x

The latest industry news to your inbox.


I'd like to hear about marketing opportunities

    

I accept IQ Magazine's Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy

ASA says resale advert ruling ‘sets a precedent’

The UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has told IQ its recent ruling against Viagogo has “set a precedent” for secondary ticketing websites.

Last month, the watchdog upheld a complaint from anti-touting campaign group FanFair Alliance that the resale platform had misled consumers in two advertorials published on the NME website in 2023. The paid-for ads were entitled “The best gigs to see this summer at Hyde Park” and “A beginners guide to getting Taylor Swift ‘Eras’ tour tickets. How to avoid the scammers and secure tickets.”

FanFair Alliance complained to the ASA, saying it understood the resale of tickets through resale websites like Viagogo was prohibited by the events listed.

Viagogo hit back, arguing it simply stated that tickets for the events were legitimately available on its marketplace and believed there was nothing in the ads which implied it was an official primary ticketing outlet. But the ASA rejected its argument and said the adverts must not appear again in the form complained of.

Speaking to IQ, the ASA’s Freddie Alcock says the case was relatively straightforward.

“The ruling is to protect consumers, ultimately, but also set a precedent going forward that you can’t omit information around the sale of these tickets”

“The reason they were misleading is because both events quite clearly stated in their terms and conditions that tickets bought on secondary ticketing platforms wouldn’t be valid,” he says. “We operate what we call ‘reverse burden of proof’, in that it’s on the advertiser to prove why something isn’t misleading, or to substantiate a claim they made – and Viagogo weren’t able to provide what we felt was substantial evidence that neither ads misled.

“The ruling is to protect consumers, ultimately, but also set a precedent going forward that you can’t omit information around the sale of these tickets. And to be fair to Viagogo, they have complied with it and removed both advertorials.”

Viagogo said it was “disappointed” by the ASA’s ruling, insisting it is “a safe, secure and regulated global online marketplace, and we are fully compliant with the law in all markets in which we operate”.

“We exist to get fans into live events and oppose anti-consumer actions taken by event organisers to restrict purchasing and resale options in an attempt to control the market. These measures ultimately harm fans by limiting choice, flexibility, and access.”

The company told the ASA that less than 1% of customers were denied entry to events after having purchased a ticket on its platform, and operated a guarantee so that if a customer was not admitted they would be entitled to a refund. But Alcock says that was not relevant to the complaint.

“It’s on our radar that a lot of events now say that resale tickets are only valid through a fan-to-fan exchange”

“That’s irrelevant to the problem here,” he says. “The problem here is that it does clearly misleadingly imply that tickets are valid. And [Viagogo’s] response, to be fair, was ‘Okay, we disagree, but we respect the ASA and its view.’

“We understand that [secondary ticketing] companies are allowed to operate – everyone has their views on that and it’s not for us to talk about. All that we’re concerned about is that, when they do advertise, they make sure that they don’t omit any information that could be considered important for the consumer to know upfront.”

Alcock says the regulator anticipates similar complaints to become more commonplace as artists increasingly seek to control where tickets for their shows can be resold.

“I think this ruling preemptively speaks to that issue,” he says. “It’s on our radar that a lot of events now say that resale tickets are only valid through a fan-to-fan exchange, or whatever. So hopefully this ruling serves as a reminder.

“Our main goal here is to protect consumers. We’re very conscious of the fact that someone’s buying a ticket for one of these events, one, they’re expensive and two, they might have to travel to it and pay for a hotel. There’s a lot that goes into someone deciding to go to one of these events.”

The ASA previously took action in 2018 alongside the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) around secondary ticket sales websites failing to properly disclose fees for tickets upfront.

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

ASA rules Viagogo misled customers in NME ads

UK watchdog the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has upheld a complaint against Viagogo, ruling the resale platform misled consumers in two advertorials published on the NME website.

The first paid-for ad feature, headed, “The best gigs to see this summer at Hyde Park”, appeared on 16 June 2023, and listed five shows scheduled to take place at BST Hyde Park, along with text stating: “Fans can buy and sell tickets for [name of artist performing] at global marketplace, Viagogo, here”.

