Ticketmaster’s statement on those trying to re-sell tickets for Pearl Jam’s Gigaton tour
If you sniff around the sites of secondary ticket sellers, you’ll find all manner of tickets (allegedly) available for Pearl Jam’s Gigaton tour. This is most unusual since Pearl Jam and Ticketmaster have gone to great lengths to thwart the flight of tickets to the secondary market by making them non-transferrable.
In short, you could only buy tickets using Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan system, which then inextricably linked those tickets to your personal smartphone. The only way to get rid of them is to use Pearl Jam’s fan exchange system, which transfers tickets from phone to phone. If you sell your tickets, it must be for face value. No markups required.
Yet tickets are all over the secondary seller sites. Pearl Jam and Ticketmaster worked are on a plan that was supposed to close any and all loopholes. So howcum these tickets are being sold by brokers? (I go into the situation here.)
Today (February 5), Ticketmaster issued this statement:
The non-transferability of Gigaton tickets has been extensively communicated to fans from the outset and is prominently featured at every step of the discovery and purchase process. To eliminate confusion among the secondary market and broker communities, we also sent them a notification advising that tickets for this tour are not available for resale. Only SafeTix mobile tickets will be valid for entry, and SafeTix tickets can only be issued directly from Ticketmaster.
In other words, I wouldn’t try buying tickets on the secondary market. You could get badly burned.
A couple of additional points from a source I have. StubHub, one of the big players in the ticket broker space, is only facilitating the resale of tickets to Pearl Jam shows in jurisdictions (that would be Colorado and New York) that enable fans to transfer their ticket purchases.
Those two states may have completely distorted the market, ascribing an artificially high resale value to those tickets. Where did they come from? Guest lists? Corporate boxes/sales? Contests? Burner accounts? No clue.
Brokers using burner phone is possible, but it seems like an awful lot of work. But if demand is high enough, you can see that some brokers will try this route.
Bottom line: Don’t do it. Don’t even think of it.
The thing about burner phone is this, I am a tenclub member and have been since 1995, my email for tenclub is the same one used for ticketmaster and how I was able to get my fanclub tickets, there’s no way I would log my ticketmaster account in on a burner phone and then hand that phone over to someone, besides, I rather sit in my amazing seats that I earned for being a tenclub member for 25 years than to sell them!
Did… did you say “howcum”?
Yeah. Just for effect.
I saw on the message boards for Ten Club, that at least in some cases, the work around people selling tickets were using for the shows where reselling isn’t allowed was actually selling the TicketMaster accounts themselves complete with tickets acquired. Presumably, these were new accounts set up exclusively for the purpose of flipping tickets at a markup and circumventing the safeguards Pearl Jam and TicketMaster put in place. This too seems very risky for any potential buyers out there, since Pearl Jam has people looking for this, and will likely void the tickets, and kick anyone in the Ten Club doing this out.
You’re an idiot. Please sit down and shut up. Until you truly understand how the secondary market works, don’t offer advice or suggestions.
Are you saying Alan Cross is an idiot and doesn’t understand the secondary market? Because based on everything’s he’s discussed or written about on the subject, the people he’s talk to about it, I’m pretty sure he knows more about it than most… Including yourself.
Obviously I need to introduce you to some of the brokers I’ve met over the years if you think using a burner phone seems like a lot of trouble. That’s like elementary school level stuff for a lot of these guys.
This entire system is wrong. They made it so normal fans can’t get tickets. I don’t have a lot of money or part of any clubs but I waited online the morning they went on sale and by the time the presale was over there wasn’t any tickets left that were worth it. Now I can’t even get them secondary or attend unless I want to meet up with someone at the areana that day? I think I’m all set. Good job Ticketmaster, I’ll just hit there show in Budapest on my next layover back to Iraq (private contractor). Was looking forward to taking my son to that one.
Wayne, you can buy tickets for face value starting Feb 18 on the Fan-To-Fan Exchange. When people who have already purchased tickets can’t use them any longer for whatever reason, they put them up on the exchange, and anyone can buy them. The tickets will be put into your Ticketmaster account on your phone. If you keep checking the exchange for tickets, you will likely find what you’re looking for.
you will likely not… for obvious reasons
Amy,
Have they published any information about the fan-to-fan exchange? I assume it will be hosted on Ticketmaster site but haven’t seen any details. Thanks for the Feb 18 date!
Tickets for the Canadian shows on ticketmaster.ca are already re-sold on their own website for well beyond face value. So much for that:/