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Greedy ticket touts are ramping up prices on nine out of 10 tickets for Scottish gigs on a popular resale site, a probe has found.
A snapshot of traffic on resale ticket site Viagogo shows that over 95 per cent of briefs on sale are from touts, all listing for above face value.
Some 80 per cent of the tickets at inflated prices are from overseas sellers, reports The Daily Record.
The tours of artists including West Lothian’s Lewis Capaldi, Oasis and others have been plagued by touts, with many harvesting tickets using computer programmes. Campaigners are now calling on the UK Government to crack down on touts with a cap on profits on ticket resales.
FanFair Alliance, which fights for fairness in ticketing, has looked at Viagogo listings in Scotland, breaking down data in Edinburgh and Glasgow.
They found that listings repeatedly broke UK consumer law.
FanFair’s Adam Webb said: “Whether it’s King Tut’s, The Garage, Oran Mor, the OVO Hydro, Caird Hall, Barrowland Ballroom, P&J Live, the Queens Hall or Sneaky Pete’s, this data suggests endemic levels of fraud, law breaking and anti-consumer practices by ticket touts who operate with impunity on Viagogo.
“This week, I have taken the step of writing to the Serious Fraud Office to highlight what we’ve found. I also hope it demonstrates to our Government the urgency of delivering on their manifesto commitment to put fans first and introduce an enforceable cap on ticket resale prices.”
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Webb highlighted a show at Glasgow’s The Garage, where a US seller is listing more than 2000 briefs for death metal band Katatonia – more than three times its 700 capacity.
He said: “This is incontrovertible evidence a blind eye is being turned to speculative ticketing – which is illegal and has led to touts being jailed in the UK. Similarly, at the Hydro, Viagogo is still allowing Eastern European sellers to speculatively resell tickets that are unsold in the primary market.”
This is called “mirroring” – it’s designed to defraud fans who think they’re buying from a primary seller.
Donald MacLeod, who owns The Garage, and is an opponent of touts said: “The Garage is not handling ticketing for the Katatonia gig but this is something we would never condone.
“I’d be hugely supportive of a sales cap that put the responsibility on resale sites to ensure no ticket is listed at more than the legally permitted price.”
A sales cap in Ireland has been a blow to viagogo. FanFair saw one tout selling 74 tickets for Capaldi gigs on the site for £169,000. Due to the cap, there were none for his Dublin and Limerick gigs.
Viagogo said: “The vast majority of sellers use Viagogo to sell small numbers of tickets to events that they are no longer able to attend. Evidence shows price caps have repeatedly failed fans.
“In countries like Ireland and Australia, they’ve pushed consumers towards unregulated platforms, where ticket fraud rates are nearly four times higher than in the UK. Viagogo takes its obligations under the law seriously and is fully compliant in the UK.”
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