A second advertorial, seen on 20 July 2023, was headlined, “A beginners guide to getting Taylor Swift ‘Eras’ tour tickets. How to avoid the scammers and secure tickets”. It included text, which stated, “To purchase resale tickets as safely as possible, fans should avoid buying tickets via social media… Your best bet is ticket marketplaces like Viagogo, which connects ticket sellers with fans via a safe platform… Fans can buy and sell tickets for Taylor Swift at global marketplace, Viagogo here”.

Anti-touting campaign group FanFair Alliance complained to the ASA, saying it understood the resale of tickets through secondary ticketing websites like Viagogo was prohibited by the events listed in the ads.

Viagogo denied the ads were misleading, arguing it simply stated that tickets for the events were legitimately available on its marketplace and believed there was nothing in the ads which implied Viagogo was an official primary ticketing outlet.

The company said that less than 1% of customers were denied entry to events after having purchased a ticket on their platform, and they operated a guarantee so that if a customer was not admitted they would be entitled to a refund.

“Furthermore, they explained that all additional information which related to a ticket for a specific event was clearly made available to consumers on the Viagogo website before a consumer purchased that ticket,” adds the ASA’s summary.

“We told Viagogo AG to ensure future ads did not mislead consumers by omitting material information regarding the entry restrictions”

However, the regulator concluded that the adverts were misleading and said they must not appear again in the form complained of.

“We understood that Viagogo operated a guarantee whereby anyone who was not admitted to an event was entitled to receive a refund and we acknowledged that only a small proportion of their customers had been refused entry.” concludes the ASA. “However, we considered that the prohibition of resale tickets, as outlined in both the BST Hyde Park and Taylor Swift Eras tour terms and conditions, was material information which was likely to affect a consumer’s decision to purchase tickets through Viagogo.

“Because the ads omitted material information about the validity of tickets purchased through Viagogo and the risk of the venues refusing entry to consumers who had purchased their tickets through secondary ticketing websites, we concluded that they were misleading.

“We told Viagogo AG to ensure future ads did not mislead consumers by omitting material information regarding the entry restrictions on tickets purchased through them and other secondary ticketing sites.”

Responding to the assessment, Viagogo spokesperson says the firm is “disappointed” by the ASA’s ruling.

“Viagogo is a safe, secure and regulated global online marketplace, and we are fully compliant with the law in all markets in which we operate,” adds the firm. “We exist to get fans into live events and oppose anti-consumer actions taken by event organisers to restrict purchasing and resale options in an attempt to control the market. These measures ultimately harm fans by limiting choice, flexibility, and access.”

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

IQ 124 out now: Year in trends, Memo Parra, Poland

IQ 124, the end-of-year issue of the international live music industry’s favourite magazine, is available to read online now to give you some reading matter over the holiday season.

The December/January edition brings down the curtain on 2023 by wrapping up the key trends and takeaways from the global live music business over the past 12 months, as well as looking ahead to what’s in store for the industry next year.

In addition, we celebrate trailblazer Memo Parra’s 30 years in music, charting his unique journey from stock market trader to director of international talent at giant Mexican promoter Ocesa.

Elsewhere, we crown road warrior Malcolm Weldon as The Gaffer 2023, and Derek Robertson glances back across the first ten years of First Direct Arena in Leeds – speaking to the people who have helped make the last decade such a success.

And in our latest market report, Adam Woods visits Poland to learn about the growing optimism among live music industry professionals.

For this edition’s columns and comments, FanFair Alliance’s Adam Webb highlights the reasons for the UK-based campaign’s relaunch, as ticket touts get ever more sophisticated, while Christina Hazboun, Keychange Project Manager, UK, at PRS Foundation outlines some of the initiatives the gender equality scheme is employing to end the music industry’s patriarchal landscape.

As always, the majority of the magazine’s content will appear online in some form in the next few weeks.

However, if you can’t wait for your fix of essential live music industry features, opinion and analysis, click here to subscribe to IQ from just £8 a month – or check out what you’re missing out on with the limited preview below:

 

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

UK gov urged to outlaw resale of tickets for profit

Some of the UK’s leading music companies have joined a fresh campaign against industrial-scale online ticket touting.

