Ticketmaster ticket cancellation

mikeand57 · 31 January 2018 at 1:36AM

Hope someone can help

I purchased four tickets for my family on Ticketmaster in December. Transaction went through and I received confirmation email. No tickets though.

I received an email a few days ago saying that my purchase has been cancelled and my refund will be processed within 5 working days.

I have spoken with them through social media and been told that 'ticketmaster reserves the right to cancel any sale'. I have spoken with friend of a friend who used to work at ticketmaster and he says they do it all the time. No recourse, just 'have to suck it up, you got your money back what you worried about?'

I wanted to attend the event but its sold out now!!!

Surely ticketmaster can't get away with this???

Is there some sort of consumer law that enables me to challenge this and get my tickets back?

DoaM · 31 January 2018 at 9:30AM

As it's an online transaction ... what do the T&Cs say regarding when a contract is formed?

unholyangel · 31 January 2018 at 6:51PM

From their T&C's:

2.2 Your contract for purchase of an Item starts once we have confirmed your purchase
...
All purchases are subject to payment card verification and other security checks and your transaction may be cancelled if it has not passed our verification process

2.3 You agree not to obtain or attempt to obtain any Items through unauthorised use of any robot, spider or other automated device or any other illegal or unauthorised activity. We reserve the right to cancel any transaction which we reasonably suspect to have been made in breach of these provisions without any notice to you and any and all Items purchased as part of such transaction will be void.

2.4 We reserve the right to cancel bookings which we reasonably suspect to have been made fraudulently.

5.3 We post tickets to the billing address of a credit card. If the address in your booking does not correspond to that held by your credit card company, we may cancel your tickets.

So did they confirm the purchase and would cancellation perhaps fall under any of the clauses I've quoted above?

mikeand57 · 1 February 2018 at 12:43AM

unholyangel wrote: »

From their T&C's:

So did they confirm the purchase and would cancellation perhaps fall under any of the clauses I've quoted above?

Well. I passed the verification procedure as my transaction was processed in December. As regards, the other three, obviously I don't fall foul of those but whether TM has unfounded suspicions that I have, i don't know, they won't tell me, they just keep saying they retain the right to cancel any order.

I've been told they can cancel and refund whenever they want. I assume this is because of touts?

mikeand57 · 1 February 2018 at 12:48AM

DoaM wrote: »

As it's an online transaction ... what do the T&Cs say regarding when a contract is formed?

Is there a contract? It seems to me Ticketmaster can do what they please.

unholyangel · 1 February 2018 at 3:31AM

If they confirmed your purchase then their own T&C's imply there is a contract.

Contract formation requires certain elements to be present. Its more complex but in a nutshell it requires an offer (you offered to buy x tickets to x event for x price), acceptance (them accepting to sell x tickets to x event for x price - and it needs to exactly match, they can't vary it by accepting for y price for example as that creates a counter offer rather than acceptance), intention to create legal relations (intend to be bound by the agreement and not still be negotiating) and consideration (needs to be something of value but need not be adequate) - also capacity, certainty etc but the ones listed are the most relevant.

Once a contract is formed, it is binding on both parties. You cannot have a contract that is only binding on 1 party - it upsets the legal balance. Normally either party cannot breach the contract without being liable for the others losses caused by the breach. In addition, terms which allow them to dissolve the contract on a purely discretionary basis for reasons not specifically stated in the contract are at high risk of being considered unfair (and unfair terms and legally unenforceable).

The CMA have unfair terms guidance you can read for more information.

If their front line staff keep repeating company policy send a letter before action. Front line staff generally are only trained in company policy & procedure, so they tend to trust what they know and distrust anything that conflicts with that. If they are relying on one of the clauses I quoted then they'll probably disclose it on receipt of the LBA.

mikeand57 · 1 February 2018 at 5:30PM

unholyangel wrote: »

If they confirmed your purchase then their own T&C's imply there is a contract.

Contract formation requires certain elements to be present. Its more complex but in a nutshell it requires an offer (you offered to buy x tickets to x event for x price), acceptance (them accepting to sell x tickets to x event for x price - and it needs to exactly match, they can't vary it by accepting for y price for example as that creates a counter offer rather than acceptance), intention to create legal relations (intend to be bound by the agreement and not still be negotiating) and consideration (needs to be something of value but need not be adequate) - also capacity, certainty etc but the ones listed are the most relevant.

Once a contract is formed, it is binding on both parties. You cannot have a contract that is only binding on 1 party - it upsets the legal balance. Normally either party cannot breach the contract without being liable for the others losses caused by the breach. In addition, terms which allow them to dissolve the contract on a purely discretionary basis for reasons not specifically stated in the contract are at high risk of being considered unfair (and unfair terms and legally unenforceable).

The CMA have...you can read for more information.

If their front line staff keep repeating company policy send a letter before action. Front line staff generally are only trained in company policy & procedure, so they tend to trust what they know and distrust anything that conflicts with that. If they are relying on one of the clauses I quoted then they'll probably disclose it on receipt of the LBA.

Thats awesome. Thanks for your insight and legal knowledge!

One question though if they've sold my tickets to someone else and the event is sold out, what possible redress can I have?

unholyangel · 1 February 2018 at 10:13PM

mikeand57 wrote: »

Thats awesome. Thanks for your insight and legal knowledge!

One question though if they've sold my tickets to someone else and the event is sold out, what possible redress can I have?

Usually there are other tickets being sold - although if there aren't any available or the event organiser has made it a term that tickets cannot be resold, you might be looking at damages.

However, try and open a dialogue with them and see what they say when they're not parroting the company line.

waamo · 1 February 2018 at 11:57PM

Are these ticket touts?

unholyangel · 2 February 2018 at 12:03AM

waamo wrote: »

Are these ticket touts?

Ticketmaster themselves are a primary ticketing agent I believe - but they do have subsidiaries who are secondary agents.

Gavin83 · 2 February 2018 at 1:26AM

Tricky situation. You can push Ticketmaster but at best you’ll likely be offered a token voucher, although the more likely outcome is they’ll ignore you. Therefore your option is to take them to court. Now your first issue is why they cancelled your sale. I suspect they oversold the tickets but it could be multiple reasons and you could spend money taking them to court, the court could side with their reason and you’re out of pocket for the fees.

Your second issue is what you are actually taking them to court for. I appreciate you just want the tickets but this probably won’t happen and I doubt you’re suggesting they take the tickets off someone else to give them to you. If you can find another company selling the tickets you could potentially sue them for the cost of these but it has to be official, no touts. This might be tough now given they’re sold out and it’s clearly a popular gig. Suing for damages is a no go as well, you haven’t lost out financially and suing for loss of enjoyment on something as insignificant as a gig is pointless.

I’d try and find another official seller, that’s now your best bet.

Ticketmaster ticket cancellation

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