Seatwave Closing Down

cruhoortwunk

Zardoz wrote: »

Have they stopped linking from TM to Seatwave , I don't think they have ?
I've seen Seatwave links on Ticketmaster for sold out events recently.

Google must be making an absolute fortune from Viagogo ,there really is no other explanation as to why Viagogo have such a large section of the market as they are a truly vile company that treat their customers like dirt .
Its a pity that its not them instead of Seatwave closing down.

They link from the odd event (Britney, EP and First aid Kit being a few examples), but it's a minority of them.
People often buy from viagogo before the event is even sold out. They just google Cliff Richard tickets Dublin and click the first google result.

phunkadelic

Exclamation Marc wrote: »

So surely if they've been losing out to Viagogo for a long time, this extra platinum seating paranoid theory should already be in place...?

So then closing Seatwave is a good thing, with hopefully Viagogo to follow when legislation is in force.

The seeds have already been sown. Lot's of gigs had platinum/VIP/Hot ticket this year. They will ramp it up from now on.
You reckon we are being paranoid, I reckon you are being naive

Wheety

I don't believe Seatwave were loss making. If you believe they were legitimate with regards to who was selling tickets, then they made quite hefty fees from the buyer and the seller with no product of their own.

They even charged the buyer a storage fee for e-tickets

Zardoz

cruhoortwunk wrote: »

They link from the odd event (Britney, EP and First aid Kit being a few examples), but it's a minority of them.
People often buy from viagogo before the event is even sold out. They just google Cliff Richard tickets Dublin and click the first google result.

Yes,it seems most people just google for tickets and Google is in cahoots with Viagogo as they pay them huge money .

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5483607/Google-rake-millions-resale-website-viagogo.html

They had to stop using the word official on their ads

http://www.completemusicupdate.com/article/irish-advertising-regulator-to-investigate-viagogos-use-of-the-word-official/

Most people still think they are buying from the primary market when they buy off Viagogo ,its scandalous really ,people buy tickets off them for rip off prices and the events arent even sold out.
It seems to be a licence to print money .

These parasitic cowboys need to be run out of town .

Zardoz

Good article and podcast here about Ticketmasters greed

https://medium.com/@ericsfuller/wtf-...r-e46b46dc10e3

rubadub

Wheety wrote: »

I don't believe Seatwave were loss making. If you believe they were legitimate with regards to who was selling tickets, then they made quite hefty fees from the buyer and the seller with no product of their own.

I cannot believe they were loss making either. It would be hugely automated.

This was a test I did to see how much extra a buyer would have to pay if they wanted to sell on an expensive ticket with zero profit. Seller pays €73.55 extra. I did this on cheaper tickets and it is still shocking.

rubadub wrote: »

If I bought 1 paper ticket online it would have been 166+6.85=172.85

To sell this and not make a loss my asking price must be €196.42

Your Price (x1)€196.42
Success Fee- €19.65
VAT- €3.92
You'll Receive€172.85

So the buyer sees €196.42

The booking fee does not appear to be an exact %, it is over 18% on all the ones I check but gets rounded. I can see a ticket for 196.49 has a fee of €36.99 as does a ticket at €194.98, so I will go with that

So €196.42
+ booking fee of €36.99
+ shipping & handling fee of €12.99
Total €246.40 and the seller makes nothing, so €73.55 above what was paid.

Wheety

rubadub wrote: »

I cannot believe they were loss making either. It would be hugely automated.

This was a test I did to see how much extra a buyer would have to pay if they wanted to sell on an expensive ticket with zero profit. Seller pays €73.55 extra. I did this on cheaper tickets and it is still shocking.

Not sure if that's shipping and handling as you said an e-ticket. But the storage fee for e-tickets is hillarious. Well if it wasn't such a rip off.

rubadub

Wheety wrote: »

Not sure if that's shipping and handling as you said an e-ticket..

By "paper ticket" I meant an old style hard copy ticket.

The e-ticket thing was disgraceful, someone thought I was joking when I mentioned it. That fee was 4.95

I can see in an old email I saw tickets going under face for a gig I was half interested in going to, ticket 37euro but
there was a booking fee €7.99 and then a delivery & handling fee of €12.99 so was actually €57.93.