Led by FanFair Alliance, the campaign is urging MPs to introduce new legislation to “protect British consumers from unscrupulous and exploitative traders who operate on controversial websites such as Viagogo and StubHub”.

WME, CAA, ATC, 13 Artists, Kilimanjaro, FKP Scorpio and One Fiinix are among the parties to back FanFair Alliance’s three pro-consumer measures regarding legislative action, tech action and industry action.

The first proposed measure is new laws making it illegal to resell a ticket for profit, bringing the UK into line with countries such as Ireland, France, Australia and Italy, which have introduced legislation to ban or restrict resale for more than face value.

The second calls for platforms like Google and YouTube to stop promoting touts, and help direct consumers towards legitimate sources of tickets. And the final point rallies the live music business to make capped consumer-friendly ticket resale visible and viable.

“We’ve seen many other countries adopt strict anti-touting legislation. It is high time that the UK caught up”

The fresh campaign comes a few months after the Department of Business & Trade rejected a series of recommendations aimed at strengthening existing laws around ticket resale in order to protect consumers, published by the Competition & Markets Authority.

But on Monday (11 September), at a meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Ticket Abuse in the House of Commons, the music industry seized on the opportunity presented by the next election to call for a “reset” in how politicians, regulators and the music business look to tackle ongoing problems in this market.

“Over the course of the next year there will be a general election in the UK, the outcome of which will define the music industry for the rest of the decade,” said Tom Kiehl, the interim chief executive of UK Music, an industry body.

“It is vital as we approach this pivotal moment that policymakers secure a fair deal for music lovers by ending rip-off secondary ticketing practices.”

Adam Webb, campaign manager, FanFair Alliance adds: “When the FanFair campaign was established in 2016, online ticket touting in the UK was out of control. There was little enforcement of consumer law, and fans were systematically misled and ripped off by the dominant secondary ticketing platforms. Despite substantial progress to improve this situation it is now clear we need a reset. We need fresh legislation and fresh thinking – ending once and for all the parasitical practices of online ticket touts, while doing more to proactively promote capped consumer-friendly ticket resale. The UK is rightly proud of its live music culture, and this is an area we should and could be leading the world.”

Sharon Hodgson MP, chair, All-Party Parliamentary Group on Ticket Abuse, comments: “Since I introduced a Private Members Bill in 2010 that attempted to outlaw the resale of tickets for profit, we’ve seen many other countries adopt strict anti-touting legislation. It is high time that the UK caught up. Every week we continue to see thousands of ticket buyers fall foul of predatory and unlawful practices in the secondary market. I wholeheartedly support FanFair Alliance’s three common sense goals which would provide audiences with far greater protections, while helping to boost one of our country’s most important cultural industries.”

Companies and individuals backing FanFair Alliance’s three pro-consumer measures include:
13 Artists
John Rostron, Association of Independent Festivals
Alex Bruford, ATC Live
Brian Message, ATC Management
CAA Music
Paul Crockford, Crockford Management
Stephen Taverner, East City Management
Adam Tudhope, Everybody’s Management
David Martin, CEO, Featured Artists Coalition
Daniel Ealam, FKP Scorpio
Stuart Camp, Grumpy Old Management
Harvey Goldsmith
Alec Mckinlay & Marcus Russell, Ignition Management
Sybil Bell, Independent Venue Week
Richard Jones, Key Music Management
Stuart Galbraith, Kilimanjaro Live
Harry Magee, Modest! Management
Mark Bent & Natasha Gregory, Mother Artists
Annabella Coldrick, Chief Executive, Music Managers Forum
Music Venue Trust
Paul Craig, Nostromo Management
Jon Ollier, One Fiinix
Phantom Music Management
Angus Baskerville & Hayley Morrison, Pure Represents
Tom Kiehl, Interim CEO, UK Music
Gareth Griffiths, Director Partnerships and Sponsorship at Virgin Media O2
Ian McAndrew, Wildlife Entertainment

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

UK govt rejects CMA’s calls to tighten resale laws

The UK government has rejected the recommendations of the British competition regulator to tighten laws around online ticket touting.

