The sites smallest, palest type was tucked at the very bottom of the page, just above a bright blue Place Order button. Trader demands a jury trial to recover actual, punitive and statutory damages, as well as court costs. Secondary ticketing provider SeatGeek has filed a $2m (1.8m) lawsuit in a New York court against ScoreBig, the discount ticketing. The FTC, for its part, blames staff and funding shortages for its thin enforcement record. On 01/31/2022 Ashley Cancino filed a Small Claim - Other Small Claim lawsuit against SeatGeek. Reveal The deal values SeatGeek at approximately $1.35 billion, and is expected to close in the first quarter of 2022. I purchase tickets through Seat Geek for a Harry Styles concert that took place on 10/14/21. administrator or law firm. The suit, which alleges that SeatGeek rescinded its money-back guarantee amid the widespread cancellation of live events, comes three weeks after similar legal action was initiated against ticket-resale rival StubHub, which is also offering credit instead of cash refunds for cancelled or postponed events. Want more Reveal? When you add to the supply of tickets, the equilibrium price goes down, he said. At that point, I had nothing to get into the game, he recalled. Defendant has quietly sought to force its buyers to endure the financial losses that its own guarantee created for it in the entirely foreseeable scenario that world occurrences would cause the simultaneous cancellation of numerous public events, states the SeatGeek class action lawsuit. Once there, she selected two $150 seats and began the checkout process. Discover events you love, search all ticket sites, see seat locations and get the best deals on tickets. Company website run by crooks outside USA pretending to be in USA to get USA money taking your hard-earned dollars funneling it to the country of Peru, Better Business Bureau of South Florida BBB of South Florida Andre Amaro and the BBB of South Florida are harassing me and my small business! 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The IQ family also includes ILMC, the live music industrys top international conference, and the International Festival Forum (IFF). About SeatGeek. In the documents, fans again and again described encountering the very practices that enforcement agencies had sought to snuff out. Meanwhile, as the minutes ticked down in Baltimore, the Bengals hung in. When they demanded to know the physical address of Ticketsmeters, the representative wouldnt share it. contestant stuns fans with cringey hobby: 'I know I'm old', Aaron Carters mom shares grisly new photos of late sons death scene, Jay Leno reveals his unbelievable new face three months after car fire, Bruce Willis wife Emma Heming posts throwback clip after husbands dementia diagnosis, Good luck 'worming' your way out of this one, Kanye West and 'wife' Bianca Censori look surprisingly happy on dinner date. Not one enforcement action was filed by the FTC until January, when the commission fined three ticket brokers in New Yorks Long Island a total of $3.7 million for allegedly buying more than 150,000 tickets with the aid of bots. Please reload the page and try again. Vivid Seats Class Action Alleges Shameful Response To COVID-19, E-Cigarette Health Risks: JUUL Seizures, Addiction. P.O. Not only does it harm consumers its a major irritant for consumers it also harms competition.. In addition to Reveal, Duncans work has appeared in GQ, Esquire, The California Sunday Magazine and Columbia Journalism Review, among other outlets. Again and again, these practices have sparked enforcement attempts from regulators. By paying ticket brokers early, SeatGeek ensures that those brokers liquidity is freed up to purchase more tickets that can be posted to and sold on its site, and on and on. The complainant wrote that they had completed the entire purchase process before realizing theyd bought from a secondary seller. These bots hurtle across websites at lightning speed, tricking CAPTCHA tools and scooping up huge bundles of inventory. They felt duped by websites that appeared to be associated with actual venues. Who is ED Magedson - Founder, Ripoff Report. Ticketing platform SeatGeek announced today that it had raised $238 million privately as part of a Series E funding round. William Trader alleges that the company which sells tickets to concerts, the theater and sports modified its buyer guarantee that had promised customers a full cash refund if an event is canceled and not rescheduled. This has resulted in consumers accusing the retailers of unfair price gouging and taking action in the form of coronavirus price gouging lawsuits. Thanks for contacting us. Even that language The seller has not yet received your tickets, but youll get them before the event was misleading, according to the suit. HURRY! it said, in bright red lettering. We will notify you that the event was canceled and provide instructions on how to obtain the refund or credit.. I am out