Recently, some consumers reported to the Shanghai Consumer Protection Commission that they had to wait until their favorite singer officially announced the concert itinerary, but they encountered troubles during the ticket rush: after receiving the tickets, they found that the actual amount paid was several times higher than the face price. Some consumers have paid the "sky-high" ticket, but the platform neither ships nor refunds, and some consumers book air tickets and hotels, and are notified that there are no tickets on the same day. In this regard, the Shanghai Municipal Consumer Protection Commission has carried out relevant investigations and research, and found that some phenomena in the ticket market bring certain risks to the legitimate rights and interests of consumers.
Concert secondary ticket market "tens of thousands" sky-high tickets are not uncommon
Consumers reported that whenever a little popular stars hold concerts, it is difficult to grab tickets at normal prices, and the ticket grabbing operation is basically in vain, and a few seconds will show "out of stock", "sold out" or "no tickets", most consumers can only play the role of "escort", and then turn to the secondary ticket market. However, the price of the secondary ticket market is often increased by hundreds of thousands of yuan, and "tens of thousands" of sky-high tickets are also common, the premium is quite exaggerated, and the price changes frequently, one price a day. For example, the ticket of a certain star's original price of 317 yuan in the stands costs up to 1317 yuan on the ticketed platform, which is directly more than quadrupled.
The explanation of these secondary ticketing platforms for high-priced tickets is that the fluctuation of prices is determined by market conditions, performance popularity and other factors, but the problem is that market heat can be manipulated artificially. The continuous increase in the consumption threshold of concert tickets may be produced by a series of behind-the-scenes manipulations such as hunger marketing, hype propaganda, and hoarding, etc., in order to continuously raise prices and introduce consumers into the "high price wins" consumption circle.
Consumers themselves are in a weak position of information and lack some rationality in star chasing, then they are very likely to become victims of market speculation. Some consumers are in a hurry to choose their way, frequently encountering problems such as fake tickets and fraud. Excessive premiums clearly violate the principles of fair and reasonable trading in the market.
Hidden expenses The actual payment amount is higher than the face value
In addition to the high premium, consumers will also encounter many problems in the process of purchasing and collecting tickets. For example, the order conceals the collection of tickets, service fees, billing fees, acceleration packages and other expenses, consumers in a hurry to grab tickets, it is easy to ignore the fact that the actual amount paid is higher than the face value of the ticket, and there are additional other costs. Consumers can only see the specific charges after clicking on the details. Most of these encounters of consumers point to secondary ticketing platforms such as Ferris wheel ticketing and ticketing.
Why there is a billing fee, the Shanghai Consumer Protection Commission said that the platform's explanation for this is the quantity purchased by consumers, resulting in sellers having only one inventory left. Due to the particularity of the performance tickets, the remaining single tickets will increase the cost of sales, so the ticket seller claims additional compensation costs, that is, the "unwinding fee". Consumers can increase the number of purchases to avoid unpacking fees.
In addition, the "acceleration package" is also a platform to earn "probability money", which belongs to stable profit and no loss. Consumers actually have no way to distinguish the success rate of ticket grabbing, true and false, but they are constantly instilled with the concept of "adding money = increasing probability", and are induced to pay high fees.
Although consumers have already spent a lot of money to place an order, they may not be able to get the tickets they want. Factors such as the uncertainty of the way and time of ticket collection, the asymmetry of refund and exchange rules, the asymmetry of price information, and real-name ticket purchase but not necessarily real-name verification give merchants the operating space to sell at a price, so as to maximize the benefits, but greatly increase the risk for consumers.
Ticket source 'unusually sufficient' claiming "third-party merchandise provider"
The Shanghai Consumer Protection Commission's investigation found that the ticketing market often has a puzzling phenomenon, in stark contrast to the lack of tickets on officially authorized ticketing platforms, the secondary ticketing platform is always "prosperous", the ticket source appears to be extremely sufficient, all price stalls are available, the front row of the infield, designated seats, and even 3 consecutive seats and 4 consecutive seats. The tickets provided by these secondary ticketing platforms are basically from so-called "third-party commodity providers". When the Shanghai Consumer Protection Commission tried to inquire the secondary platform whether these "third-party commodity providers" were officially authorized ticket sales companies and ticket sources, the customer service was vague and failed to respond positively. Most of these "third-party" ticketing companies are not officially authorized ticket sales companies.
So where exactly do the large number of tickets from these unofficially authorized ticket sales companies come from? At present, in accordance with relevant regulations, the number of tickets for commercial performances publicly sold to the market must not be less than 70% of the number of audiences approved by the public security departments. In other words, a significant portion of tickets are not on sale. The flow of this part of the tickets is unknown, but it is very likely that most of them will fall into the hands of "scalpers" after layers of changes. At the same time, even those tickets that are sold publicly, the sales information is not transparent, and many "scalpers" use technical advantages to grab tickets and stock up tickets, which eventually leads to a large number of tickets flowing to the secondary market, and various problems follow. What worries consumers even more is that this unfair chaos is intentional by some official and ticketing platforms.
The Shanghai Consumer Protection Commission expressed the hope that the performance ticketing management system can be more perfect and reasonable, the sales channels will be more open and transparent, promote consumption fairness, and restore normal ticket market order. At the same time, it is suggested that relevant departments can pay attention to protecting the legitimate rights and interests of consumers and ensuring the benign and healthy development of the performance market.
Text/Reporter Li Tiezhu (Source: Beijing Youth Daily)