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Which? research finds secondary ticketing listings in breach of Consumer Rights Act
By Andy Malt | Published on Thursday 22 October 2015
As the government kickstarts a new review of the secondary ticketing market in the UK, new research carried out by Which? Magazine has found listings on five of the leading secondary ticket websites – GetMeIn, Seatwave, StubHub, Viagogo and WorldTicketShop – which it says are in breach of the new Consumer Rights Act.
As previously reported, the Act, which passed into law earlier this year, placed new rules on the resale of tickets, including making it compulsory to display the face value of the tickets being sold, and information on the seating area and any restrictions that apply.
Looking at tickets on sale for U2 and One Direction shows, as well as Rugby World Cup and Six Nations games, Which? found listings on all five sites missing pieces of now legally required information. Seatwave, Viagogo and WorldTicketShop all had missing or incorrect face value price details on some listings, while all five had missing seating information. And one ticket for this year’s Rugby World Cup final on Viagogo failed to state that the terms and conditions of the original sale meant that it could be cancelled if resold, despite carrying a resale price of £12,000.
Which? Executive Director Richard Lloyd said in a statement: “It’s unacceptable that these ticket resale sites are getting away with not providing fans with key ticket information, leaving them unsure whether their ticket is a good deal, where they’ll be seated or if they’ll even get in”.
When contacted by Which?, all five of the sites said that they would always amend or de-list tickets if made aware of incorrect information. Meanwhile a spokesperson for Stubhub noted that sellers may not have all the information, such as seat numbers, available when they list the tickets for sale.
But while the Which? report notes that the Consumer Rights Act is not clear about whose responsibility it is to ensure that required information is correctly provided, Lloyd goes on: “Reselling sites cannot continue to push the blame onto individual ticket sellers. Instead they must take responsibility for information displayed on their websites and ensure consumers have enough details to make an informed choice”.
CMU premium subscribers can read more about the Consumer Rights Act and what it means for secondary ticketing in this trends report from April this year.
