If you managed to get to the front of the hours-long, crash-ridden online queue Little by Little to see Oasis next summer – which numbered hundreds of thousands – and you had enough money in the bank to pay for the expensive tickets, then you could have been in for a shock as you were given seconds to decide if you could afford to pay massively more than the advertised prices. Not exactly the Morning Glory many were expecting.
Ticketmaster advertised standing tickets at £150. Hidden behind that was the usual booking fees but due to the company’s ‘dynamic pricing’ approach many had to pay much more. Four tickets for the band’s hometown show in Manchester for example cost £1,423.55. £73.55 of this is processing and service charges. Per ticket this came to £361.13. Well over double the original price and Half the World Away from what most can afford.
Dynamic pricing is when a seller does not set a fixed price for their product, but instead adjusts what they charge in response to changing demand. This is what leads to airline and hotel prices rising during school holidays and during large events. Apparently bands and artists are often told that dynamic pricing deters touts from fleecing fans. In theory, the higher face-value price decreases the margin on offer for touts. However, Oasis tickets have also been dynamically priced in Ireland, where for-profit resale is illegal and secondary sites are not advertising tickets for shows at Croke Park.
So it’s clear profit is the name of the game. Labour’s culture secretary Lisa Nandy has ‘vowed’ to ‘end the rip off’ but you can never control what you don’t own. As Ireland shows, even if laws change, multinational companies will still find a way to rip off fans who want to see Rock n’ Roll Stars.
Fans will Look Back in Anger at the whole process as ticket company and music industry bosses will be drinking Champagne Supernova in their penthouses in the sky. Listen Up and nationalise them now!
