Should ticket companies be responsible for refunding customers if an event is cancelled?
Opinion piece
Another day, another festival cancellation. Yeah, it’s been a year and we’re still talking about this, but now the focus is on the irresponsible companies taking a punt on a gig that’s unlikely to happen (or as the more cynical amongst us gig goers claim – to deliberately raise revenue and never have to put on a festival as they file for bankruptcy, or repeatedly rename the company to hide themselves away from bearing the brunt of these poor business decisions).
Ticketing companies in the middle
And amidst all this are the ticketing companies who sit in the middle doing very little, pocketing their ever growing fees and then shrugging their shoulders when it all falls apart and people lose their money. Now, of course, it’s not their fault that these events get cancelled, but honestly, as someone who only loosely follows what’s going on in this area, even I could tell you which companies are cancelling festivals left right and centre over and over, and which are clearly stretching beyond their means to put on a festival or event that feels unrealistic or hopelessly optimistic at best. So surely the ticketing companies working in this industry have a much better understanding of this than me.
Is it time for them to take responsibility
Shouldn’t there be some responsibility on them to engage with responsible promoters and event organisers within the industry and not just perpetuate this problematic practice? If they were forced to refund money of events not going ahead (or at least take some partial responsibility for this), it would make it a lot more likely that these events would happen (or people at least would get their money back). Hear me out on this….
- Better monitoring of if events are financially viable
If they were liable for the costs of cancelled tickets, I bet they’d vet the quality and likelihood of events actually happening – predicted ticket sales, revenue required etc. – before agreeing to selling tickets. - Better checks and measure on companies with poor business practices
Individuals can’t realistically sit there and research if a company has a pattern of cancelling events before buying their tickets, but Ticketmaster can. They literally have that data right in front of them. If they’re taking the hit, I bet they’d stop selling that companies tickets pretty damn fast. - Support for festivals with short term financial issues
Sometimes festivals genuinely get cancelled because of an unexpected rise in costs or a small shortfall in how much they need. Guess who’d probably foot that cost if it meant they didn’t have to cop refunding $$$$ in tickets – yup Ticketmaster and their buddies. They have the capital to invest in these events, in the industry in general. They’d also probably push cheaper tickets to get things sold out, or help promote the event… you know, the sort of stuff they should be doing anyway. - Increased chances of companies having to return the money
1000s of individuals trying to get their money back from a company, never going to happen. One big ticketing company with their team of lawyers would make that happen pretty fast (and wouldn’t it just put you off pretending you were going to have a festival if you knew this was going to happen and you weren’t able to just pocket the money and run?)
A more responsible attitude to festivals
It might also lead to more responsible festival planners getting more of a look in, or smaller festivals that maybe don’t have quite the same level of acts but who can scale everything accordingly and put on a great event.
People’s budgets are limited and if an event gets cancelled with no refund (or a severely delayed one) most people can’t just drop $$$ on another festival in the same season. Whereas if the “non-existent revenue raising” festival had never been given the light of day in the first place, these people would maybe have bought tickets to something different, something that works, that’s well planned and that could go on to bigger and better things in the future.