In a 2021 report, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) proposed stronger rules to deal with illegal activity on non-price-capped secondary ticketing sites, including measures to clamp down on the bulk-buying of tickets as well as the practice of “speculative ticketing”, where sellers list tickets they don’t yet own.

Other suggestions included ensuring platforms are fully responsible for incorrect information about tickets that are listed for sale on their websites, and a new system of licensing for platforms that sell secondary tickets that would enable an authority to act quickly and issue sanctions.

However, in the government’s response, business secretary Kevin Hollinrake MP says he is “not convinced” by the need for additional legislative changes.

“I am not convinced that the additional costs that would fall on ticket buyers (as regulatory costs would be passed on) are justified by the degree of harm set out in your report,” says Hollinrake. “This is especially the case when we are already proposing to give the CMA additional administrative powers to protect consumers which the CMA could deploy in the secondary ticketing market.

“However, we propose to keep the position on maximum numbers of ticket resales under review as part of our ongoing monitoring of the legislative landscape in the ticketing market and in the light of technological, enforcement and other market developments.”

“It appears the uncapped market may still provide a service of value to some consumers”

He continues: “The government notes and agrees with the CMA recommendation that there should not be a ban on the uncapped secondary ticket market. Whilst both the way tickets are sold and used are changing and there is a growing authorised capped ticket resale market to help those who can no longer use their purchased ticket, it appears the uncapped market may still provide a service of value to some consumers.”

Hollinrake argues that is “too soon to conclude that the only way forward is further legislation focused on this market”.

“As you are aware, there are a number of improvements to other aspects of consumer law which we have now published in our response to the 2021 consultation,” he adds. “These will be our priority in the immediate future, rather than changes to the secondary ticketing regime specifically.”

“The government has effectively given bad actors a free pass to continue acquiring tickets in bulk to popular events and to engage in speculative and fraudulent selling”

Sharon Hodgson MP, chair of the APPG on ticket abuse, says the group is “struggling to understand” why the government has turned down the CMA’s recommendations.

“In August 2021, the CMA made it clear to the government that a handful of additional safeguards could help reduce the scale of unlawful online ticket touting, and better protect consumers,” says Hodgson. “Nineteen months on, and all their recommendations have been rejected. We are still struggling to understand why, and on what basis.

“Rather than improving the capacity of enforcement agencies to clamp down on malpractice, the government has effectively given bad actors a free pass to continue acquiring tickets in bulk to popular events and to engage in speculative and fraudulent selling. These individuals can make extraordinary profits at the expense of ordinary fans who are left ripped off and out of pocket.

“The UK is rightly proud of its live event industry, but an uncontrolled black market risks harming the consumer experience and wreaking untold damage on the sector overall.”

“The experiences of consumers appear to have been overlooked entirely”

Adam Webb, campaign manager of UK-based campaign against industrial-scale online ticket touting FanFair Alliance, shares similar sentiments.

“In August 2021, the Competition & Markets Authority published a series of common sense recommendations to the government that aimed to further protect consumers from being ripped off by unscrupulous ticket touts and parasitical ticket resale sites,” he says. “These included new measures to clamp down on the unlawful bulk-buying of tickets and large-scale speculative fraud, where rogue traders list tickets for sale that they do not possess. Research by FanFair Alliance has shown these problems remain rampant on certain secondary ticketing platforms.

“Nineteen months down the line, and, despite overwhelming evidence of continuing bad practice, the government has today comprehensively rejected the CMA’s advice – without, we believe, consulting with experts, campaigners or the live music industry.

“The experiences of consumers appear to have been overlooked entirely. Although much progress has been made in recent years to tame the UK’s black market for tickets, FanFair Alliance shares the views of the CMA that further action is still required to tackle these evident and ongoing problems with online secondary ticketing.”

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

Most fest tickets on Viagogo sold by three traders

Just three people are responsible for over two thirds of UK festival and outdoor event tickets listed by resale platform Viagogo, according to a new report.

