Ticketmaster UK boss tells MPs costs are particularly reasonable

The boss of Ticketmaster UK has advised MPs tickets are” very pretty priced”.

Andrew Parsons was showing earlier than the Enterprise and Commerce Choose Committee, after followers slammed his firm’s “dynamic pricing” of Oasis reunion-tour tickets final summer time.

The corporate didn’t set ticket costs, which had been determined forward of gross sales, he mentioned.

“The place differing worth tiers [are] made obtainable, that is a alternative of the occasion organiser. Promoting a small quantity of tickets at a higher-priced tier appears pretty affordable.”

Many followers mentioned they’d paid considerably greater than anticipated for tickets to see Oasis – as much as £350 per ticket, about £200 greater than marketed.

However Mr Parsons denied costs fluctuated throughout a basic sale.

“We work carefully with occasion organisers to give you the option promote tickets on the costs that they’ve decided,” he advised the committee.

“There is no technology-driven change to these costs.

“They’re the costs which people have agreed to.

“There’s not a pc or a bot behind it.”

The band themselves had additionally hit out on the system, saying: “It must be made clear that Oasis go away selections on ticketing and pricing solely to their promoters and administration.”

However Mr Parsons advised the committee: “If we’re not capable of [capture] that worth, which the artist is doing in these cases, then that cash is simply going to go, and the tickets are going to be captured and devoured up by touts.”

The MPs didn’t ask in regards to the Oasis sale particularly, as the Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA) is wanting into whether or not Ticketmaster breached consumer-protection legislation.

Ticketmaster’s father or mother firm, Stay Nation, is the world’s greatest reside occasions promoter.

And Charlie Maynard MP urged the CMA, additionally represented on the listening to, to launch a separate investigation into Stay Nation’s “dominant market share”.

However Mr Parsons advised the committee Ticketmaster and Stay Nation “have clear divides between how we function every day” and the UK ticketing market was “as aggressive as any market on the earth”.

Ticketmaster UK additionally criticised the federal government’s proposed 30% cap on the resale of tickets.

Mr Parsons mentioned the corporate was in favour of a cap however “30% nonetheless offers the chance for touts to have the ability to be working a enterprise in that method”.

Tradition Secretary Lisa Nandy introduced plans final month to clamp down on touts who bulk-buy tickets after which resell them for large earnings.