Ticketmaster & Credit Card question

simu

I recently bought a ticket online with my credit card from Ticketmaster. It was for my brother as he has no card of his own. He later decided he wanted to upgrade the ticket so he got in contact with Ticketmaster to do so. The upgrade cost E30 and the money was taken off my credit card account.

Now, I don't care about this that much because I know he will pay me back but I find it very strange that Ticketmaster would allow such a transaction to take place. They effectively took money from my credit card account without my permission. Is this not dodgy, if not illegal? (My brother does not know my credit card number or sort code so I presume they didn't ask for these before upgrading the ticket).

Random

They "forged" your signature/agreement without your consent. I would get onto them and complain, regardless of whether the outcome was desired or not.

BrianD

I think you are making a mountain of a molehill. Buying a ticket on ticketmaster is a case of "card not present" transaction so no signature is required or needs to be forged. Your brother must have sufficient information about your original booking to allow him access it.

Secondly, the seller is not to know that it is your brother and not you that is making the purchase. You'll probably find that the ticket will arrive addressed to you (I don't recall if TM allow a different delivery name/address to be used). As they ticket is being upgraded and being sent to you the card holder, there is no security implication. As far as the seller is concerned it's you again making the phone call to upgrade the ticket. So in short, you have no grounds for complaint.

However, it would be best practice to ask for the credit card to be re-entered again to pay for the upgrade. I know that Aerlingus.com ask for the card to be re-entered if you amend your booking and extra charges are incurred.

Random

BrianD - This means that anyone who buys a ticket off someone who's paid by credit card can go and upgrade their tickets, at the original buyers expense.

Ticketmaster must ask for autorization (I can't spell that bloody word!) before they charge anything to the credit card, so charging a further e30 to the card without confirming with the cardholder is downright not on.

BrianD

I disagree. Firstly, you are not supposed to allow a third party to use your credit card (although Simu indicates that he himself made the original booking) so Simu has breached his own security from the first point.

Secondly, Simu's brother had sufficient information - booking reference, name address - to allow him to change the booking. He didn't call up and randomly select a booking to amend. He was upgrading a ticket that would be sent to the same person. He was probably posing as his brother and therefore there would have arroused no suspicion. If Simu wanted his transaction to be fully secure and watertight he should have hidden the ticket or booking confirmation from his brother! Simu has no grounds for complaint and in fact he is 100% liable for the charges incurred.

nesf

BrianD wrote:

I disagree. Firstly, you are not supposed to allow a third party to use your credit card (although Simu indicates that he himself made the original booking) so Simu has breached his own security from the first point.

Secondly, Simu's brother had sufficient information - booking reference, name address - to allow him to change the booking. He didn't call up and randomly select a booking to amend. He was upgrading a ticket that would be sent to the same person. He was probably posing as his brother and therefore there would have arroused no suspicion. If Simu wanted his transaction to be fully secure and watertight he should have hidden the ticket or booking confirmation from his brother! Simu has no grounds for complaint and in fact he is 100% liable for the charges incurred.

First off my girlfriend isn't male (Although, to be fair, everyone online is male until proven otherwise)

This isn't a big deal, it is a mountain out of a molehill, but I really do not see where you made all those assumptions from.

Simu booked the ticket, the ticket was in her name, and in fact legally, the ticket was in no way connected to anyone else. She bought the ticket for her brother, but it wasn't bought in his name.

Her brother then took the ticket into a Ticketmaster and asked to upgrade it and they charged simu's credit card for the upgrade.

There was no third party involved, the ticket could be in the hands of anyone, it didn't matter. Her brother wasn't asked for identification but the ticket was upgraded nonetheless.


It's not a huge issue, since it was her brother and he is paying for it anyway so this is really just a topic for discussion. But it did strike me as extremely bad business practice. I'm also pretty sure it's illegal for ticketmaster to do such.

The ticket wasn't addressed to simu's brother that is the issue. If it was in his name then it wouldn't be an issue I agree, but the situation is quite different to that.

BrianD

Well you should have let us the scenario from the outset. The assumption was that the booking was online or by telephone. In this case the upgraded ticket would have gone back to the original address.

If it was a face-to-face sale, Ticketmaster have made a serious error of judgement by allowing the upgrade without representing the credit card. In this case, I would write to TM and express your concern about how this loophole could lead to fraud. I suppose if the ticket was stolen and the receiver upgraded the ticket to a premium seat he would be sitting a numbered seat. People have been ejected from seated events where they held stolen or forged tickets.

The best practice is as I said previously to represent the card unless there is a secure environment.

Random

It seems we all made a different assumption lol

BrianD - I think your middle paragraph summed it up nicely.

simu

BrianD wrote:

If it was a face-to-face sale, Ticketmaster have made a serious error of judgement by allowing the upgrade without representing the credit card. In this case, I would write to TM and express your concern about how this loophole could lead to fraud. I suppose if the ticket was stolen and the receiver upgraded the ticket to a premium seat he would be sitting a numbered seat. People have been ejected from seated events where they held stolen or forged tickets.

It was not a face-to-face sale. My brother contacted them by phone.

nesf

simu wrote:

It was not a face-to-face sale. My brother contacted them by phone.

Ok, now I'm confused.

RainyDay

simu wrote:

He later decided he wanted to upgrade the ticket so he got in contact with Ticketmaster to do so. The upgrade cost E30 and the money was taken off my credit card account.

Can you confirm exactly what you mean by 'upgrade'? Better seats? same venue? same artist?

BrianD

I suggest that you charge your brother an extra €50 administration fee and buy us a round of pre-gig drinks. Make sure he pays cash and upgrades from a pint to a cocktail are welcome.

simu

RainyDay wrote:

Can you confirm exactly what you mean by 'upgrade'? Better seats? same venue? same artist?

Camping ticket rather than a non-camping ticket.