A bunch of Taylor Swift followers are suing Ticketmaster, saying the corporate’s “anticompetitive conduct” was guilty for the Eras Tour ticket sale chaos.
Last month, thousands and thousands of Swifties had been unable to buy tickets to the artist’s long-awaited tour after Ticketmaster crashed through the preliminary “verified fan” presale. Those who obtained the unique presale codes waited for hours within the web site’s queue, and plenty of obtained error messages falsely saying that their codes had been invalid. Ticketmaster wound up canceling the general public sale afterward, saying there was “insufficient remaining ticket inventory” to satisfy demand.
The lawsuit — which was filed Thursday in Los Angeles County Superior Court and contains 26 plaintiffs — accuses Ticketmaster of “intentionally and purposefully” permitting scalpers and bots to snap up tickets, lots of which had been instantly put up for resale for double and even triple their authentic worth.
Because Ticketmaster runs its personal resale market, it stands to rake in much more cash in charges from scalped tickets, the lawsuit, which was obtained by Deadline, alleges.
“Ticketmaster was eager to allow this arrangement, as Ticketmaster is paid again in additional fees every time a ticket is resold,” the go well with states.
The lawsuit additionally accuses Ticketmaster of deceptive presale-code holders by distributing too many codes “when it could not satisfy demands.”
“Millions of fans waited up to eight hours and were unable to purchase tickets as a result of insufficient ticket releases,” the suit states.
Because Ticketmaster controls such a huge portion of the market, the lawsuit alleges, it faces very little competition.
“Ticketmaster doesn’t cost excessive costs to provide a greater service,” the suit states. “It expenses increased costs as a result of it has no actual competitors and needs to take each greenback it might from patrons.”