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The Tennessee Conservative Staff –
While most people have grown accustomed to seeing concert tickets listed for one price but paying a different higher price once they reach checkout, Tennessee lawmakers say this shouldn’t be happening.
“You click on the price and then there are all these fees that get added afterward,” Senator Heidi Campbell (D-Nashville-District 20) stated.
This is nothing new for ticket buyers, but a Tennessee law was passed earlier this year with the intention of ending this practice.
“The goal of the law is for the first price that you see on the ticketing website to be the same price you see in the checkout box,” Rep. Caleb Hemmer (D-Nashville-District 59) said.
Much of this occurred after the fiasco with Taylor Swift and Ticketmaster took place earlier this year.
“Unfortunately, we’ve seen a few folks that are ticket vendors that have not followed the spirit of the law,” Hemmer said.
“I don’t think the law is being followed,” Campbell agreed, in a separate statement.
While Ticketmaster has complied with the new law, other ticket vendors such as StubHub and Vivid Seats are still incorporating additional fees prior to checkout.
“It doesn’t seem like we’re enforcing that,” Campbell said. “I have a letter – I haven’t sent it yet – that I’m drafting to the AG to address that.”
The law should be enforced by the Attorney General, but that office did not comment on the issue when questioned by the Tennessee Lookout. The Attorney General was also contacted by News 2.
In response to a request for comment, Director of Communications Amy Wilhite replied:
“The Office of the Tennessee Attorney General has not received any consumer complaints about non-transparent ticket pricing since the law went into effect on July 1, 2023. Only Ticketmaster’s lobbyists have complained to the Office about other ticket sellers allegedly not complying with the law. We have not seen evidence demonstrating any violation of the requirements of the new law. This Office continues to prioritize protecting consumers from deceptive and unfair business practices and has a close eye on the ticketing industry.”
A follow-up was sent to Wilhite who returned the following statement:
“We received the video minutes before WKRN’s deadline and will give it the appropriate review. If consumers have complaints about potential violations of the ticket pricing transparency law, they can file a complaint with the Office’s Division of Consumer Affairs (Consumer Affairs – Main (tn.gov)).”
Vivid Seats and StubHub were also asked why they were not in compliance with the law.
Vivid Seats responded, saying, “We fully support consumer transparency in our industry. We can confirm that we have made the appropriate changes to our platform as required by the new law in Tennessee.”
A screen recording was then sent showing the price increase, asking if they still agreed with the statement that they were in compliance with the law. No response from the company was received.
A StubHub representative replied, “Thanks for reaching out! We’re looking into this and I’ll come back with more as soon as I have it.”
A follow-up response was received on Wednesday, “confirming the screen recording you shared does comply with Tennessee law.”
2 Responses
If they are breaking the law, arrest them. Fines are built into their business models, jail time is not. Same goes for the gay blades and authorities who are flaunting the law. Just think how much the state would take in by, first, jailing these people, all of them for ninety days then assessing a five thousand dollar fine and each. The politicians would have to pay out of their own pockets, not mine.
What about some Transparency of the Legislators also??????