Rip off ticket prices!

[Ben H]

On the upside, six flatmates and I got tickets in decent seats at the Millennium this Saturday for what will probably be the most exciting match of the Six Nations - for the grand total of £46/each. Not bad at all.

[DanO1978]

On the upside, six flatmates and I got tickets in decent seats at the Millennium this Saturday for what will probably be the most exciting match of the Six Nations - for the grand total of £46/each. Not bad at all.

Most exciting match of the Six Nations? Are they cutting it to 11-a-side, putting the players on a diet and making the ball round?

[Dragon Rapide]

On the upside, six flatmates and I got tickets in decent seats at the Millennium this Saturday for what will probably be the most exciting match of the Six Nations - for the grand total of £46/each. Not bad at all.

Not bad at all - £46 to see Wales lose......!!

[tache3]

Recent Channel 4 documentary about ticket prices. Controversial allegations-

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/disp ... od#3290181

The programme was the subject of an attempted court injunction to stop it being shown. Here's C4's statement after the hearing-

Channel 4 has defeated an injunction in the High Court on Wednesday, 22 February and can now reveal an important public interest investigation into how real fans are paying the price for hidden practices used by live event promoters and a major 'fan-to-fan ticket exchange'.

Dispatches, which will air on Thursday, 23 February at 9pm, went undercover inside one of the UK's biggest ticket reselling websites - Viagogo - and found that major promoters allocate hundreds or even thousands of tickets to be sold through their website at well above the face value.

Tickets for recent gigs and tours by Coldplay, Rihanna, Westlife, Take That, and V Festival have been allocated by the promoters in this way.

The application for an injunction was brought by Viagogo on the grounds of 'breach of confidence' and it was dismissed on all counts at the High Court.

A Channel 4 spokesperson says: 'We are pleased that we can now broadcast in full a programme of important public interest. It is disappointing that having provided Viagogo with a fair opportunity to respond to the allegations uncovered by our investigation several weeks ago, they chose instead to seek an injunction which would have effectively stopped the broadcast of our programme.'

[Dragon Rapide]

But are they doing anything illegal?

[Bucky P]

But are they doing anything illegal?

Not illegal but immoral, there are some lyrics in a Don Henley song that resonate all around anything to do with making money, from the song 'If dirt were Dollars' "a man with a briefcase can steal more money than any man with a gun". It is theft by every sense of the word but not illegal, it could be associated with lawyers fees, bankers bonuses, directors massive pay rises compared to the people that actually do the work and earn the money, energy companies and ticket prices. These 'robbers' are in such powerful positions that they can do and charge exactly what they want just because they can, it doesn't make it illegal just immoral and enforces the 'Rip Off Britain' feeling. Having said that I believe this goes on globally, apart from the smaller people who earn their money and do all the work and contribute to keeping the planet fed and moving, the minority cream off all the profits and just make money at everyone else's expense! Capitalism gone bad!

[Dragon Rapide]

Unfortunatley the anti-capitalism wave in the UK these days will do nothing but harm to this country's prospects in the long run. I will make no judgerment on the morality of people making a profit. I see no difference, morally, in the list of people you have singled out for condemnation and the market trader selling you junk for pounds for which he has paid pence. Or the cowboy builder. Or indeed anyone else who has for centuries "turned a fast buck". You either have a free unregulated market or you have a regulated statist system. I know which I prefer and I know which has stood the test of time. And we'll be even better off once we have cleansed local government of its legions of overpaid spongers.

[Bucky P]

Unfortunatley the anti-capitalism wave in the UK these days will do nothing but harm to this country's prospects in the long run. I will make no judgerment on the morality of people making a profit. I see no difference, morally, in the list of people you have singled out for condemnation and the market trader selling you junk for pounds for which he has paid pence. Or the cowboy builder. Or indeed anyone else who has for centuries "turned a fast buck". You either have a free unregulated market or you have a regulated statist system. I know which I prefer and I know which has stood the test of time. And we'll be even better off once we have cleansed local government of its legions of overpaid spongers.

