The Western Australian Consumer Protection agency is reportedly investigating ticket resale platform Viagogo after tickets to several Perth events - including Billie Eilish and Justin Bieber concerts - were being resold for at least more than twice the original price - and nine times higher in one case.
The resale mark up for the tickets would appear to break Western Australia’s Ticket Scalping Act, which came into effect in September last year, that limits profits on ticket resales to 10% of the original price.
The law also outlaws the use of software designed to by-pass security measures to prevent bulk purchases.
Advising that it was the obligation of sites like the Switzerland-based reseller to identify illegal sales on their sites and quickly remove the offending advertisements, Consumer Protection Commissioner, Gary Newcombe told Western Australia’s WAtoday newspaper “Viagogo needs to do more to prevent these ads being posted on their website, as the law is broken as soon as the illegal tickets are made available to the WA public
“While Viagogo has removed some ads that have been brought to their attention by regulators, they need to take proactive measures ideally to detect the ads before they get posted, or have them removed as soon as possible afterwards, without waiting for others to bring them to their attention.”
The investigation also relates to tickets for the Van Gogh Alive exhibition, Harlem Globetrotters game, Super Netball Grand Final game and the Tyler, the Creator concert.
In May this year Viagogo was ordered to pay a $7 million penalty for misleading Australian consumers, after its appeal against a 2019 judgement was rejected in the Federal Court.
UK investigation reveals majority of Viagogo tickets listed three people
An investigation by UK television channel ITV News has found that just three people are responsible for over two thirds of festival and outdoor events tickets listed listed for resale on the Viagogo platform.
The research, carried out by campaign group FanFair Alliance for ITV News, found that less than 10% of the listings were from ordinary consumers while the vast majority were being sold by ‘traders’ or resale businesses.
Image credit: Shutterstock.
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