Fans Deal with Ticketmaster Glitches

[JerseyGirl]

This is what I was dealing with this morning. I got on the Ticketmaster site at exactly 10am and kept getting bumped off. So many people weren't able to get tickets. Thankfully I eventually got them and they're decent seats. Ticketmaster really needs to do something about this. :mad

LINK: Bruce Springsteen Fans Deal with Ticketmaster Glitches | Music News | Rolling Stone

Several concerts on Bruce Springsteen's forthcoming spring tour – mainly in the rocker's home state of New Jersey – went on sale today, resulting in traffic-related issues for Ticketmaster that have kept many fans shut out from purchasing tickets. Earlier this afternoon, Springsteen put a message on his official site letting his fans know that he was aware many of them were having trouble buying tickets, and sharing the following message from Ticketmaster:

"We have been experiencing highly abnormal traffic patterns on our site this morning that have impacted the fan buying experience for some customers. We are investigating the source of the problem and are working to resolve it as quickly as possible, but tickets are selling so please stay patient. We will update fans as we know more."

Springsteen wasn't the only high-profile act with gigs on sale today. Tickets for Roger Waters' performance of The Wall at Yankee Stadium also went on sale this afternoon, along with Florence and the Machine dates and a rare U.S. appearance by Pulp at Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan.

This isn't the first time East Coast fans have dealt with Ticketmaster glitches related to Bruce Springsteen tickets. Back in 2009, fans attempting to get seats for the singer's shows on Long Island and in New Jersey were greeted with error messages immediately upon the tickets going on sale and were redirected to Ticketmaster's subsidiary TicketsNow, which specializes in selling tickets above face value. This led New York senator Charles Schumer to introduce ticket legislation intended to curb secondary-market ticket sites by insisting on a two-day waiting period before putting new tickets on sale.

Tickets for today's Springsteen shows are already available on sites such as StubHub.

 

[Powerage]

I'm not sure what the answers are in relation too heavy traffic when buying tickets. I guess that's part of it when the big guns play these days.

As for secondary ticket sites. Ban them. When there are hundreds of tickets for sought after shows on sale there minutes after they go on general sale, they can get ****ed as far as I'm concerned. It's touting and should be made illegal. It's against the terms and conditions of concert tickets anyway!

 

[JerseyGirl]

^^^Yeah, I've dealt with it being hard to get tickets for a Bruce show every time I've gone to see him. I've waited on long lines before the internet too. But yesterday was ridiculous and something needs to be done about the secondary ticket sites. The tickets I got are going for double and triple of what I paid. And forget about the most sought after seats. You're talking a couple thousand for some. Absolutely horrible. This happened two years ago too and something was supposed to have been done about it. And now here it is again. :mad

 

[LG]

^^I see no solution other than making it Illegal to sell tickets online. Make people do it the old fashioned way and limit the number per person to 4 or something like that.

This is what happened to the stock market a few years back when they all plunged headlong into the "Speed of light' way of playing the market. Result, Black Monday I think it was called. The authorities had to shut things down to prevent a collapse due to runs on banks at a speed they had never experienced before.

Speed and efficiency is not always an improvement.

 

[JerseyGirl]

This is from Billboard...

LINK: Scalper 'Assault' Caused Website Jam for Bruce Springsteen Ticket Sales, Ticketmaster Says | Billboard.biz

Scalper 'Assault' Caused Website Jam for Bruce Springsteen Ticket Sales, Ticketmaster Says

The latest episode in the saga between Bruce Springsteen and Ticketmaster arose Friday when the company's websites were jammed by what the company said was an "assault" from scalpers looking to hoard tickets for the Boss' upcoming tour dates, which went on sale Jan. 27.

Fans attempting to buy tickets for Springsteen's worldwide "Wrecking Ball" tour were met with frozen screens and were blocked from purchases, while at the same time StubHub and others in the secondary ticketing market had blocks of seats available for purchase, according to NBC.

In 2009, fans attempting to buy tickets were redirected to Ticketmaster's secondary market site TicketsNow despite primary tickets still being available, a move that infuriated Springsteen and confused thousands of fans.

At the time, U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) introduced the BOSS Act, which was aimed at creating transparency in the way Ticketmaster and other large ticketing companies worked, hoping to avoid conflicts of interest in the event that a ticketing company "locked out" fans while allowing others to buy large blocks of tickets for the purpose of resale on the secondary market. Pascrell has now promised to reintroduce the bill to Congress.

"I think it's important to note that while many fans were unable to get tickets today, many brokers were able to get their hands on good seats for Springsteen and put them up on secondary ticket sellers' websites where they were sold at higher prices," Pascrell said in a statement Friday announcing his intent to reintroduce the bill. "Whether today's problems are due to honest mistakes or dishonest market manipulation, regular folks who wanted a little entertainment were not able to get what they wanted at a fair price."

Ticketmaster responded later in the day, releasing a statement that noted the company had experienced highly unusual traffic patterns, and attributing their site freeze to an assault by scalpers who hoped to repeat the bulk purchases of tickets that plagued the tour in 2009.

"We have been experiencing highly abnormal traffic patterns on our site this morning that have impacted the fan buying experience for some customers," Ticketmaster's statement said. "We are investigating the source of the problem and are working to resolve it as quickly as possible, but tickets are selling so please stay patient."

 

[Powerage]

Maximum of two tickets per person per transaction, 4 per household.

 

[JerseyGirl]

Maximum of two tickets per person per transaction, 4 per household.

Yup! They need to do something, that's for sure.

 

[Powerage]

Another option is a swipe card, that gets the ticket loaded onto it electronically. As much as it would be shit to lose the stubs [I collect mine after I've seen the show], you would only need to load the "show" onto the card and swipe it at the gate to get in.

Have cards registered to you, with a photo and some info or something.

 

[JerseyGirl]

^^^ Do you mean paperless tickets? You pay by credit card and then swipe it when you get to the venue. They had that here for most of the seats if that's what you mean. But the scalpers still got them.

 

[Powerage]

^^^ Do you mean paperless tickets? You pay by credit card and then swipe it when you get to the venue. They had that here for most of the seats if that's what you mean. But the scalpers still got them.

Yeah pretty much.

Like an Oyster card for the London underground, or I guess a store card with money off loaded onto it for example?

Although my idea is still like a ticket I guess, in that the card is the ticket and could be discarded after the show has finished.