An investigation by ITV News, based on research carried out by anti-touting campaign group FanFair Alliance, found that fewer than 10% of tickets on the secondary ticketing site were being sold by ordinary consumers.

Analysis of more than 11,000 tickets from 174 events over a three-month period revealed that over two-thirds were being sold by just three “traders” for a combined total of £1.7 million – almost £1m above face value.

The report found evidence of so-called “speculative” tickets – which sellers do not yet possess – being illegally offered for sale.

The investigation contacted 10 festivals being listed by the three traders, with two saying the sellers had bought nowhere near the number of tickets being advertised, and the rest saying they had no record of them buying any tickets at all. One of the traders’ listings have since been removed from Viagogo’s website.

“We treat concerns about tickets with the utmost priority”

“We treat concerns about tickets with the utmost priority,” says a spokesperson for Viagogo. “In this instance, we acted swiftly to remove the relevant listings and have returned several to the site that have clearly demonstrated that they are legitimate and valid.

“We continue to review the remaining listings and these remain off site.”

Viagogo was fined €23.5 million by Italy’s Communications Regulatory Authority AGCOM in June for breaking the country’s rules on secondary ticketing.

The decision followed an investigation by Italy’s financial crime enforcement agency the Guardia di Finanza, which found the platform had listed tickets for 131 events at prices up to six or seven times above their face-value. Viagogo responded that since it had already been held a ‘passive’ intermediary platform by the Council of State in a previous final judgment, it was confident the fines would be annulled on appeal.

Earlier, in May, Australia’s full federal court dismissed Viagogo’s appeal against a ruling that it had made misleading claims on its website relating to the reselling of concert and sports tickets.

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

International Ticketing Report 2021: Secondary ticketing

The International Ticketing Report is a one-off annual health check on the global ticketing business, with emphasis on the sector’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The past two years have been turbulent for the business, but with consumer demand for live events now at an all-time peak, the challenges of fulfilling the most packed event schedule in history will test ticketers to the hilt.

Staffing, vouchers schemes and refunds, demand, consumer behaviour, communication, new products & services, secondary ticketing, pandemic lessons and recovery are among the challengers addressed by industry-leading experts in this extended report.

The report, originally published in IQ105, is in lieu of the International Ticketing Yearbook – a standalone global guide to the live entertainment market that will return in 2022.

IQ will publish sections of the International Ticketing Report over the coming weeks but subscribers can read the entire feature in issue 105 of IQ Magazine now.

To read the previous instalment of the report on new products and services, click here.


The controversial business of secondary ticketing was never far from the headlines, pre-Covid, and indeed on the eve of the pandemic being declared, leading European operation Viagogo acquired eBay’s ticketing division, StubHub, for an eye-watering $4.05billion (€3.5bn) in cash.

The timing of that transaction, in February 2020, led to financial publication Forbes branding it the “worst deal ever” as sports and live entertainment were among the first sectors to close down, effectively shutting down the secondary market, too.

Since then, Viagogo sold its StubHub assets outside of North America, primarily to meet anti-competition regulations, but with little to no revenues over the past 18 months, the company will be determined to make the most of 2022’s packed events schedule to start clawing back some of that substantial investment.

According to Adam Webb, campaign manager at FanFair Alliance, an anti-touting campaign group, “The fear now is that the secondary players will be as desperate to get as much inventory as they can, and the other side of that is that some promoters will be desperate to sell tickets any which way, as well.”

“There’s still a lot of work to do on the industry’s behalf educating their consumers about capped resale services”

With thousands of tours, festivals, and other events going on sale in the weeks and months ahead, Webb is all too aware that many people may need to use secondary services to divest of tickets for rescheduled shows they can no longer attend for any number of reasons.

Webb contends that while those ticket exchange platforms with capped resale rules also suffered during the pandemic, they also seem to have weathered the storm.

“Just before the likes of Reading and Wireless festivals, there were loads of tickets available on places like Twickets, so there was real need – possibly driven by Covid – for a lot of people to genuinely resell their tickets,” says Webb.

