New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram added two New Jersey ticket brokers to the list of three companies her office is suing for fraud for their part in allegedly selling tickets to Bruce Springsteen’s fall concerts at Giants Stadium before tickets were publicly available. The original lawsuit named TicketNews’s parent company TicketNetwork, Orbitz’s Cheaptickets.com and Riverdale, NJ-based Select-A-Ticket.
Named in the new lawsuits were Fort Lee, NJ-based Ticket Town, Inc., also known as NortheastTickets.com, and a Vauxhall, NJ-based ticket company called Almost Backstage Inc., which supposedly sells tickets from the Web site abtickets.com. However, that Web address goes directly to a California-based ticket broker who is not involved in the lawsuit, Al Brooks Tickets. Another Web site, abstickets.com, goes directly to Google, and a third site, abstixs.com, takes visitors to Almost BackStage, but a spokesperson for the company declined to comment.
A person who answered the phone at Ticket Town today also declined to comment. While the two are separate companies, both have listed tickets on TicketNetwork’s online exchange.
“Selling something that you don’t have and ultimately might not be able to provide to the purchaser is fraud,” Attorney General Milgram said in a statement. “Our investigation into the ticket sales industry, and how these sellers can advertise and sell tickets before the tickets actually go on sale to the public, is widening.”
Also known as speculative ticket sales, or “spec selling,” the practice of brokers selling tickets before they have them in hand has been a widely accepted staple of the secondary ticket market for several years, and while it has not necessarily sought to end the practice, the National Association of Ticket Brokers has instituted stiff guarantee rules of its members to help protect consumers in the event of a busted ticket order. Tickets to the two fall Springsteen shows went on sale to the general public today, June 1.
Milgram is accusing all five of the companies of violating New Jersey’s Consumer Fraud Act and Advertising Regulations, even though in each case the orders were not busted. The other companies initially sued are denying any wrongdoing.
Last week, both Ticket Town and Almost BackStage allegedly offered dozens of tickets for sale to the upcoming shows, for prices above face value, and went so far as to list specific seats and rows even though the tickets were not yet available, according to Milgram’s office.
“These firms cannot offer to sell specific seats that haven’t gone on sale and will not actually be available for purchase until June 1. We will continue to dig deeper into the working of ticket sales industry and stop fraudulent activity,” David Szuchman, New Jersey’s Consumer Affairs Director, said in a statement.
Controversy has surrounded sales of Springsteen tickets since February when Ticketmaster and its TicketsNow subsidiary allegedly redirected customers from face value tickets to higher priced ones. The pair has since been sued several times by customers, and Milgram settled several complaints with the companies, though they did not admit to any wrongdoing.
In addition, thousands of tickets were allegedly withheld from the public for recent Springsteen New Jersey shows, which made it difficult for some fans to obtain tickets.
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Yes thats very true I was just naming a few there more for sure a lot on the west coast
add anytickets.com to the mix of having a spinner or two in their arsenal as they ALWAYS have FRONTS!!!
Name them on the west coast since you like to lay blame on them.
wow, can springsteen just retire already? Look at the prices of 90% of his shows , they are WAYYYY under face value … the secondary ticket market helps fill his venues, otherwise his true fans wouldn’t have enough money to pay $110+fees to sit in nose bleeds.
Hey senator, how about focusing on the housing crisis or economy? As I see it, ticket brokers stimulate the economy …. you get rid of the secondary ticketmarket, and guess what? The only benefits go to TicketMaster and the artist themselves, nice, the rich get richer. The consumers will never get a good seat unless they buy it direct from Ticketmaster at 10x face value from their “VIP” experience packages. What a crock.
What about Chavet? Is chavet going to get sued?
What about Razorgator.com
what’s wrong with it? if they listed a specific sec/row but added disclaimers that warned the buyer about potential upgrades to a lower row # i don’t see what’s wrong with that either. if they took the money and never intended to deliver the tickets, then sure it’s fraud. please stop wasting our tax $s prosecuting something trivial.
I think something needs to be seriously done to the brokers who use spinners it is usually all the same brokers that have fronts First15events(aka The ticket liquidator)look at Phish in CT. Cheaponlinetickets.com, Averytickets, VIPticketsource, Theatron events just to name a few of the brokers that usually always have fronts all over the country
My husband purchased tickets online from Anytickets.com for Tyler Perry Play. Anytickets charged him 420.92. The breakdown was 172.00*2 tickets, 30.96 *2 service fee, and 15.00 standard delivery. It gave us seat numbers and everything. However, when I went to Ticketmaster to get the actual price of the tickets, they were only 45-65.00 in price range. Unfortunately, there is nothing that can be done at this point, and I just pray we receive the tickets in time and actually have great seats, as the picture they provided him of the coliseum is not even updated. And today, they send us an email stating the tickets have been mailed and it is saying it is being sent from CoasttoCoast tickets.com. BE CAREFUL!!!