Too sick to attend, too bad: why the live music ticketing market is broken

I recently had an urgent surgery to have a malignant growth removed. Unfortunately, this meant I was too immobile to attend the Melbourne event of the annual hard rock festival Good Things, this year headlined by the greatest band of all time, Tool.

I explained my situation to OzTix, Good Things’ ticketing provider, and requested a refund for two tickets – but was denied on the grounds I hadn’t purchased “refund protection”.

I was then directed to a resale platform, Twickets, which only allows resale at the initial cost price. This is a poor option for tickets to events that are yet to sell out, as buyers can simply buy from the primary vendor at the same price point.

Disappointed, the experience got me thinking about the considerable consolidation of the Australian ticketing market, and the addition of “refund protection” as an extra cost.

It’s not just fans who suffer. The lack of competition in this market is negatively impacting artists and promoters alike.

No right to a refund

As event tickets became digitised throughout the 2000s, companies in Australia and overseas started to integrate “refund protection” as an optional purchase at the point of sale.

This additional cost was adopted by the Australian market wholesale during the pandemic. With lockdown-related uncertainty plaguing the events sector, ticketing providers needed to mitigate liability for cancellations and no-shows.

Much of this liability has been passed onto consumers. Most providers no longer bother with robust or discretionary refund policies, no matter how severe the circumstances.

And consumer law only protects consumers if an event is cancelled or postponed – not if they’re unable to attend. If refund protection isn’t purchased, providers are off the hook, even in the event of death.

This approach is a choice, just as it is a choice for airlines to offer refunds or compassionate fares in extenuating circumstances such as a medical emergency.

Refund protection is often costly. It scales with the price of the ticket, becoming more expensive as the cost price increases. And it can only be purchased at the point of sale, which is often six to twelve months before an event. All of this amounts to a form of price-gouging that’s not dissimilar to hidden add-ons used by budget airlines.

Resale platforms blocked

Many consumers might forgo purchasing refund protection with the confidence that, if they can no longer attend, they can resell their tickets for cheap (to increase the chances of sale) on a legitimate resale platform such as Tixel.

However, the Good Things festival blocked the resale of tickets on Tixel this year, limiting resale to Twickets at the original cost price.

In such cases, fans with unwanted tickets may turn to unregulated channels such as social media. This increases the risk of scams, adding further uncertainty to the equation.

The live music sector is already struggling. Blocking off a legitimate resale platform could reduce consumers’ confidence in the sector, and may make them hesitant to secure early tickets in future.

Market consolidation

All of this has a lot to do with the relative consolidation of Australia’s ticketing market. The sector is dominated by two major operators, Ticketek and Ticketmaster, owned respectively by multinationals TEG and Live Nation.

This duopoly was further solidified in 2019, when Ticketmaster purchased Australian company Moshtix. Today, only Oztix remains as the primary independent operator in Australia.

A handful of smaller companies offer bespoke ticketing services, such as Eventbrite, Humanitix and TryBooking – but they are yet to crack the live music market in the same way.

Australia’s ticketing market stands in stark contrast to the United Kingdom and Europe, where dozens of ticketing providers compete for business (often in smaller markets such as Denmark and Ireland).

In research conducted during my recent Churchill Fellowship, I spoke to 100 venue operators, promoters and music industry professionals across the UK and Europe. Each had a choice of multiple ticketing services to work with.

This level of competition produces a healthier market for artists, fans and promoters.

For fans, it could mean less hidden fees, more robust refund policies, and reduced prices as fewer costs are passed on.

For promoters, it allows access to more competitive rates and a diversity of back-of-house services. For instance, Dutch company Stager is not only a ticketing platform, but also handles marketing and event management.

And for artists, more competition means potentially less chokepoints between them and fans, as well as greater control over this relationship, potentially reducing the ability of intermediaries (such as ticketing companies and promoters) to squeeze transactions for unnecessary profits and audience data, an increasingly important asset.

Read more: Chokepoint Capitalism: why we'll all lose unless we stop Amazon, Spotify and other platforms squeezing cash from creators

Dealing with anti-competitive practices

The government has already taken action to crack down on dynamic pricing for concert tickets. It should go further.

Encouraging new market entrants could help boost competition. New entrants have failed to break in since ticketing, like much of Australia’s music industry, has been locked up through a series of handshake deals, personal relationships and decades-long contracts.

In 2019, UK-based operator DICE attempted to enter the market, but the pandemic and other factors stymied its efforts.

Australia also suffers from a lack of anti-trust laws, which would be relevant in the case of Live Nation, TEG, and their vertical integration of ticketing.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) could be doing more to investigate anti-competitive practices, such as the blocking of legitimate resale sites such as Tixel.

And if new entrants aren’t able to make an impact in a market of almost 28 million people, the ACCC should be asking why – and what can be done about it.

The Conversation reached out to OzTix for comment, but it did not reply within the allocated timeframe.