“Because of dates being rescheduled or people who have health concerns, I think having that option through is probably more vital than ever, and there will be a need for primary agents to up their game a little bit to make sure fans are aware of those ticket exchange services, what they are and how to use them.”

He adds, “Going into 2022, with the calendar busier than probably ever before, lots of consumers are still unaware of the difference between an uncapped seller like StubHub or Viagogo and the primary ticket services.

“So I think there’s still a lot of work to do on the industry’s behalf educating their consumers about capped resale services and how to use them. All of the primary ticket companies have a resale service or are affiliated with one but those services need to be marketed a bit better.”

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

The likes of Viagogo are actually weak and damaged

How must the smart people at Bessemer Venture Partners and Madrone Capital Partners, the two VC funds that bankrolled Viagogo’s US$4.05bn acquisition of StubHub, be feeling right now?

For Madrone, in particular, it’s been a tough couple of years. As well as losing $150m in the crash and burn of Theranos, they were also the lead investor in Quibi, backing the ill-fated short-form video service to the tune of $200m during the upwards part of its firework-like trajectory.

And then they met Eric Baker.

Much has been written about how the Viagogo/StubHub merger, completed one month before the world shut down, was, in the words of Forbes magazine, “The Worst Deal Ever”.

I’ve written about it myself, on this website – highlighting how the deal appeared wildly overpriced, even before we all became self-professed experts in vaccines and lateral flow testing, and how a combination of regulation and innovation were, in the longer-term, likely to fundamentally disrupt a secondary ticketing “business model” wholly dependent on search advertising and large-scale touts.

Added to that was the spectre of an investigation by the UK’s business regulator, the Competition & Markets Authority, who duly put the merger on hold, concluded that the acquisition created a “significant lessening of competition” in the UK, and subsequently ordered Viagogo to sell-off StubHub’s international operations before integration can complete.

There’s evidence to suggest much of the inventory on Viagogo doesn’t actually exist

Would-be suitors for the international (ie loss-making) parts of StubHub, as well as being approved by the CMA, will be required to run the platform as an uncapped resale service and in direct competition with Viagogo. In the current environment, that sounds a fairly unalluring prospect. Although, as Madrone has repeatedly highlighted, fools and other people’s money can be easily parted.

Meanwhile, and perhaps more alarming for those beleaguered investors, the credit rating of Viagogo’s parent company PUG LLC started to nosedive. They took on an additional $330m in loans, and then, earlier this year, informed regulators in Australia – who’d hauled them over the coals for making false or misleading representations when reselling tickets – that they couldn’t pay a AUD$7m fine due to the catastrophic impacts of the pandemic.

Oh, and Eric Baker reportedly embarked on a property spree in Beverly Hills, completing the purchase of his third mansion in September 2020 for $39m. Presumably, the pandemic not being quite so financially catastrophic for him personally.

And now, as detailed in a Guardian yesterday, there’s evidence to suggest much of the inventory on Viagogo doesn’t actually exist, and that speculative selling – some of it by businesses likely connected to Viagogo itself – is rife.

This could now be the opportunity to step up, to standardise the changes outlined in the FanFair guide

I certainly hope Bessemer and Madrone have digested the implications of Rob Davies’ latest investigation into the bizarre and artificial constructs of this market – and that they’ve studied the February 2021 Phase 2 Final Report from the CMA, which concluded that the value of tickets resold through the UK’s online ticketing platforms in 2019 was around £350m. Somewhat less than the £1.5-2.5bn estimated by Viagogo and StubHub.

As we all wait optimistically for gigs and festivals to return, and for normal life to resume, I hope that promoters, agents, artist managers, venues and primary ticket companies are also taking note, and recognising that, rather than all-powerful platforms, the likes of Viagogo are actually weak and damaged enterprises – and that the UK industry has been greatly empowered over recent years to prevent the exploitation of customers in the secondary market and offer them a better and fairer alternative when it comes to resale.

The wider industry can, of course, choose to do nothing. Shrug shoulders. Say how terrible ticket touting is while failing to enact the fairly simple measures that can help prevent it.

