Ticketmaster Preparing Refund Plan For Thousands of Postponed Shows (vulture.com) 57
Ticketmaster is finalizing a plan to begin offering refunds to concertgoers who purchased tickets to an event canceled or indefinitely postponed by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Vulture reports: Starting May 1, per Billboard, ticket-holders will be alerted to their concert or show's new date, then given 30 days to request a refund. If they don't seek a refund, their ticket will be valid for the event on its new date. If their event has been straight-up canceled, well, then their refund will be returned to them either way.
If that's not enough options for you, however, Live Nation has two other suggestions for those fans whose shows have been canceled: receive credit for a future ticket through their "Rock When You Are Ready" program, up to 150% of your initial ticket's value, or donate the value of your refunded ticket to health-care employees battling COVID-19 through the company's Hero Nation program. As for when we'll all actually be packed into a stadium again, singing along to Taylor Swift's "Lover," truly, only time will tell. The plan comes after the company came under fire by concertgoers for quietly changing its refund policy to cover only canceled events -- not the many functions that promoters have indefinitely "postponed" or rescheduled to a date/time that some ticketholders cannot make.
If that's not enough options for you, however, Live Nation has two other suggestions for those fans whose shows have been canceled: receive credit for a future ticket through their "Rock When You Are Ready" program, up to 150% of your initial ticket's value, or donate the value of your refunded ticket to health-care employees battling COVID-19 through the company's Hero Nation program. As for when we'll all actually be packed into a stadium again, singing along to Taylor Swift's "Lover," truly, only time will tell. The plan comes after the company came under fire by concertgoers for quietly changing its refund policy to cover only canceled events -- not the many functions that promoters have indefinitely "postponed" or rescheduled to a date/time that some ticketholders cannot make.
..isn't it illegal to not just straight up refund? (Score:4, Interesting)
I mean, they can't make up rules about it. they have to refund canceled or postponed shows at least in most of the world.
It's not up to them to make preparations or programs or whatever for it.
That they have leveraged the money they weren't sure to have and basically borrowed from their own coffers is not the consumers problem - they have to refund not make some of their own "preparations" or "agreements" about it. they can't just decide the rules for this.
this max leveraging is why basically why many seemingly healthy money printing businesses are on brink of bankruptcy even when things are going well. it's stupid. this is why in some western countries like 30% up of companies are scaring bankruptcy due to covid, whereas in asia a lot of the companies, sure, they're shut down for the moment but the owners wont kill the companies because they know they will make money again next year with them - so they have an actual buffer and can just shut down for a while.
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"I mean, they can't make up rules about it. they have to refund canceled or postponed shows at least in most of the world."
Yes, but they spent the money and now they're in deep shit.
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And my nose bleeds in sympathy, because that still isn't the customers' problem and no attempts to move the goalposts ("oh, it's classed as postponed, we're ignoring the 'indefinitely' part because that's the same as a cancellation, so no refund for you") have merit.
Also without merit is the coercing venues to declare "postponed" as cancelling attracts additional admin fees the venues can't afford.
So they tell the venues not to cancel or they'll get charged through the nose for doing so, and tell customers
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No, as long as you're talking about a modern Western society that is functioning normally, it's not customers' problem.
But if company has no money and goes into bankruptcy because it can't pay all those refunds, all while entirety of economy is under massive strain which is what caused this bankruptcy alongside many others, it becomes customers' problem very quickly. Something that most of the privileged and naive first worlders don't seem to comprehend, because they seem to treat "everything working as it
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Are you having a stroke?
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What you fail to understand is that like most lynchings, the euphoria is short lived and regret is life long.
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That would be because Blockbuster failed due to its business model being outdated.
Ticketmaster is failing because entirety of economy is shut down temporarily. It has nothing to do with viability of its business model. Same is true for a lot of companies going under right now.
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That would be because Blockbuster failed due to its business model being outdated.
Ticketmaster is failing because entirety of economy is shut down temporarily. It has nothing to do with viability of its business model. Same is true for a lot of companies going under right now.
Ticket Bastard is the greediest middle-man monopoly I've ever seen. They can go away tomorrow and there will be lots of other ways, overnight, that tickets to events can be bought and sold.
Please die, Ticket Bastard, please die. I, for one, will be demanding immediate cash refunds for all of the tickets I have bought from them in order to hasten their demise.
As soon as they let me, that is........
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Yes, that's the emotional response. But once entirety of live events industry folds alongside Ticketmaster, folks that actually used the company will find that their favourite entertainment is gone.
And there's no shortcut to getting them back. It will take years to decades to rebuild an industry that intricate, and that's assuming that economy will come back.
Because it's not Ticketmaster that is having the root problems. It's the people actually doing the events. Ticketmaster's problems are simply a consequ
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>Your admiration for this company is unfounded.
My what?
>Others will take its place if it fails and no one will mourn it.
And in reality on the other hand, once something that works has been destroyed alongside the rest of the entire sector, rebuilding it takes a decade if we're lucky. Decades if we're not.
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Dear person living under a rock. They already did. Past tense.
That's why Ticketmaster is having these problems.
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You are desperately dancing around the main point, trying to not engage with it. I'm going to hammer it home regardless.
Why are events being talked about here being refunded? Is this because Ticketmaster cancelled them?
Or is it because the entire live events sector is in existential crisis?
And yeah, this is totally about the stock. After all, who would be more influential in relevant things than a random AC that is desperately trying to pretend that live events sector is totally fine and it's just Ticketmas
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Problem being that this is what market decides when it's functioning normally. That's literally what the purpose of market is.
And right now, it's not functioning normally, which means there's no meaningful way to measure this.
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Monopolies are a natural outcome of a functioning non-managed market. It's why you need to regulate market to avoid monopolies forming.
