CMA seeks changes to how Ticketmaster labels tickets, provides pricing info

The U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority is providing a progress update on its investigation into Ticketmaster following widespread complaints about the sale of Oasis’ concert tickets. Following a formal investigation, the CMA is now consulting with the ticketing platform on changes to ensure fans receive the right information, at the right time. The CMA is concerned that Ticketmaster, which sold more than 900,000 tickets during the Oasis ticket sale, may have breached consumer protection law by: Labeling certain seated tickets as ‘platinum’ and selling them for near 2.5 times the price of equivalent standard tickets, without sufficiently explaining that they did not offer additional benefits and were often located in the same area of the stadium. This risked giving consumers the misleading impression that platinum tickets were better. Not informing consumers that there were two categories of standing tickets at different prices, with all of the cheaper standing tickets sold first before the more expensive standing tickets were released, resulting in many fans waiting in a lengthy queue without understanding what they would be paying and then having to decide whether to pay a higher price than they expected. Since the opening of the investigation, Ticketmaster has made changes to some aspects of its ticket sales process, but the CMA does not currently consider these changes are sufficient to address its concerns. The CMA has provided Ticketmaster with details of the further steps required to address its concerns and is seeking changes to Ticketmaster’s processes – including to the information it provides to customers, when it provides that information, and how it labels some of its tickets. The CMA is now consulting on these changes with Ticketmaster.