Italy’s SIAE music industry group has initiated legal proceedings against the secondary ticketing industry for the third time this year following complaints about the sale of Lady Gaga tickets.
In a complaint made to the Court of Milan, SIAE said that just a few minutes after ticket sales for the singer’s gig in the city in September commenced via official channels they were being sold on secondary sites at significantly higher prices.
SIAE has also made official complaints about the sale of tickets for Italian concerts featuring U2 and Vasco Rossi since the start of 2017. It has also taken action in relation to Coldplay and Ed Sheeran gigs in recent months.
Discussing the Lady Gaga sale, Gaetano Blandini, SIAE’s director general, spoke of a “surreal situation” in which tickets were being resold “even before the start of the presale on 9 February”.
“The sales of entrance tickets on official channels had not yet begun and already on parallel platforms there was announced the availability of affordable tickets plus” Blandini said.
SIAE advised music fans not to purchase tickets from resale sites and also urged them to submit evidence of unauthorised resales.
Last month, SIAE filed a petition with the Civil Court of Rome following the commencement of sales via TicketOne for U2’s concert in the city “to protect both the rights of its members and consumers who find themselves also paying up to 10 times more than the entry ticket on the parallel market”.
“After seeing that some sites yesterday (Monday), after 25 minutes of opening the ticket sales on official channels, they are selling on the secondary market significantly increased in price tickets for the concert on July 15, we decided to act immediately,” said Blandini.
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