Viagogo Taylor Swift ticket - excessive cancellation charges

Holdenm298

My daughter and I listed 6 Taylor Swift Tickets on Viagogo’s website in July 2023 after Purchasing them early pre general release. We were trying to raise money for my daughters first car and were newbies at this. They sold within a couple of days. The news then broke that the Eras tour would be a lead booker event and can only be sold via the official ticket agent (AXS in this case).

On realising this, we listed them on AXS and subsequently sold them. We did not cancel them on Viagogo’s site wrongly assuming that they would take them down / cancel the sale as they are not allowed to be bought as they would be invalid as per the official terms and conditions of the Taylor Swift Eras tour. This is our fist (and last) time using their marketplace site. We should of acted sooner but I’m unsure it would of made a difference as the tickets had already sold at this point.

We received an email from Viagogo this week asking us to upload the tickets. I contacted them to state we cannot do this for the reasons stated above. I have spent numerous hours via their UK call centre trying to discuss the issue, to ask them to waive the seller fees and not charge us as this issue was not known to us at the time of the sale. I have had no luck. Having spoken to them they state that under their T’s and C’s they will charge us both the sellers fees and 100% of the full price so they can provide replacement tickets for the original buyer (even though they are not allowed to sell T Swift tickets via their site). This could cost me £3,000 for the 6 tickets we listed. We have had no money from viagogo for the sales, so effectively they are informing me that I am paying to find new tickets for these buyers. I have asked to speak to supervisors / managers but they cannot forward my call, there are no other depts.  We have now cancelled the tickets and await our fate. 

We feel that it is unfair to charge us for something we could not of known was going to occur nor can we resolve at this stage. In addition, Viagogo have been paid for the tickets I cannot provide and as such the sensible course of action seems to be that they just need to give the money back to the buyers. 

Does anyone have any experience of this, provide any useful advise?

thanks,

Matt

born_again

Viagogo, why would you think they would pull them down? Especially as you had already sold them.
They are not a UK company & their history to say the least is in the "Barge & pole" territory.

Sadly you have fallen foul of their T/C & not reading them.

swingaloo

Were these tickets that you bought with the intention of going to the concert or were they bought to sell on at a profit?  Viagogo make money by ripping off both the buyer and seller and should be avoided at all cost.  But its all there in the T&Cs .
Personally I think the sooner artist and promoters make it impossible to get into venues using resale tickets the better it will be.  

itsthelittlethings

So you were trying to make money by selling the tickets at a profit?