Normally, you'd need to address this. However in event of a severe market disruption, such as pandemic, you cannot actually address problems within market, because everything is disrupted, bad and good. There's no reliable means to figure out which is which.
It's why all the megacorps in many sectors across the Western world are managing to grab rescue funds purportedly aimed
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No, as long as you're talking about a modern Western society that is functioning normally, it's not customers' problem.
Everywhere in the world, it can become the customers' problem as quickly as they can spell i-n-s-o-l-v-e-n-c-y.
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Too fucking bad. They made so much god damn money on their service charges and bullshit fees over the years that they probably shouldn't be spending revenue gained from events that haven't happened yet.
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But they have not spent ALL their money and are not filing for bankruptcy, so they have to live up to the agreement and supply the refunds. If they truly spent all their money, then why cry for them as they drive away in their new cars? It is not our job as consumers to make sure we provide welfare benefits to corporations ("I'm so sorry you wont' be able to make payroll, I'll just set here at home jobless knowing that I helped you out by not asking for a refund because you clearly need the money more tha
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I mean, they can't make up rules about it. they have to refund canceled or postponed shows at least in most of the world.
True. But they need to set up rules on HOW to refund. And giving additional options isn't a problem either.
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"True. But they need to set up rules on HOW to refund. And giving additional options isn't a problem either."
Yes, you can choose between vouchers to later shows, one is a Punch and Judy show by his 8 year old nephew, the other one is a full week access to the Oktoberfest in Munich, you just have to pay for the flight.
PS. Oktoberfest is cancelled, that was sorta the joke.
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It can get complicated depending on the consumer laws in that area. For example airlines here are required to refund if they can't transport you, but many are refusing to do so until 2 days before the flight even though there is no chance that the lockdown will be lifted by then.
They are also free to offer alternatives like tickets for a different flight.
Unfortunately many of them are scummy like Ticketmaster and will instead try to trick consumers into thinking that their T&Cs actually mean something a
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We haven't begun to see the lawsuits over everything from this and other unfulfilled contracts to every last sicknes or death because even essential businesses like food refused to shut down.
We will need laws to protect for this one-time thing to prevent the transfer of trillions to law firms.
charge back! (Score:2)
charge back!
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This is the company that offers you the option to print your own tickets at your own cost (thereby saving them printing and distribution fees) ... and then has the cheek to charge you for emailing the PDF.
If anyone can try to make up rules about refunds, I'm pretty sure Ticketmaster will have a good go.
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Got my email today about the "postponed" Primus concert. New date? Nope, TBD. Refund? No information available.
Yea, I feel like I'm getting screwed. I could really use that money right now. I shouldn't be denied it due to the Ticket Bastard's business model.
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Well, when you put it that way... (Score:4, Funny)
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After being held over a pot of boiling oil Ticketmaster does the right thing
"then given 30 days to request a refund"
I would disagree that they've done the right thing. I would be okay with "you have until 30 days before the new date for an event to request a refund", but not this. There are many moving parts with some events. Sure, most events are just local "get in my car and drive to the venue" type things, but many others involve booking travel arrangements, somewhere to stay near the venue, and may involve several other people who also need to make arrangements. Requestin
doing the right thing. After trying other options (Score:2)
Insurance (Score:2)
But only for the people who purchased the 'ticket insurance', right?!
As if that counts for anything.
You just have to hope against hope (Score:2)
That there aren't any arbitration clauses hidden somewhere in their website click-by EULA agreements, because they could drag out refunds for years.
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Your post makes no sense at all.
Ticket insurance is for when the customer has to bow out of a show. Even then, selling tickets is a better option than blowing the money on insurance. I've done both, the return is always better just selling the ticket at maybe a $5 loss.
In this case, the venues, performers, and promoters are the ones bowing out. It's their responsibility to refund, since they aren't providing the service for which the ticket is a contract.
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And to be clear, since TM was the actual seller, it's their responsibility first to refund.
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When you buy a ticket on ticketmaster's website, they offer you ticket insurance for an extra I dunno, $10 or so?.
I bought the insurance for my vacation beach house rental. The company is now saying that a pandemic isn't a natural disaster like a hurricane, so they're not going to pay out.
We'll see how that goes.
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How about this one: when they charge obnoxious service fees in order to be a monopolistic ticket broker, and then the event is cancelled (let's not even talk about "postponed indefinitely" because that's just legal two-step bullshit), the price of the ticket plus any issuing fee should be returned to the purchaser just the same as if I ordered a physical good from a store, and the store can't deliver the physical good.
The purchase never took place because the event isn't taking place, therefore every fuckin
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What about the other companies? (Score:2)
Everyone is talking about Ticketmaster, because they're the biggest and get the most coverage, but what about the other ticket resellers?
I have had one concert, of many, for which I bought tickets through TM that's been cancelled. To their credit, I got an email from TM within minutes of learning the show was cancelled confirming that fact, and stating that I would receive a refund within thirty days. The thirty days bit is scummy, but I saw the same thing with Expedia earlier this month cancelling a hotel
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They're also the biggest assholes in the live event business, so there's a bit of schadenfreude going on.
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AXS sent me an email today about the "postponed" (no new date) Primus concert I bought tickets for. No refund option, no plans for refunds for moved events, and no dates for when the concert might happen.
Yea, at this point, they seem worse than Ticket Bastard, probably going to get away with it because they're smaller and not getting the bad press Ticket Bastard is dealing with.
convenience (Score:4, Funny)
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First time I bought a ticket was when they tried to charge me a $14 convenience fee to let me print my own tickets. I had them mailed to my house for free, instead.
Refund Fees (Score:2)
Ticketmaster has a history of slapping on random fees with no explanation or logic. So just assume they will slap on a $200 refund fee. That's per ticket.