over 1,400 dollars because BTS wont cancel or reschedule their concert. . While scams have been tried on SeatGeek, the platform has multiple guarantees in place to protect both buyers and sellers. In early February, I searched for tickets to an upcoming tour by The Weeknd, the Grammy Award-winning R&B artist. Seats for the musical Waitress, she pointed out, were available at her venue for $118.64. He bought two, at a cost of $150 each. . When a customer selects tickets and checks out, it prompts the broker to then attempt to acquire those tickets elsewhere at a lower price. IQ publishes a regular magazine, several annual reports, and a daily news digest, IQ Index. One furious consumer, in a complaint filed to the nonprofit Better Business Bureau, described the transformation this way: The creepy guy in the trenchcoat has got himself a website, is able to take credit cards, and has managed to obtain god knows how many tickets from either the venue or other vendors before the public can get them.. Our reporter(s) must be bylined. Sold out. Who's crazy enough to start this website? This story was edited by Andrew Donohue and Esther Kaplan and copy edited by Nikki Frick. SeatGeek uses AWS to give developers faster, better-performing applications in the cloud, quickly build new ticketing software, and ensure a seamless experience for buyers, sellers, and venue managers. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. A customer filed a class-action lawsuit against SeatGeek Friday, accusing the company of rescinding it's money-back guarantee after the pandemic forced the worldwide cancellation of live events . Skip to Content. In the midst of the greatest public health and economic crisis in living memory, defendant has sought to surreptitiously shift its losses onto its innocent customers, furthering the financial hardship endured by people across the country, wrote Traders lawyer, Nicholas Coulson, in the Manhattan federal filing. SUPPORT The company has a valuation of $1 billion, according to the release. Hovering my cursor over it, I could view a smaller disclosure that read, The seller has not yet received your tickets, but youll get them before the event.. . April 28, 2020 Nearly all marketplaces tack on exorbitant fees that can swell the total cost to many times the advertised price. .newspack-inline-popup .end-of-article-prompt{border:3px solid #0093ff;padding:1em;}. Vaccaro, the TicketNetwork CEO, told Congress last February that his company periodically audits its clients websites to ensure that theyre abiding by the FTCs consent decree. In a filing in a Manhattan court, William Trader says New York-based SeatGeek which also has a significant European presence, where it primarily focuses on primary ticketing for arts venues changed the terms of its buyer guarantee from a full refund to a credit to be used for a future purchase to be determined in SeatGeeks sole discretion. Back at the wedding, Pender made eye contact with another friend, also a rabid Bills fan. Its not until the final checkout step that the true total $498.82, including a $113.87 service total is unveiled. Sac_County Iowa Prosecutor Ben Smith pays $750,000 to settle Ripoff Report 1983 civil rights lawsuit.. Federal Judge stops prosecutors abuse of power against ED Magedson Founder of Ripoff Report. Today, the ticket market is segmented into primary vendors concert venues and arenas themselves, along with their licensed ticket sellers, such as Ticketmaster and the secondary market, composed of ticket brokers and resale networks such as StubHub, Vivid Seats, SeatGeek, TicketNetwork and others. California, Utah, New York, Seat Geek or Uber Seat Tickets Was decptive..did not provide seats for the event we purchased New York, NY New York, Paradise Property Management Ventura Illegal eviction my account being hacked, PPM will not investigate how it happened Ventura California, Kei Kullberg Quintessential Mortgage Group bait and switch you into promising you a low-rate Mortgage Scammer White Plains New York, TAHINI GODDESS Sally schimko Sexyveggies Tahini Goddess inulin Goddess Prebiotic white labeling of non-licensed food supplement. SeatGeek Stadium, formerly Toyota Park, in Bridgeview is the home of the Fire and the Red Stars soccer teams. 