Jun 21 2008
Ticketmaster Sucks
I don’t understand how Ticketmaster continues to operate in the way they do. In this country we are anti-monopoly. The government will strike you down if you even think about owning too much market share. Yet, Ticketmaster continues to be ONLY viable option for tickets. How can this be?
Let me give you 3 recent examples of why Ticketmaster sucks:
- Ordered Neil Diamond tickets for a gift. Chose the option for Retail Location Pickup; that means I can go to a Ticketmaster location and have them print out my tickets. I go the nearest location, which is inside a Macy’s. The system is down/will not work. After waiting for 30 minutes plus, I finally ask the associate, can I take a look at the “terminal?” She says, “go for it.” It took me all of 5 minutes to fix the problem for her/them, which allowed them to print off my tickets. Here’s the kicker…Ticketmaster charged me a $1.00 convenience charge to pick up the tickets. Shouldn’t they have paid me?
- Ordered Peter Frampton tickets for myself. Chose the option for Retail Location Pickup. Between the time I ordered the tickets and went to pick them up, Discover (my credit card of choice and the one I used to buy the tickets) had issued me a new care and new number. I think you know where this is going. I present my receipt, my driver’s license, and my new Discover credit card to the associate. Despite ALL of this documentation they can not print my tickets, because I did not have my old Discover card with the my old number. After dealing with them for over 30 minutes in person and via phone, Ticketmaster agrees to send me my tickets via United States Postal Service.
- Ordered Ringo Starr tickets as a Father’s Day gift for my dad. The concert is in NY, I live in MN. I use the Retail Location Pickup locator on Ticketmaster’s site. It shows me that the nearest location is a Macy’s about 5 miles from my house. Taking my lessons learned from the above situations, I come prepared with my license, receipt, and credit card that I used to purchase the tickets. I present all 3 and of course we have a problem. Ticketmaster locations in Minnesota are unable to print tickets for events in New York. The associate’s recommendation was to pick them up in person in New York. Seriously. Think about that. Sir, can you please drive 1,800 miles to pickup your tickets? So I call Ticketmaster who agrees to ship them to me via UPS for a charge of $14.50. Now this gets better. On the day of the show, I receive an alert from Ticketmaster to my iPhone. The alert informs me the concert is canceled and I will receive a refund. I then receive a follow up email that says “Your credit card will automatically be credited the ticket price and convenience charges, and should post to your account within 7 to 10 business days. Please note, the $3.00 per order processing fee and any ticketFast or UPS delivery charges are non-refundable.” So the $14.50 that I shouldn’t have had to pay in the first time is now a sunk cost and Ticketmaster keeps their order processing fee.
If you are like me, then you’re saying to yourself, “Adam, if you think Ticketmaster sucks, and they screwed you over the first two times, why did you go to the well again?” Good question. Because there was NO other alternative.
In total, for all 3 transactions Ticketmaster charged me the following:
- Tickets: $392.00
- Building Facility Charges: $4.00
- Convenience Charges: $55.30
- Order Processing Charge: $11.34
- UPS Delivery: $14.50
- Retail Location Pickup: $1.00
- Tax: $2.78
I’m open to ideas and suggestions on what to do in the future and how to shine more light on Ticketmaster’s short-comings. Thoughts?
fuck ticketmaster. their new website sucks and so do they
I fell into the same trap, having no alternative. I purchased four tix and haven’t yet tried to pick them up, but I’m now scared about it. They made a big deal about being able to pick up the tix at a local convenient location, but once I purchased them I found that the locations are NOT convenient!! I actually have to go out of my way, make a special trip, probably during my lunchhour. What a rip.
Worst part is they initially charged me a convenience charge of three hundred and forty dollars per ticket. Yes, thats right, they messed up the decimal point and so the order came out to something like sixteen hundred for four tickets. To see a twenty five dollar dance performance.
I remember Eddie Vedder going against ticketmaster years ago. But eventually I guess he was just like, “oh fuggit; we’ll never win.” It was a noble fight though.
Ticketmaster really is the monopoly; government should investigate that.
you guys are right! I tried to buy 3 tickets to see Ringling bros circus. I decide not to go because the website sucks and the fee they added on the top of ticket price is outrage. They really suck!