The only difference between the examples you made of market traders and cowboy builders is that they make a few quid which is hardly big profits, my examples add up to £millions which is where the problem starts. We all need to make a profit, its knowing where to draw the line between reasonable profit and rip off profit, when you make the kind of profit I was referring to, is it really necessary to make that much, there is only so much you can spend and so much food you can consume. The large profits are made and then because they end up with far more than they actually need to survive and live off the rest gets invested in useless ways like buying foreign currency and rental properties, which push up property prices so normal people cannot afford to buy them and have to rent instead at extortionate rates, just to make even more money that they don't need and dodge taxes! If profits were kept to a reasonable level they could still lead wealthy lives but could afford to pay the 'lower' people better salaries and help to even things out a bit, give the population a better standard of living and equally as a result boost our flagging economy and put more money back into the governments coffers through taxes and get us out of the brown smelly stuff we are in. My problem with the current capitalist society is that the fat cats get fatter at the expense of the rest of the population because they are consumed with an unquenchable greed that sees no bounds, they need to become realistic and socially aware before the country goes into an anarchic melt down, the likes of which we have already had a taster of last year with the riots we experienced!

[Dragon Rapide]

That's neither a moral nor rational defence of your position but simply a predictable political rant of the type rehearsed over and over again by the usual suspects.

[AlexC]

I refuse to buy train tickets from the Trainline since they added a fee for printing off your own pre-booked tickets at the machine at the station.

It's been quite amusing watching the TV programme 'The Tube' about the London Underground that's running at the moment. Several times they've shown someone turn up at the ticket office and ask for a ticket going three or four stops. When told how much it's going to cost them they say 'what!!!!' and walk off.

[Bucky P]

That's neither a moral nor rational defence of your position but simply a predictable political rant of the type rehearsed over and over again by the usual suspects.

You seem very defensive on this matter, but is anything I have stated untrue? The fact is there is a growing discernment within the majority populous that we, as a nation, are being taken for a ride by the people who have too much, I'm not defending my position in any way shape or form all I am stating is the reality of our position. The usual suspects you refer to are in the majority so does that mean you fall into the other bracket?

[Ben H]

Not bad at all - £46 to see Wales lose......!!

Hey, it will be a win! France have been playing pretty badly of late...

Most exciting match of the Six Nations? Are they cutting it to 11-a-side, putting the players on a diet and making the ball round?

Go dive on the floor and roll around 'injured', O'Hagan
Rugby is clearly the far superior sport!

[DanO1978]

Go dive on the floor and roll around 'injured', O'Hagan
Rugby is clearly the far superior sport!

Reminds me of the egg-chasing team at our school. Basically the fat lads were made to play as forwards, and the skinny ones who could run were the backs. Silly little game, where skill is secondary to physicality.

When England won the Commonwealth Cup in 2003, I remember working for a sports editor who was convinced rugby would become the new national sport!

[Dragon Rapide]

That's neither a moral nor rational defence of your position but simply a predictable political rant of the type rehearsed over and over again by the usual suspects.

You seem very defensive on this matter, but is anything I have stated untrue? The fact is there is a growing discernment within the majority populous that we, as a nation, are being taken for a ride by the people who have too much, I'm not defending my position in any way shape or form all I am stating is the reality of our position. The usual suspects you refer to are in the majority so does that mean you fall into the other bracket?

It is just a raft of sweeping generalisations stemming from am subjective view of the reasons for what you describe. The British follow, like sheep, and if you ask the man in the street to explain his distatse for the world as he sees it he'll just spout the usual mantras about fat cats and greed, which he reads in the tabloid press most days. And it's all so one-sided. I might be more interrested in the debate if equal scorn was directed against the amounts of money and perks enjoyed by our national and local civil servants.

[Dragon Rapide]

Not bad at all - £46 to see Wales lose......!!

Hey, it will be a win! France have been playing pretty badly of late...

France could yet field the team we haven't seen yet in these championships and turn the expectations upside down!!

[Bucky P]

I might be more interrested in the debate if equal scorn was directed against the amounts of money and perks enjoyed by our national and local civil servants.

I agree, they get fantastic benefits, great pensions, guaranteed pay increases (when everyone else, apart from the fat cats who give themselves massive pay rises while freezing the pay of those who work for them, get pay freezes or cuts) generous holiday entitlements including free time off if they get married or have children, and still think they get a bad deal and insufficient pensions!

