The Cure’s Robert Smith Demands Explanation From Ticketmaster For ‘Weird, Over Priced’ ‘Face Value’ Ticket Fees
Robert Smith still hasn’t found a permanent cure for Ticketmaster’s ill-priced fees. After blasting the company earlier this month for applying exceptionally costly service charges to ticket sales for The Cure‘s upcoming tour, the frontman is now calling out the entertainment giant once again.
This time, the issue comes with the discovery of some tickets labeled by Ticketmaster as being “face value” in spite of the fact that they cost a lot more money than a standard ticket normally would, much less one supposedly charging a minimum amount. “I AM ASKING ABOUT THE WEIRD OVER PRICED ‘FACE VALUE’ TICKETS THAT ARE POPPING UP HERE AND THERE… X,” Smith tweeted on Tuesday (March 28).
For reference, one fan commented on the guitarist’s tweet with a screenshot of two “face value” tickets that cost nearly $1,400. “That’s nuts,” someone else replied to the fan. “I gave almost the same seat for Toronto and paid $160. In USD, that’s around $115!!!”
On Ticketmaster’s website, the face value ticket exchange is defined as “an artist-driven marketplace where fans can sell their tickets to other fans at face value.”
As the band gears up for its first trek in seven years, The Lost World North American Tour, The Cure had hoped to keep seat-buying fair and simple for their fans by opting out of dynamic pricing and shielding against scalpers with non-transferable tickets. But when the sale opened mid-March, customers were disappointed to find that the Ticketmaster had tacked on sky-high fees to tickets that totaled more than the price of the actual tickets themselves.
Afterward, Smith went on a similarly all-caps Twitter rant, writing that he was “AS SICKENED AS YOU ALL ARE BY TODAY’S TICKETMASTER ‘FEES’ DEBACLE” before promising to investigate what went wrong. Soon after, he took to social media again to announce that Ticketmaster would be offering refunds and lower fees.
See Smith’s tweet below.
Hannah Dailey
Billboard
