Ticket Touts Found Guilty Of Fraudulent Trading In The U.K.

Two ticket touts from the U.K. were found guilty of fraudulent trading and possessing an article for fraud at Leeds Crown Court on Thursday, Feb. 13.

The touts, which go by the names of Peter Hunter and David Smith, had used multiple identities and bots to circumnavigate the limits placed on the number of tickets one single customer could buy, and used all available secondary ticketing platforms to do so.

According to the Guardian, the touts, who were trading as Ticket Wiz and BZZ, bought £4 million ($5.2 million) worth of tickets and sold them on for £10.8 million ($14 million).

Gigs included shows by Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift as well as London West End Shows like Harry Potter.

Ben Douglas-Jones, the lawyer representing the Hunter, told the court, that “the prosecution’s focus on high-profile, high sought-after events missed the fact that sellers like Hunter (…) provided a valuable service to acts who struggled to sell out venues,” according to a report by LeedsLive.

He made the case that both Ticket Wiz and BZZ were “a trusted and reliable source of tickets,” as proven by “thousands of positive reviews.”

The lawyer said his client was “no more greedy than other businessmen providing a service.”

The prosecution, however, described Hunter and Smith as “dishonest fraudsters motivated by greed,” and the court found them guilty of fraudulent trading and possessing an article for fraud.

Douglas-Jones admitted his client breached the terms and conditions of the primary ticket sellers, but also said that this did not constitute a criminal offence. 

He told the jury, “it was known across the industry that many of the terms and conditions were unenforceable,” according to the LeedLive report.

Adam Webb, campaign manager of the U.K.’s FanFair Alliance, the campaign group against the practice of for-profit ticket resale, commented:

“Today’s verdict shines further light on the murky world of secondary ticketing, and the dependency of websites such as viagogo and StubHub upon large-scale commercial ticket resellers.

“We strongly suspect Peter Hunter and David Smith are not exceptional, and that other suppliers to these sites may also acquire tickets by unlawful means – no questions asked. 

“Given the outcome of this case, it is now urgent that National Trading Standards are resourced to increase the scope of their investigations, and for the Competition & Markets Authority to apply further scrutiny towards the secondary ticketing market overall.” 

The FanFair Alliance offers a whole guide on “How to stop ticket touts with terms and conditions” on its website.

Pollstar reached out to viagogo, which has previously stated publicly that any terms and conditions that restrict resale are not in consumers best interests, are unenforceable, and almost certainly illegal.

The different opinions on the importance of terms and conditions stems from the fact that viagogo interprets a ticket as being a good as opposed to being a license.

A viagogo rep said the company banned both Hunter and Smith from using its service some two years ago, after becoming aware of their fraudulent activity

The statement in full:

“We don’t believe that anyone should be using software to gain an unfair advantage when buying tickets.

 

“Their activity was a clear breach of our user agreement, that strictly prohibits sellers from  selling tickets sourced through criminal means. As soon as we became aware of their fraudulent activity, we removed them from the site immediately. That was approximately two years ago.

 

“We believe greater coordination between the primary and secondary markets along with the proper authorities will enable us to identify this type of fraud early, and ensure it is stopped.”

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