Dispatches- The Great Ticket Scandal, C4 Thursday 9pm

[eFestivals]

It's perhaps worth tuning into this programme tomorrow night.

Reading & Leeds ticket partner Viagogo have tried to get an injunction to stop this being broadcast.

Anyone might think they tried to get that injunction because they have something to hide.

Watch the programme and make up your own mind.

Edited February 22, 2012 by eFestivals

[Vieuphoria]

This will be incredibly interesting. Thanks for this.

[JID]

Will watch this, I detest ticket rip off!

[TYLER_4]

could be interesting, worth a watch.

[kev1664]

Yep I saw this advertised and immediately thought it was viagogo.

I'm hoping they are exposed as a scam and are delisted as an official partner.

There should just be a returns policy on all ticket sites.

[lharris92]

will try to watch it, if i'm not busy

[Dukeeyyy]

Cheers, have set Sky +

[rustysub]

It's wrong that ViaGogo & Stubhub are endorsed by the likes of FR. They are scalpers and despite the efforts of Bruce Springsteen and Trent Reznor they are flourishing with promoters taking the easy option of 'if you can't beat them, join them we may as well make some more profit out of the punter'.

http://uk.prweb.com/releases/2009/04/prweb2361744.htm

Oldish article but it seems like everybody loves the idea...except the ticket buyer.

Will be interesting to see the Despatches evidence.

[mrtourette]

I've just seen advert for this, it didn't say so but I assumed it would be about viagogo. Interesting stuff.

[rustysub]

It is Viagogo, check Dispatches online and the subject matter is how large organisations are allocating tickets direct to Via for extra revenue.

Viagogo growing rapidly surprisingly

[joe1990]

you don't need a program to tell you viagogo is a rip off, have you ever bought a ticket of there web site?. it starts at say £100 then after shipping, handling, tax, and delivery your talking another 40 quid easy. its by far the most expensive none face value ticket seller in my opinion.

[rustysub]

But it's the angle that the promoters are now taking, allocate large numbers of tickets to the scalpers for the extra shared revenue opportunity. It's licensed secondary marketing with the primary marketeer as the supplier. Punter screwed by the scalper and the promoter.

[mrtourette]

It's shameful but it's worth remembering that FR only got them on board because they were somehow being held responsible for the number of bedroom touts/con artists that were driving the price of second hand tickets through the roof or not sending them out to people who bought them.

People demanded that the organisers did something about it so they got someone involved who could guarantee that if they paid for a second hand ticket they would get one. Sure how they go about it is a disgrace but people weren't demanding a cheap morally sound option, they just didn't want to be without a ticket.

It will be interesting to see how involved the organisers are or whether for them ignorance is bliss.

[rustysub]

Totally agree that there was a huge backlash against touts and unlicensed resellers which the Viagogo type of organisation stepped into in order to provide a legitimate and secure avenue for tickets. Unknowingly what it appears to have manifested into is a cosy partnership between organisatons to control supply and make extra profit. As you say it will be interesting to see if any of the promoters acknowledge this...given Viagogo's reaction so far it would appear that they want to keep things quiet :-(

[let's 'ave it!!!]

Some interesting stats in this article regarding the dispatches documentary....

29,000 tickets were held back by Viagogo to sell for Take That's tour last year for e.g. Shocking!

[edfirth]

I've worked for the BFG at Leeds festival in three of the past four years and have had a number of disputes face-to-face with Melvin about this, as well as on the Official forums. The BFG were working (supposedly) with the festival in order to take complaints and suggestions at the festival and relay them to the organisers. Essentially they ignored everything we said that would cost any money.

Melvin personally told me in their first year of the Viagogo partnership that they received no money from it. Obviously I did not believe that and neither did those there at the time. How ridiculous a statement does it look now?

At Leeds 2010 I had a rather aggressive argument with Melvin around Viagogo when both of us lost it after I called him a bare-faced liar, which he was.

In the build up to Leeds 2011 (which the BFG were dropped from) I was looking for a cheap re-sell ticket as I refused to pay the (ever increasing) asking price but still wanted to go. I managed to get one £50 below the asking price on Ebay in the end. During that time, I looked at Viagogo a lot. It was VERY clear to me that something dodgy was going on. There were thousands of Leeds tickets available on the Viagogo site and many of them were set at identical prices (things like £269.92). I brought this up on the Official forums and was ignored by the organisers.

Following a number of campaigns from myself and another BFG worked called Steve on the Leeds forums regarding a Leeds link with a non-profit ticket resale site, Melvin released a video on Youtube saying he had a contract with Viagogo so wouldn't be doing so.

Now Dispatches are about to reveal all of this. It'll be very interesting to read the responses from the organisers, I'm sure they have to be forthcoming

[jk1]

The organisers dumped 100's of half priced tickets through Viagogo last year.

Weekend and all day tickets were on there at half price at various times to try and shift some tickets

Edited February 22, 2012 by jk1

[edfirth]

Thousands. I counted 4000+ for Leeds alone

[jump]

The organisers dumped 100's of half priced tickets through Viagogo last year.

Weekend and all day tickets were on there at half price at various times to try and shift some tickets

Edited February 22, 2012 by jump

[edfirth]

It didn't sell out. They lied about that too. I went on the ticket site the day before the fest and you could get tickets. It just said it was sold out on the page. All a face

[luckysalt]

I'll be watching this for sure.

[mrtourette]

It was definitely fishy last year when they were officially announcing that tickets were sold out and directing people towards viagogo when you could still get tickets on ticketline and stargreen.

[eFestivals]

http://www.efestivals.co.uk/news/12/120223c.shtml

[rug568]

Loving the use of scum-bag. I hope viagogo are shitting themselves.

[Kierkegaard]

I've bought through Viagogo. Last year, I spotted that Big Chill tickets were going for much less than face value. (79.00) With the fees on the end, they were more like 100.00, so still 60-70 quid cheaper than buying them straight from Ticketline. I wasn't going to argue with that!

Thing is, they were offering something like 8 tickets for sale. Who overbuys 8 tickets, seriously? I always assumed that it was an individual tout, who had bought up loads, found that they hadn't sold well, and was trying to offload them. Thinking about it now, the Big Chill hasn't been an immediate sell out event for as long as I can remember. Why would any external tout worth his salt think that it would be a good idea to spend over a grand on Big Chill tickets?

There were only like twelve people at the Big Chill this year, could ticket websites have been sending them to Viagogo direct to try and shift some of the things?