Fury as Viagogo a no-show at UK ticketing hearing

British politicians and artist managers lashed out at ticket reseller Viagogo for not appearing at a March 21 parliamentary hearing at the House of Commons reviewing secondary ticketing and scalpers.

Viagogo is based in Switzerland but has an office in London.

Conservative MP and Chair of the Commons Culture Committee, Damian Collins, said, “It is of considerable disappointment to us that Viagogo have decided not to send a representative.

“Despite the fact they have a substantial office in Cannon Street in London, they do not believe they have adequate representation in the UK in order to assist the committee with its inquiries.”

MP John Nicholson, scoffed, “It says something about their lack of self-respect and the shocking nature of their operations that they feel they can’t appear here and answer questions.”

MP Nigel Huddleston slammed Viagogo as “one of the most psychologically manipulative websites I have ever seen in my career.” He accused it of “panicking” ticket buyers by claiming there were only a limited amount of tickets left.

“There is a fundamental difference between informing and educating a customer and deliberately deceiving them or panicking them,” he commented crisply.

There was talk of ordering Viagogo’s CEO to make himself available at a future grilling.

The UK Parliament first held a session with the music industry and ticket resellers in November 2016. It wanted to find out what needed to be done to protect ticket buyers, and get an insight into why the country’s Consumer Rights Acts are not being effective on this issue.

At that session, the resellers acquitted themselves against the MPs’ questions, and were highly criticised for their attitudes.

At this week’s meeting, the second, among those giving evidence were Ed Sheeran’s manager Stuart Camp, Rob Wilmshurst (See Tickets), Stuart Galbraith (Kilimanjaro Live) and Claire Turnham, who set up the Victim of Viagogo Facebook group to seek refunds for those ripped off after she herself was overcharged by £1,150 (A$1,815) when buying tickets for her 16-year old son.

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The music industry had been hoping to pull Viagogo’s representative up on some of its actions before the politicians.

One was that £40 ($65) and £110.($178.50) tickets for a charity concert Ed Sheeran played at the Royal Albert Hall for teenage cancer patients, were on the site at £5,000 ($8113.40).

Keith Kenny, Sales and Ticketing Director for the upcoming UK run of the musical Hamilton, told the MPs that he had made it clear that anyone with re-sold tickets would not be allowed into the venue. Yet these sites continued to sell £60 ($97.35) tickets for up to £6,000 ($9736.10) without advising fans of the theatrical group’s threat.

Ed Sheeran and Iron Maiden released statements that they had contacted the major reseller sites to make similar warnings, but had been ignored. An MP described it as “naked fraudulent misselling.”

It was suggested that a one-strike penalty shouldbe introduced for such behaviour.

Recently, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport announced a crackdown on bots, threatening scalpers using such technology with unlimited fines.

Rob Wilmshurst of See Tickets told the committee that it would not make a difference. “Bots have been a red herring in this. We’ve added more technology to thwart bots but we don’t see conversion rates dropping.”

Promoter Stuart Galbraith said that despite the Consumer Rights Act being updated two years ago – for resellers to supply information as face value and seat number – no one had been prosecuted. (Although the Government has now put aside money for enforcing and prosecuting).

Galbraith said the Act needed an amendment for resold tickets to include the unique booking reference on the original primary ticket, to make it possible to also track general admission standing tickets.

A day before the hearing, the FanFair Alliance – set up by the UK music industry to campaign on online scalping – published a free guide to help fans beat touts.

Ed Sheeran said in a statement, “It’s important to get educated about ticket touts. Read the advice in the FanFair Alliance guide – find out who the authorized ticket sellers are, avoid the secondary sites … and if you’ve got to sell a ticket, sell if for face value.”