Ticketmaster in unfair practices non shock

Well after the last 7 weeks of gigs I feel without a shadow of a doubt that what we previously thought were unfair practices by Ticketmaster are in fact policy decisions by them.

Firstly Bruce Springsteen played the M.E.N. Arena on 7 May. I bought tickets when they went on sale in Block 109 on the rear stand. Not great but not as bad as they would normally have been as we were told the gig was being played to only a half size arena with the stage being brought forward.

10 days before the gig "extra" seats were released at the sides of the stage in Blocks 103 and 114. I bought four of these and sold the other tickets on backstreets.com.

Then on the day of the gig itself at midday they put Block B Rows B backwards on sale. This was the first time Ticketmaster had sold any more than a handful of tickets for the floor and all previous ones had been mostly rear floors.

So I ate two tickets in Block 103 and upgraded for a third time to the tickets I wanted in the first place. Everyone I spoke to in Blocks A, B & C at the gig had done the same and bought them that afternoon online.

Last week The Eagles played the same Manchester venue for two nights. I decided against going as at £85 I felt it was not worth it. However, at 5pm on the day of the first gig I could have bought Block B Row B from Ticketmaster online. Then at midnight that night I went online and was offered Block B Row A centre. That is front row centre for a gig that has been "sold out" for 5 months!!!

I then tried Billy Joel and was offered Block A Row C for his July gig. Again these seats were not even available the morning the tickets first went on sale in March.

I have just gone online to see what is available for tomorrow night's John Fogerty gig at Hammersmith Odeon. Nothing was available in the stalls on the morning they went on sale in February. I got 4th row seats in the circle instead. Not bad but not what I was looking for. However today I could get Row K in the stalls and anything from 1 to 10 tickets in that row.

In March I was in Chicago and noticed Donald Fagen was playing Chicago Theatre whilst I was there. I could not get anything on the day of sale online apart from the rear of the upper circle / gallery. Over the following 4 weeks I kept checking back and watched the ticets offered to me slowly but surely work there way from back to front gallery. Then down into the circle then to the rear stalls until 7 days before the gig I was offered 10th row centre which I purchased.

These examples confirm to me beyond doubt that Ticketmaster are not selling tickets on the first day or sale, or any other days for that matter, off a genuine level playing field. They appear to be selling all the crap seats first with only a tiny amount of good tickets being released for sale on the first days of sale. This creates a completely false sense of the gig being a hot ticket and therefore making people who are offered poor seats and who might not normally purchase those seats feel they should or it will sell out.

In future I will not buy any tickets from Ticketmaster on the initial day of sale unless they are exactly what I want. I will simply wait until nearer the concert, or the day of the concert itself, to buy front row or front block seats.

This is the only way to react to a company who are intent on pursuing a policy of unfair trading practices on the public.

It is pointless taking this to trading standards, as I have been tempted to do, as Ticketmaster will simply deny this is a firm practice and that tickets come avaialble late on from numerous other sources.

We know this is total bollocks.

Rant over.