Christopher BarrettTo the delight of many in the live events industry, the Labour government has pledged to make good on its pre-election promise to clean up the UK’s secondary ticketing market.
The Department for Business & Trade and Department for Culture, Media and Sport have jointly announced the launch of a consultation that they said will look at new measures to prevent consumers being “fleeced” by ticket touts as part of government’s Plan for Change.
Alongside the consultation, ministers have also launched a call for evidence into pricing practices in the live events sector, including the controversial dynamic pricing model adopted by Ticketmaster for many shows on the forthcoming Oasis tour.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said, “As part of our Plan for Change, we are taking action to strengthen consumer protections, stop fans getting ripped off and ensure money spent on tickets goes back into our incredible live events sector, instead of into the pockets of greedy touts.”
The call for evidence will seek views on how the ticketing system in the live events sector is working for fans and whether the current system provides sufficient protection from unfair practices. It will consider whether there is potential for new harms to consumers to arise from emerging business trends including the use of new technologies and dynamic pricing.
The secondary ticketing consultation will explore a range of options to make ticket resales fairer and more transparent, which include:
- Introducing a cap on the price of ticket resales – with the consultation seeking views on a range from the original price to up to a 30 per cent uplift, and limiting the number of tickets resellers can list to the maximum they are allowed to purchase on the primary market. These measures would prevent organised touts reselling a large number of tickets at vastly inflated prices and disincentivise industrial scale touting.
- Increasing the accountability of ticket resale websites and apps – creating new legal obligations so that they are held responsible by Trading Standards and the Competition and Market Authority for the accuracy of information they provide to fans.
- Strengthening consumer enforcement – review of existing legislation to bring it up to date, including stronger fines and a new licensing regime for re-sale platforms to increase enforcement of protections for consumers. Trading Standards can already issue fines of up to £5,000 for ticketing rule breaches. The consultation will look into whether this cap should be increased.
The consultation and call for evidence will be open for 12 weeks from today, 10 January, and close on 4 April.
Typical mark-ups on tickets sold on the secondary market are more than 50%, according to analysis by the Competition and Market Authority (CMA), and investigations by Trading Standards have uncovered evidence of tickets being resold for up to six times their original cost. According to research by Virgin Media O2, ticket touts cost music fans an extra £145 million per year.
The CMA has estimated the value of tickets sold in 2019 through secondary ticketing platforms to be about £350m, with around 1.9m tickets sold on these platforms. 1.9 million tickets accounted for around 5 to 6% of the number of primary tickets sold in 2019.
Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds said all too often big events have been dogged by consumers being taken advantage of by ticket touts: “These unfair practices look to fleece people of their hard-earned income, which isn’t fair on fans, venues and artists.”
Adam Webb, campaign manager for the FanFair Alliance, which was established in 2016 to unite members of the music and creative community in the fight against industrial-scale online ticket touting said, “These suggested measures are potentially game-changing. Other countries, notably Ireland, have demonstrated how legislation to prevent the resale of tickets for profit can massively curb the illegal and anti-consumer practices of online ticket touts and offshore resale platforms. The UK simply needs to follow their example.”
Music Managers Forum CEO Annabella Coldrick said its members also warmly welcomed the news: “The MMF both directly and through the FanFair Alliance has been campaigning to tackle the issue of industrial scale ticket touting and put tickets back in the hands of the fans for many years. We are pleased that the Government is following up on its manifesto promise and we will be pushing for effective regulation to resolve this harmful practice once and for all.”
In September 2023, the FanFair Alliance suggested a three-point plan that it said would dramatically reduce exploitative mass-scale ticket touting, boost the live music business and improve the experience of audiences. The plan was supported by leading figures across the industry from artist managers and agents to promoters including Kilimanjaro Live, SJM Music and AEG Presents. The Three points were:
Legislative action
New laws making it illegal to resell a ticket for profit, bringing the UK into line with other progressive music markets.
Tech action
Platforms like Google and YouTube must stop promoting touts, and help direct consumers towards legitimate sources of tickets.
Industry action
Across the board, the live music business needs to make capped consumer-friendly ticket resale visible and viable.
LIVE CEO Jon Collins said the live music industry body’s members have warmly welcomed the government’s move to deliver on its manifesto commitment: “We are delighted that measures which permit responsible and fair fan-to-fan resale, while eliminating third-party profiteering, will be brought forward. This will reduce the incentive for touts to squeeze fans out of the primary sale and highlights the need to set the cap on resales at or near the original price.”