Wheety

rubadub wrote: »

By "paper ticket" I meant an old style hard copy ticket.

The e-ticket thing was disgraceful, someone thought I was joking when I mentioned it. That fee was 4.95

I can see in an old email I saw tickets going under face for a gig I was half interested in going to, ticket 37euro but
there was a booking fee €7.99 and then a delivery & handling fee of €12.99 so was actually €57.93.

Sorry, I misread, you did say paper ticket. But yeah charging for storage of an electronic document is blatant rip-off.

drunkmonkey

Don't know how anyone thinks getting rid of printed tickets is a good thing https://m.independent.ie/irish-news/the-show-may-be-over-for-printed-tickets-in-crackdown-on-the-touts-37243259.html
We're now going from one extreme to a other, no more getting a last minute tickets to go with your mates. Big step backwards if it happens.

Sabre0001

Have tickets for 4-5 more gigs/shows booked before the end of the year and the "Find my eTicket" link doesn't work, so I presume that means digital tickets via app only. Almost caused issues for Billy Talent when a friend had to drop out last minute, but made a new friend on the street outside the Academy who was looking for a ticket so worked out for everyone. I'm OK with this move (except you don't have the keepsake).

cruhoortwunk

You can see 25 - 30 EP tickets sold in the last few days on Seatwave, so they were still doing well on listings that redirected from TM sold out event page.
Prices between €330 and €400

okidoki987

why Viagogo have such a large section of the market as they are a truly vile company that treat their customers like dirt .
Its a pity that its not them instead of Seatwave closing down.

+1

Don't know how anyone thinks getting rid of printed tickets is a good thing

Making ALL tickets digital will be a massive change for the industry and great news.
With Seatwave etc closing, there is no way T/M will allow companies like Viagogo or Stubhub an easy way to make money.
Will make it easier for people to avoid getting ripped off with forged/invalid tickets especially for the likes of concerts like 1D and concerts where kids will be going.
These concerts see parents who have no knowledge of buying tickets, searching online and end up buying the 1st offers they can find only to find out they are fake and then end up with crying kids at the ticket office cause they can't get in.

One problem with digital tickets may be is if one person can't go and you then have to try and offload it, not sure how that will work.

Toast

I've often said making tickets more like a license that can be transferred digitally makes the most sense for the future. If ownership change is controlled by a system it means it can be tied to payment and policed to be only face value. The problem is it will mean Ticketmaster are the only gatekeepers of ticket transfer and they could easily (certainly) abuse that position.

I imagined the implementation more like a physical card like a leap card though as that could operate without someone having access to a computer or a smart phone. It could even operate with the existing Kiosks. As soon as it becomes all digital you're isolating people who might not have access to smart phones or printers (they exist).

Zardoz

okidoki987 wrote: »

Making ALL tickets digital will be a massive change for the industry and great news.
With Seatwave etc closing, there is no way T/M will allow companies like Viagogo or Stubhub an easy way to make money.
Will make it easier for people to avoid getting ripped off with forged/invalid tickets especially for the likes of concerts like 1D and concerts where kids will be going.
These concerts see parents who have no knowledge of buying tickets, searching online and end up buying the 1st offers they can find only to find out they are fake and then end up with crying kids at the ticket office cause they can't get in.

One problem with digital tickets may be is if one person can't go and you then have to try and offload it, not sure how that will work.

I think the day we have all tickets digital will be a long way off ,especially in the Uk where there are so many different ticket vendors and paper tickets are more popular than Ireland.

You can transfer mobile tickets for most events on Ticketmaster in the US ,I'd imagine the same here but it may be disabled for certain high profile events .

I've often said making tickets more like a license that can be transferred digitally makes the most sense for the future. If ownership change is controlled by a system it means it can be tied to payment and policed to be only face value. The problem is it will mean Ticketmaster are the only gatekeepers of ticket transfer and they could easily (certainly) abuse that position.

Whats happened in the US over the last few years is that Ticketmaster has done exclusive mobile ticketing arrangements with sports teams .
This isn't done to protect the consumer ,its so that Ticketmaster can control the resale market.
You can only resell these mobile tickets on their platform .