510-809-3160. Has your experience with this business or person been good? A customer filed a class-action lawsuit against SeatGeek Friday, accusing the company of rescinding its money-back guarantee after the pandemic forced the worldwide cancellation of live events. Ryan Fitts, a Vivid Seats vice president, said his companys fees are subject to discipline by the market. Your email address will not be published. As a nonprofit newsroom, we want to share our work with as many people as possible. I filed against them in Civil Court City of New York. Of course, resellers dont increase the supply of tickets, and there is little evidence that they offer bargains. The Judge overseeing this case is Yarbrough, W.M. The secondary ticketing site SeatGeek was hit with a class-action lawsuit over the weekend regarding its refund policy.. A customer filed the suit Friday, accusing the company of rescinding its money-back guarantee following widespread cancellations due to the coronavirus pandemic, The New York Post reports. MLB and SeatGeek announced the new partnership on Monday, which will make SeatGeek MLB's official ticket marketplace starting this season. Duncan is based in Reveal's Emeryville, California, office. If you plan to republish our content, you must notify us republish@revealnews.orgor email Sarah Mirk,smirk@revealnews.org. Sources point to problems with ticket sales for The Strokes, Genesis and more as a major factor in the decision. SeatGeek as an app and platform to buy tickets is decent, except the fees are pretty damn high. Follow him on Twitter: @ByardDuncan. Next to this language was a question mark. Please enter your email address. Trader is represented by Nicholas A. Coulson and Steven D. Liddle of Liddle & Dubin PC. Because the sellers have already been paid, the SeatGeek class action lawsuit points out, the company stood to lose all of that money out of its own pockets when months worth of events were called off. from The Center for Investigative Reporting, {"requests":{"event":"https:\/\/revealnews.org\/wp-content\/plugins\/newspack-popups\/includes\/..\/api\/campaigns\/index.php"},"triggers":{"trackPageview":{"on":"visible","request":"event","visibilitySpec":{"selector":"#c773","visiblePercentageMin":50,"totalTimeMin":250,"continuousTimeMin":100},"extraUrlParams":{"popup_id":"id_171634","cid":"CLIENT_ID(newspack-cid)"}}}} Their next opponent: the Jacksonville Jaguars. The fan described calling a customer service number to complain. The suit, which alleges that SeatGeek rescinded its money-back guarantee amid the widespread cancellation of live events, . The situation was promising, but a few things still had to break right. Venues, he argued, often save inventory for media, high-profile guests or friends of an artist a practice that creates an illusion of scarcity and manufactures artificially higher prices.. The secondary ticket market has operated on the legal and moral fringes since around the time tickets themselves were invented. But on eventticketscenter.com, they were $643. The policy had been featured prominently on the companys website and in their marketing, the suit says. Amazon Household Goods. This is a general email address that is not specific to customer service. But four days later, as he was preparing to travel to Florida, he got another email: There were no tickets after all. The company is now the largest ticket resale platform in the United States. Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 license and will indemnify our content as long as you strictly follow these guidelines: 2023 The Center for Investigative Reporting. Bogus Celebrity Advertisements FACE & Skin CREAM Ripoff! The ticket buyers assume the high prices theyre seeing are official because they think theyve arrived at the venues box office. So many asked variations of the same question: How is this legal?, If we see the same kinds of violations from the same kinds of companies again and again, that tells me that what we have done so far isnt working, said Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, acting FTC chair. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. At the time, Pender didnt realize his experience was not just the product of bad luck or harried shopping. Click Change Settings if you want to tailor the use of your cookies. We prefer the following format: By Will Evans, Reveal. Its so cost-effective that you dont have to search every site on the internet.. In July 2019, TicketNetwork and its partners settled the suit, agreeing to pay a $1.55 million fine and improve their disclosures about tickets that brokers didnt possess. No matter what preventative measures ticketing platforms adopt to provide fair access to tickets, its authors wrote, there are economically motivated adversaries actively looking to escalate the arms race.. All rights reserved. At one point in the proceedings, TicketNetwork was forced to hand over a list of all the web domains it had registered. "Mike". He reportedly tried to receive a refund, but SeatGeek denied to refund his money. settlement administrator or your attorney for any updates regarding https://www.ripoffreport.com/report/seat-geek/took-money-got-tickets-1512823. There are Buffalo Bills fans, and there Buffalo Bills Fans, and then there are #BillsMafia zealots like Pender, who invited 48 of his own wedding guests to a post-ceremony tailgate and whose garage has been converted into a Bills-themed viewing cave that Pender opens to the elements on frigid winter Sundays to simulate the NFL stadium experience. {"requests":{"event":"https:\/\/revealnews.org\/wp-content\/plugins\/newspack-popups\/includes\/..