing that the APPG has ignored its input into the Group’s secondary ticketing investigation, concluding: “With its raft of recommendations, the APPG is only serving to harm the secondary ticketing industry, and more importantly, the fans”.
Noting those comments in CMU’s report on the APPG’s paper on Friday, Hodgson, a long-term campaigner on this issue, tweeted: “Disappointing response from [Ticketmaster] to [the] report on CMU – our [recommendations] would build confidence in their service”.
But another key player in the UK resale market expressed similar concerns over the weekend, with Viagogo’s Oliver Wheeler telling reporters: “We completely support the need for consumers to be protected from fraud and from having bad experiences with ticket resale. However, we don’t agree with many of the APPG’s recommendations because they would make it more difficult to use secure resale platforms. That would just drive people back to the black market, where there’s no consumer protection and legislation can’t be enforced”.
Wheeler added: “We don’t believe anyone should interfere in a voluntary transaction between two parties. In fact, both the last government and the present government have concluded that regulation is not needed because safe, secure and guaranteed platforms like Viagogo are the best solution for consumers”.
It remains to be seen how Weatherley and Hodgson’s fellow MPs, and the relevant government ministers, respond to their proposals to sneak secondary ticketing regulations into the Consumer Rights Bill, but I think it’s fair to say lobbyists for the ticket resale sector will be out in force to try and keep their business out of the new legislation.
