The UK Government has today (Friday) announced plans for a new cap to be introduced on the price of resold tickets for concerts, live sport and other events.
The cap forms part of further measures to help clamp down on ticket touting in the country.
“From sports tournaments to Taylor Swift – all too often big events have been dogged by consumers being taken advantage of by ticket touts,” said Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds.
“These unfair practices look to fleece people of their hard-earned income, which isn’t fair on fans, venues and artists.
“Fans enjoying themselves in the moment are what make concerts and live events the thrilling experiences that they are, which is why as part of our Plan for Change, we are putting them back in control.”
According to analysis from the UK’s Competition and Market Authority (CMA), typical mark-ups on tickets sold on the secondary market are more than 50%, and investigations by Trading Standards have previously uncovered evidence of tickets being resold for up to six times their original cost.
The government announced a consultation on secondary ticket sales in August last year.
This was then followed up with plans to look into the use of dynamic pricing in concert ticket sales, following the Oasis onsale last summer. Ticket sales for the UK and Ireland dates utilised dynamic pricing, which sees costs rise in line with demand. The practice drew criticism, as tickets originally began at £135 (€161/$166) and increased to more than £350 in some cases.
‘Plan to tackle greedy ticket touts’
In 2019, the CMA estimated that the value of tickets sold through secondary ticketing platforms to be around £350m – with roughly 1.9 million tickets sold. This accounted for approximately 5-6% of the number of primary tickets sold that year.
The government has now launched a public consultation which sets out a range of measures in the ticket resale market that aim to better protect fans. The consultation will explore a sweep of options to make resale fairer and more transparent including: introducing a cap on resale prices; increasing the accountability of ticket resale; and strengthening consumer enforcement.
The consultation will seek views on a range from the original price up to a 30% uplift, explore the options of limiting the number of tickets resellers can list to the maximum they are allowed to purchase on the primary market. This would help to prevent organised touts from reselling a large number of tickets at inflated prices, and crack down on industrial-scale ticket touting.
To increase accountability of ticket resale websites and apps, the government will look into creating new legal obligations so they are held responsible by Trading Standards and the CMA. There would also be a review of existing legislation to bring it up-to-date and strengthen consumer enforcement.
In response to the government’s consultation into resale, major industry player Ticketmaster UK said in a statement: “Ticketmaster is committed to making ticketing simple and transparent. Since 2018, our resale has been capped at face value, providing fans a safe place to sell tickets they can’t use at the original price set by artists and event organisers.
“We support proposals to introduce an industry-wide resale price cap. We also urge the government to crack down on bots and ban speculative ticket sales. Ticketmaster welcomes any action to protect fans and give them the best chance of getting tickets to the events they love.”
Building on the plans to look into dynamic pricing, the government also launched a call for evidence into pricing practices used in the live events sector.
The call for evidence will seek views on how the ticketing system in the live events sector is working for fans, and whether it currently provides sufficient protection.
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