Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation Entertainment Inc, are being sued by Canada’s competition regulator over misleading prices.
The Competition Bureau stated on Thursday, January 25th, that an investigation into the company’s practices found that they were hiding additional fees from customers.
Essentially, the customers assumed that they were paying a final price, only to get slapped with additional fees later on. Live Nation allegedly made the prices appear final, only to add on extra fees later in transaction.
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Ticketmaster and Drip Pricing
The bureau calls this behaviour “drip pricing” – a term for when a company inflates a ticket price by adding mandatory fees late in the purchasing process.
Due to the nature of this behaviour, a customer never purchases a ticket at the advertised price.
“The regulator claimed that Ticketmaster’s mandatory fees often inflate the price by more than 20 percent, and, in some instances, by over 65 per cent,” reports CBC News.
In addition, the bureau warned ticket vendors in July 2017 to review their pricing practices.
