Rockfest organizer Ron Heyrend said that he doesn’t have the funds to refund ticket holders after the festival was cancelled late last month.

Idaho’s Rockfest was cancelled two weeks ago after Heyrend was sued by a Tennessee entertainment agency for not paying a broker’s fee. Todd Hutchison of Hutch Entertainment filed a lawsuit against Heyrend of EKR Entertainment and Productions Inc. since Heyrend owed the agency a 15 percent broker’s fee for connecting him to multiple artists scheduled to perform at the festival.

Heyrend now owes the company $25,163, and on top of that, he must refund all of the ticket holders who originally bought tickets to the show. The would-be concertgoers were told that they would be refunded in 24 to 48 hours, per a Facebook post. When the 48 hours passed and many ticket holders were not refunded, Heyrend said that he was waiting for a refund from the contractor and intends to refund the remaining tickets.

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However, according to Post Register, he does not have the money to refund the remaining tickets at this time. He told the Post that he did not know how many ticket holders still needed to be refunded, but has the number of total tickets sold listed in documents. While customers are contacting him about refunds, he said he’s unsure how refunds were determined since there had been no plan in place before the concert was cancelled.

“It was never supposed to be refunded,” Heyrend said.

Ticketholders are not happy with the situation. One concertgoer, Angela Olaveson, told the Post that she bought two tickets totaling $159.79 and has not been refunded yet, noting that “it sure sounds like the ticket holders will be getting the raw end of this scam.”

Heyrend released the following statement via Facebook:

“The Idaho Rockfest refund recovery is still underway. We have now turned this completely into a legal issue with a contractor who is withholding a large amount of funds. We are as frustrated as you. It doesn’t make sense because he will have to refund it. We have been extremely transparent, making all anouncements public on radio and TV. We have money that’s being withheld as well. We are sincerely sorry for this issue. The site is being monitored for abuse, hacking, and inflammatory comments. Please just be patient with us. This was as big of a shock to us as anyone. This will be rectified. Again we are very apologetic for everything we have all suffered from. We will keep everyone up to date as the process moves forward. Thank you.”

“I’m doing everything I can to get this sorted out,” Heyrend told the Post. “It was supposed to be a fun time.”

Heyrend said that he never intended to scam anyone and since the cancellation, he’s been speaking to lawyers to get everything figured out.

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