There is always another angle to Ticketmasters policies.

okidoki987

If Ticketmaster control the resale market, that should be fine as long as it's face value or lower.
Presume people buying at an outlet will have to give their mobile number
and get the tickets sent to there?

okidoki987

I think the day we have all tickets digital will be a long way off ,especially in the Uk where there are so many different ticket vendors

Would have thought Ticketmaster would have around 90% of the market anyway?

Zardoz

okidoki987 wrote: »

Would have thought Ticketmaster would have around 90% of the market anyway?

Unlikely in the UK ,different venues have different main sellers .

The O2 Arena and Wembley Arena in London is AXS, Manchester Arena is Eventim, Ticketfactory is Birmingham NIA and Genting Arena etc.

Then you have places like the Echo Arena ,that sell their own tickets and lots of other venues like the Albert Hall are similar.
Wembley box office sell their own tickets too for most events.

Ticketmaster would get a small allocation for these venues.

See Tickets are the primary seller for alot of events too.

Its simpler in Ireland, Ticketmaster have a monopoly here .

phunkadelic

A little window into the future with TM. Platinum tickets interspersed among the normal tickets. So instead of people going to seatwave to pay 350, they just get them direct from the tm listing at the same price.
The difference being tm gets 100% of the profit now.

hots

phunkadelic wrote: »

A little window into the future with TM. Platinum tickets interspersed among the normal tickets. So instead of people going to seatwave to pay 350, they just get them direct from the tm listing at the same price.
The difference being tm gets 100% of the profit now.

Are they actually interspersed or is it the flat + first X number of rows are marked as premium? I see Tim Minchin is doing some sort of loyal fan scheme to stop touts for his UK & Aus tour this morning, no idea if it'll be any use.

phunkadelic

hots wrote: »

Are they actually interspersed or is it the flat + first X number of rows are marked as premium? I see Tim Minchin is doing some sort of loyal fan scheme to stop touts for his UK & Aus tour this morning, no idea if it'll be any use.

When I said interspersed, I meant the webpage has them listed all together. You don't have to search for plantinum to see them, they are listed among the standard tickets.

Zardoz

hots wrote: »

I see Tim Minchin is doing some sort of loyal fan scheme to stop touts for his UK & Aus tour this morning, no idea if it'll be any use.

The Verified Fan scam .
Steal peoples data ,sell the data to third parties and then put them into a lottery for tickets .
Its a cod.

boyznoise

TM Platinum is far more extortionate than any resale site. TM will drip feed tickets and control the supply and demand. This is far worse for fans than any resale site, look at Paul McCartneys UK tour for example.

TheIrishGrover

^^^^^^^^

Case in point..... General tickets go on sale tomorrow.....

dixiefly

What happens when Ticketmaster dont sell those tickets? Will they dripfeed into general sale?

Same question regarding Seatwave, what to Seatwave sellers do when they fail to sell tickets for a particular gig. Do they then sell at face value on toutless or auction on adverts.ie etc?

TheIrishGrover

dixiefly wrote: »

What happens when Ticketmaster dont sell those tickets? Will they dripfeed into general sale?

Same question regarding Seatwave, what to Seatwave sellers do when they fail to sell tickets for a particular gig. Do they then sell at face value on toutless or auction on adverts.ie etc?

Personally I hope they are lumped with them or have to sell them at a loss. Parasites.

boyznoise

TM will offload unsold platinum tickets for standard price leading up to the gig or just gradually reduce price over time. TM will drip feed these platinum tickets therefore we will never know how many they are holding back for the gig in question. Its shocking how they are getting away with this and how the media is portraying them as heroes because they closed 2 non profitable resale sites to focus on what we are seeing now, the future is bright the future is platinum people. I did buy 2 platinum tickets for Rodger Waters in Liverpool they are just your bog standard ticket.

phunkadelic

They even have platinum listed on the app now before general onsale begins.
Ramping it up bit time.

Exclamation Marc

phunkadelic wrote: »

They even have platinum listed on the app now before general onsale begins.
Ramping it up bit time.

This isn't new at all? Was the case way before Seatwave was even being considered to close.

phunkadelic

Exclamation Marc wrote: »

This isn't new at all? Was the case way before Seatwave was even being considered to close.

Wrong, to see platinum in the past on the app, you had to click into the platinum listing. It was a separate listing.
Now though, they are on the standard listing for the event before it goes on general sale.