Los Angeles – In response to consumer complaints, Ticketmaster (NASD: TKTM)
plans to begin listing the "convenience" and other fees added to base
ticket prices on its website for consumers earlier in their transactions.
"We get it — you don’t like service fees," the company said in a
blog post, in response to the results of a consumer survey.
"You don’t like
them mostly because you don’t understand what the heck they are for. We’ll try
to do a better job in this space over the coming months of helping you
understand our business, and how our fees compare to others in the industry
(both in ticketing and e-commerce in general)."
The move stops short of
"all in" pricing, where all extra fees are included in the listed
price, and as Wired.com notes, does not itemize where proceeds from various
fees will end up.
"Most of the parties in the live event value chain
participate in these service fees either directly or indirectly — promoters,
venues, teams, artists, and yes, ticketing companies — and service fee rebates
are our largest annual expense at Ticketmaster," the company added.
Related Links:
http://blog.ticketmaster.com/2010/08/23/first-things-first/
http://tinyurl.com/2avbbhk
(Wired.com)