The fat cats and the civil servants all need to be brought down to earth with the reality of how well off they are compared to the other tax payers who pay their salaries or subsidize their tax breaks and dodges.

I'm not all one sided, I see it as it is and take a realistic view of what is going on and I don't think I'm the only one!

[Dragon Rapide]

The difference is of course that the so-called "fat cats" are accountable to their shareholders whilst the publicly employed "fat cats" are paid for by you and me and are answerable to us - theoretically!!

[Bucky P]

Most often the fat cats own a vast majority of the shares and much of the rest belong to other fat cats who are in the same position so they each vote in favour of themselves and answer to themselves! The state are major shareholders in some of the banks but the fat cats still seem to manage to get their bonuses (tax payers money) and massive salaries (tax payers money), so your argument about being accountable to shareholders doesn't really add up. These big directors have meetings among themselves as to what salaries are paid and its supposed to be an unbiased arrangement but when they are each also being salaried by the others they all want to keep each other happy so award big packets so that when their turn comes they get a big packet too.

No matter which way you look at it the fat cats are always going to win, they dodge taxes by paying accountants huge sums (all tax deductible) to find all the tax fiddles and loopholes they can (all legal) so they can pay as little as possible to the IR in many cases they probably pay less percentage wise than someone on minimum wages. The rest of us pay what we are demanded with no exceptions and if people do a little bit of cash in hand work (which would be small change to what others are avoiding 'legally') and get found out, they are slammed with massive tax bills (again small change to the real tax dodgers), fines and recriminations. It's always the small guys that suffer and have to answer to authority, never the fat cats.

I'm not anti capitalism when it works for all but capitalism these days has gone as far the other way as the hard line Communists went in the other direction, there's no middle ground.

[Dragon Rapide]

Your first sentence displays a considerable ignorance of the composition of PLC boards and your incessant use of the tediously emotive and pejorative term "fatcat" suggests a clear lack of objectivity in this discussion. To use the example of the two banks partially owned by the taxpayer to make your general point against my comments is almost irrelevant.

As to the rest of it you are simply repeating ad nauseam what you have said before so I don't think we are going to progress much in this debate.

[Mad Dan]

This ongoing debate/discussion/argument seems to have lost its way and drifted well away from ticket prices...which are a rip-off. Well, at least all the adds-ons are...

[tomcatforever]

Another thing that really pees me off is the re-selling market for tickets, I couldnt get tickets for Iron Maiden last year so I went on Viagogo for a couple of tickets and the greedy buggers wanted upwards of £150 for just one ticket that was only £35 face value... however I did get a couple of tickets on ebay for face value and it was a good concert!

Yep that really annoys me too Missed out on Gaslight Anthem ticket's on Friday because of trying to get Radiohead ones. Now if i want to see Gaslight Anthem possibly only UK date this year outside of festival's have to pay double the face value

[sjt]

Yep that really annoys me too Missed out on Gaslight Anthem ticket's on Friday because of trying to get Radiohead ones. Now if i want to see Gaslight Anthem possibly only UK date this year outside of festival's have to pay double the face value

I reckon they'll tour in Autumn if they have a new album out then.

[Bucky P]

Your first sentence displays a considerable ignorance of the composition of PLC boards and your incessant use of the tediously emotive and pejorative term "fatcat" suggests a clear lack of objectivity in this discussion. To use the example of the two banks partially owned by the taxpayer to make your general point against my comments is almost irrelevant.

As to the rest of it you are simply repeating ad nauseam what you have said before so I don't think we are going to progress much in this debate.

I agree to disagree!

Looking forward to seeing Jack Bruce on Sunday!

[Dragon Rapide]

Now we are on the same wavelength!! At Milton Keynes? Have a great day!

[falconpie]

IMO these secret overheads should be made illegal. It's just as bad as false advertising isn't it? Not only is it common with concerts but with airline flights as well! They're just as bad. So many times have I trying booking tickets online or even at travel agents and the little star at the bottom with the hidden costs are sometimes not even there. Something really needs to change in this department, seriously!