Alternatively, this could now be the opportunity to step up, to standardise the changes outlined in the guide FanFair published back in September 2019, and ensure there’s a wider push to properly communicate how resale works, and that those services are the best they can be.

 


Viagogo disputes the claims made in the Guardian article. A spokesperson says: “Viagogo rejects the unsubstantiated allegations in the Guardian article referenced in this piece. No evidence was outlined in the article nor was any provided to the company despite repeated requests.

There is a mechanism in place to raise issues formally either with Viagogo or the regulator. The Guardian chose instead to write a misinformed article.

 “Viagogo has strict measures in place to ensure the accuracy and compliance of listings and to prevent fraudulent selling, which are audited annually by a third party.

“In all transactions there is an onus on the seller to agree to certain terms and conditions, which includes the right to sell a ticket.

“Where we are provided with proof from a relevant authority of an abuse of these rules we will investigate and, if confirmed, action will be taken.”

 


Adam Webb is campaign manager for FanFair Alliance.

Viagogo offers to sell parts of StubHub in merger bid

Viagogo is offering to sell StubHub’s resale business outside of North America in a bid to address concerns expressed by the UK’s competition watchdog which has provisionally halted the $4 billion (£3bn) merger.

UK watchdog, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), recently found that the acquisition of StubHub by Viagogo will reduce competition in an “already very concentrated market”, throwing into doubt the fate of the already completed deal in the UK.

Now, Viagogo is proposing the sale of StubHub’s holding company, which operates all of its international primary and secondary businesses, including its UK operations, in a bid to address the CMA’s concerns – though the deal would see Viagogo retain StubHub’s much larger US and Canadian ticket resale business.

“There are some glaring concerns with their reported proposal, which appears to suggest a three-year lease not an outright sale”

Under the sale, the buyer of StubHub’s operations would receive customer and transaction data in the UK and beyond as well as the Spain-based Ticketbis, which was sold to StubHub in 2016 for a reported €165m.

The proposal also states that the buyer would be allowed to use the StubHub UK brand for three years, followed by a year-long “blackout” where neither the buyer nor Viagogo could use the StubHub brand in Britain.

Adam Webb, campaign manager for anti-ticket touting group FanFair Alliance, told IQ: “Viagogo is a discredited business that’s been at the heart of a major ticket mis-selling scandal, ripping off UK audiences to the tune of millions. The operators of this platform cannot be trusted. Even on initial glance, there are some glaring concerns with their reported proposal, which appears to suggest a three-year lease of StubHub UK’s business – not an outright sale. We have already raised these concerns with the CMA.”

While a Viagogo spokesperson says: “We look forward to working with the CMA to deliver a comprehensive solution which addresses their concerns and we believe this proposal would achieve that.”

 


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

Lost no more: Campaigners take centre stage as IQ Focus returns

After taking a week off last week, IQ’s popular virtual panel series, IQ Focus, returns this Thursday, inviting six new panellists to shine a light on worthy causes which have taken a back seat during the Covid-19 crisis.

Before Covid-19, a wide range of advocacy work was centred around live music, from campaigns to improve gender diversity in line-ups and accessibility for disabled customers to environmental projects and drives around recruitment, inclusion and mental health.

But what have experts and practitioners in these areas been doing since live music shut down? And when music events do return, against an uncertain economic backdrop is there a risk that their important work will be diminished?

The Lost Causes: Campaigners & Advocacy counts the broader cost of the business interruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic

The first in a new series of ‘Lost Causes’ discussions invites Francine Gorman, outreach coordinator at Keychange; Jacob Sylvester Bilabel of Green Music Initiative; Natalie Wade, founder of Small Green Shoots; Attitude is Everything’s head of volunteering and skills development, Paul Hawkins; Musica Therapy’s Sital Panesar; and chair Adam Webb (FanFair Alliance) to counts the broader cost of the business interruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

As with previous sessions, The Lost Causes: Campaigners & Advocacy will be streamed live on Facebook and YouTube. To set a reminder for Thursday 13 August’s session, head to IQ’s Facebook or YouTube pages now.


Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.