UK Antitrust Watchdog Launches Probe into Ticketmaster

It’s the Ticketmaster takedown (England’s version). 

This week, tickets for the reunion tour of ‘90s rock band Oasis went on sale in the UK, and some fans found that while they were waiting in the queue, the prices had quietly crept up from £135 ($177) to £350 ($460). On Thursday, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced it was launching a probe into Ticketmaster and its use of “dynamic pricing.”

The Dynamic Duo

Dynamic pricing — when companies raise prices in response to high demand — has become a pretty familiar if frustrating phenomenon for consumers. The classic example would be Uber: Try catching a ride after a major football game, and you’ll notice the fares are just a scooch higher than usual. Airlines also use dynamic pricing for popular flying days.

Exactly which sectors are able to deploy dynamic pricing without stoking backlash is a tricky cultural issue, however. When media outlets reported in February that Wendy’s was gearing up to use dynamic pricing at its restaurants, the chain quickly put out a statement denying the reports to counter the swift consumer backlash. It seems that with the Oasis debacle, Ticketmaster may have just about fallen off the dynamic pricing tightrope:

• A key issue at stake in the CMA’s investigation is whether ticket buyers were aware that the price could change after they got in the digital queue for tickets. On top of that, there’s an issue of whether, once they got through, Ticketmaster pressured them to buy tickets in a certain time frame.
• This isn’t Ticketmaster’s first brush with an antitrust agency. In May, the US Department of Justice sued to break up Ticketmaster’s parent company, Live Nation, accusing it of monopolistic practices.

Bad Blood: Oasis put out a statement blaming Ticketmaster for the fiasco, saying they “at no time had any awareness that dynamic pricing was going to be used.” They’re not the first artists to throw Ticketmaster under the bus. Ahead of her Eras Tour in 2022, which was preceded by chaotic Ticketmaster sales, Taylor Swift put out a statement saying the company had assured her it would be able to handle the demand.