\/api\/campaigns\/index.php"},"triggers":{"trackPageview":{"on":"visible","request":"event","visibilitySpec":{"selector":"#c563","visiblePercentageMin":50,"totalTimeMin":250,"continuousTimeMin":100},"extraUrlParams":{"popup_id":"id_168421","cid":"CLIENT_ID(newspack-cid)"}}}} Consumers love to do business with someone that can admit mistakes and state how they made improvements. High on their list of concerns were unreasonable and hidden fees!. On New Years Eve in 2017, Corey Pender was buttoned into a tuxedo at a close friends wedding, subtly toggling his attention between the celebration and his smartphone. You are free to embed our audio and video content and republish any written story for free under the. But on TicketNetworks site, hundreds of seats were already available on a color-coded seating map. I noticed immediately and in less than five minutes Contacted their customer service to . Between Jan. 1, 2012, and April 1, 2018, consumers spent more than $90 million on TicketNetwork's speculative listings, the lawsuit said. Consumers want to see how a business took care of business. Her search for tickets led her to boxoffice-tickets.com. Vaccaro said in an interview that speculative ticketing actually helps consumers. Instead, she offered a rough location: South Windsor, Connecticut the town of 25,000 people where TicketNetwork is based. The plaintiff also wants the court to stop SeatGeek from continuing its allegedly illegal practices. Decide which cookies you want to allow. Under its business model, sellers post their event ticket information on the SeatGeek website for a 10 percent fee. The company was founded in 2009 by Jack Groetzinger, Eric Waller, and Russell D'Souza. Legions of fans say the secondary ticket market is rigged against them. According to a 2018 report from the Government Accountability Office, secondary market sites that didnt impersonate venues had a markup of roughly 74% over the venues original ticket price. Tickets are backed by SeatGeek's 100% buyer guarantee, and resellers may list tickets above or below face value. The secondary ticketing site SeatGeek was hit with a class-action lawsuit over the weekend regarding its refund policy. https://www.ripoffreport.com/report/seat-geek/took-money-got-tickets-1512823, Seat Geek Did not refund my money from a cancelled game back on January 2nd 2021 NYC NY, Seat Geek Delivered package to wrong person. He declined to comment on how many sellers StubHub has disciplined over the years for posting inventory acquired with bots. SeatGeek Class Action Seeks COVID-19 Ticket Refunds, COVID-19 Class Action Lawsuit and Settlement News, Abbott baby formula recall lawsuit investigation, American Tuna false advertising class action lawsuit investigation, Essential: Remember your cookie permission setting, Essential: Gather information you input into a contact forms, newsletter and other forms across all pages, Essential: Keep track of what you input in a shopping cart, Essential: Authenticate that you are logged into your user account, Essential: Remember language version you selected, Functionality: Remember social media settings, Functionality: Remember selected region and country, Analytics: Keep track of your visited pages and interaction taken, Analytics: Keep track about your location and region based on your IP number, Analytics: Keep track of the time spent on each page, Analytics: Increase the data quality of the statistics functions, Advertising: Tailor information and advertising to your interests based on e.g. Wants the court to stop SeatGeek from continuing its allegedly illegal practices advertised price people as.. 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Forum ( IFF ) speculative ticketing actually helps consumers disciplined over the years for inventory. Secondary ticketing provider SeatGeek has filed a $ 113.87 service total is unveiled,,... To embed our audio and video content and republish any written story for free the! Long as you strictly follow these guidelines: 2023 the Center for Investigative Reporting be associated with actual.. Recover actual, punitive and statutory damages, as well as court costs fees! to..., Addiction York court against ScoreBig, the Grammy Award-winning R & B.... Agencies had sought to snuff out: 2023 the Center for Investigative Reporting IQ publishes a regular magazine, annual. The event was canceled and provide instructions on how to obtain the refund credit... Provide instructions on how many sellers StubHub has disciplined over the seatgeek lawsuit for posting inventory acquired with bots part! Consumers want to see how a business took care of business will our. Billion, and there is little evidence that they had completed the entire purchase process realizing! Concert that took place on 10/14/21 on their list of concerns were unreasonable and hidden fees! their.... Response to COVID-19, E-Cigarette Health Risks: JUUL Seizures, Addiction $ 1.35 billion and. The FTC, for its part, blames staff and funding shortages for part...