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

Ticket touts bid to scupper Labour resale reforms

Ticket touts hatched secret plans to sabotage Labour’s bid to cap ticket resale if the party wins the next UK general election, according to a new report.

Footage filmed by the Guardian shows touts and representatives of secondary ticketing platforms such as Viagogo, StubHub and Vivid Seats discussing the proposals at a private event in London, organised by US-based lobby group the Coalition for Ticket Fairness (CTF) and sponsored by Swiss marketplace Gigsberg. Guests paid $240 (€222) each to be in attendance.

At the gathering, touts reportedly pledged £73,000 to hire a “bulletproof” political lobbyist to target MPs after CTF UK president Tony McGowen told guests they could help “guide parliament and to fight back against all the bullshit that a Labour government potentially want to throw at us”.

“We are going to fight parliament, we’re going to fight government,”  he said, “because if we don’t, bottom line is we are all fucked.”

Jason Berger of CTF US added: “It takes a long time to change a law. It’s a lot easier to … stop the law from being written.”

“A Labour government will cap resale prices so fans can see the acts that they love at a fair price”

The event took place in the wake of Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer’s recent vow to restrict the resale of tickets at more than a small, set percentage above face value should his party triumph at July’s general election.

The proposed legislation would also limit the number of tickets individual resellers can list and make platforms accountable for the accuracy of information about tickets they list. In addition, it would ensure watchdog the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has the powers to take action against platforms and touts to protect consumers.

“We can’t let access to culture be at the mercy of ticket touts who drive up the prices,” Sir Keir told the Labour Creatives Conference in March. “So a Labour government will cap resale prices so fans can see the acts that they love at a fair price.”

The lobbyist whom the CTF said it had selected told the Guardian they had met with the group over a year ago but would never agree to work for it.

In a statement to the newspaper, the CTF said it was “not currently engaged in any lobbying activities in the UK” and has “no timeline to begin doing so”.

“CTF believes that measures to restrict access to ticketing will create a black market with more transactions driven underground”

“We have not engaged professional support in the manner described and we have no agreement to do so,” it continued. “Like any industry preparing for a potential change in a regulatory environment, we are taking preparatory action which includes bringing the industry together to share insights.

“CTF believes that measures to restrict access to ticketing will create a black market with more transactions driven underground, removing customer security; reduce the availability of tickets to fans; and create further monopolies for vested interests which will see prices driven up for fans.”

A Viagogo spokesperson told the Guardian that two of its executives attended the event for “networking reasons” and said the Swiss-headquartered firm was not funding the CTF. StubHub International and Vivid Seats did not comment, but the latter company is expected to launch in the UK shortly, having incorporated back in March.

A 2022 investigation by ITV News, based on research carried out by campaign group FanFair Alliance (FFA), found that three people were responsible for over two-thirds of UK festival and outdoor event tickets listed by resale platform Viagogo.

Rules to outlaw ticket touting have been adopted in a number of other countries. However, the Conservative government recently rejected fresh legislation that would impact the UK secondary ticketing market. The amendments to the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill called for requirements to be imposed on resale platforms regarding “proof of purchase, ticket number limits and the provision of information, with the aim of reducing fraud”.

“I have quite happily used Viagogo on many occasions, as other people have when reselling tickets”

Business minister Kevin Hollinrake said: “We believe those provisions are already there,” and admitted to using Viagogo himself in the past.

“I have quite happily used Viagogo on many occasions, as other people have when reselling tickets,” said the Conservative MP. “Of course we will keep looking at the primary and secondary markets, and at the interaction between the two, so that we can develop the right way to regulate the market, in a future parliament.”

The suggested requirements for resale sites were in line with the recommendations made in a 2021 report by the CMA to tighten laws around online ticket touting, which were rejected by the UK government in May last year, with then business secretary Hollinrake saying he was “not convinced” by the need for additional legislative changes.

Earlier this month meanwhile, four people were jailed for using fraudulent tactics to purchase and resell hundreds of tickets at hugely inflated prices for events and concerts such as Ed Sheeran and Lady Gaga. The defendants ran multi-million-pound limited company TQ Tickets, which they used to purchase hundreds of tickets for events and concerts by the likes of Gary Barlow, Liam Gallagher, Paul Weller and Little Mix.

The trial heard the firm sold tickets worth more than £6.5 million (€7.6m) over the course of two-and-a-half years.

 


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 ticket touts jailed in ‘significant milestone’

Four people have been jailed for using fraudulent tactics to purchase and resell hundreds of tickets at hugely inflated prices for events and concerts such as Ed Sheeran and Lady Gaga.

Maria Chenery-Woods (54), Mark Woods (60), Lynda Chenery (51) and Paul Douglas (56) – all from Norfolk – were sentenced to a combined total of six years and five months imprisonment at Leeds Crown Court, earlier today (17 May).

The four defendants ran multi-million-pound limited company TQ Tickets, which they used to purchase hundreds of tickets for events and concerts by the likes of Gary Barlow, Liam Gallagher, Paul Weller and Little Mix.

The trial heard the firm sold tickets worth more than £6.5 million (€7.6m) over the course of two-and-a-half years.

An investigation by the National Trading Standards eCrime team found that the defendants used multiple deceitful and fraudulent tactics to acquire multiple tickets from reputable sellers including Ticketmaster, Eventim, SEE Tickets and ACS.

They used fake identities to resell the tickets at significantly higher prices – up to 500% above the original cost – on secondary ticketing sites such as Viagogo, Seatwave, Stubhub and Getmein.

“Today’s sentencing marks another significant milestone in our work to combat online ticket touts”

The defendants were also involved in ‘spec selling’ – where non-existent tickets are sold to consumers at inflated prices. When they couldn’t fulfil the purchases, the defendants tried to cover it up by providing fake postal trackers and sending empty or torn envelopes to make it appear as if the tickets had been sent and lost in the post.

“Today’s sentencing marks another significant milestone in our work to combat online ticket touts, which has already resulted in landmark prosecutions, and sends a clear message that criminals trying to rip off honest fans risk prosecution,” says Lord Michael Bichard, chair of National Trading Standards.

Mark Woods and Lynda Chenery were found guilty of fraudulent trading on 13 March 2024. Maria Chenery-Woods and Paul Douglas entered guilty pleas earlier in the process.

Maria Chenery-Woods today received four years imprisonment and is disqualified from being a company director for 10 years.

Mark Woods was handed down two years imprisonment and suspension for two years. In addition, he is disqualified from being a company director for four years, required to undertake 250 hours of unpaid work and must adhere to an electronic curfew for four months between the hours of 8 pm and 6 am.

Lynda Chenery was sentenced to one month’s imprisonment and suspension for two years. She is disqualified from being a company director for three years and complete 180 hours of unpaid work and 20 days of rehabilitation.

Paul Douglas received two years and five months imprisonment and is disqualified from being a company director for six years.

 


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.