Changes to the state’s current ticket resale law will be one of the items discussed Thursday, June 10, during a meeting of the Regulated Professions Committee of the New Jersey State Assembly.
Currently, ticket resale is legal in the state, but brokers are required to obtain licenses and resales are capped at 50 percent above face value. The proposed legislation, bill A373, removes both the cap and the licensing provision, but instills other requirements to help make the state’s ticket market more transparent and open.
Under the proposal, speculative ticket sales would be prohibited because advertised tickets would have to include the rows and seat numbers. In addition, venues, promoters and primary ticket companies would have to disclose the number of tickets available for an event. The bill also prohibits the use of software “bots,” computer programs designed to procure blocks of tickets quickly and surreptitiously before the general public can access them.
Also, primary ticket companies, such as Live Nation Entertainment’s Ticketmaster division, would be prohibited from shuttling tickets to its secondary ticket company TicketsNow, which had been the subject of a complaint by the state’s former Attorney General against Ticketmaster.
“The bill would prohibit owners, operators, or their agents, from making initial ticket sales to themselves or affiliates. In addition, they would be barred from advertising, selling, or offering to sell, tickets not previously sold through an initial sale,” the bill states in its description.
Assemblymen Gary Schaer and Fred Scalera initially introduced the proposed legislation last year, but no action was taken by the end of that legislative session, so they reintroduced it this year.
Neither assemblyman could be reached for comment.
In separate but related ticketing matters in the state, Gov. Chris Christie recently ended the practice of event tickets being withheld for state officials to buy. The tickets were for events held at the Meadowlands Stadium and other facilities under the direction of the New Jersey Sports & Exposition Authority, and were not initially made available to the public.
