I am angry so where do you go when you're mad ~ The Cafe!!!
Today I ordered tickets for the Depeche Mode show that is in July in Virginia.
Since it's not everyday that they come around I did not mind paying the middle level price for tickets. What made me really mad was that Live Nation and the Nissan Pavilion had some unbelievable charges!!! $14.50 for the service fee and a $6 parking fee PER ticket!! I wound up paying $41 in service charges!! I thought that Ticketmaster was the all time rip off king but there is a new king in town!!!!!! ALSO, when I read the Nissan Pavilion site it said that there is very limited parking available and "reasonable" priced parking in the surrounding area. WHAT!?!!?! Thanks for letting me vent.
I hope that LN is not responsible for U2 tickets!!!!!

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Ticketmaster and LiveNation are both ripoffs imo and they are merging...they recently got some bad press over a Springsteen concert tour. Ticketmaster customers couldn't order online due to system issues but oops Ticketmaster was able to reroute customers to LiveNation to buy the tickets at an even higher markup.

Sadly, those large companies seem to have a monopoly on most concert tours...just one reason I haven't been to a concert in years!

We went to see TSO 2 years ago. I had no choice but to order from Ticket Master as the concert was out of state for us. I had 3 different charges charged to me. On top of the cost of the ticket I was charged a 10.00 ticket handling fee, 3.50 on line buying fee and 2.50 print on line fee. total of 16.00 EXTRA dollars per ticket.Since the concert box office closed before we would have been able to get there I had to print out the tickets at home. I thought that was awful to charge a fee for me to print the tickets using my own printer,paper and ink.Needless to say, I now will not go Thur ticket master if all possible.Such a rip off. The handling fee I had no problems with as they do have to make money for offering their service. But to change for printing and a on line buying fee seems unreasonable.

Op I feel your pain. On top of the over price tickets, the travel and fees makes if a very costly night out.
Oh BTW the fees charged to me was 1/2 the ticket price. We had to end up getitng nose bleed seats @ 32.50 each.

These ticket places really piss me off (can I say that? ) What I want to know is whether there is a way to get around all those fees, etc? Can I buy tickets at the venue and not pay those fees? What are my options?

Also, I bought Baltimore Raven's tickets from a link on their website. Unbeknownst to me, I was transfered to a site that was re-selling tickets at a very high markup. Boy was I pissed when the tickets came and the face value was about 1/2 what I paid for them!!


cj/

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I was walking home one night and a guy hammering on a roof called me a paranoid little weirdo. In morse code. -Emo Phillips

Most places do offer a box office to buy tickets. But they close anywhere from 10-15-20- to 30 Min's after the start of the show.Not a wise move to make if you have to travel out of town or state in hopes to buy the tickets w/o fees. In our case this was a value point. We got lost for over an hour trying to find the place. we arrived 3 Min's before the start of the concert. The box off closed 5 Min's after the start. Depending on whoms watch you are going by we might have been 3 Min's to later to pick the tickets up. With buying tickets at the venue you can buy them a few days to a few weeks in advance to the show at times the box office is open to sell. If you find a show you want to attend call the host site to see if they offer tickets you can buy before and during the show.

I am definitely showing my age, but one of my first concerts in 1978 cost around $12.00 to go see E.L.O. Ticket prices have have come a long way since then. Ticketmaster totally monopolizes this market, which is not right. If you want to completely avoid Ticketmaster, can you go directly to the venue and buy? Otherwise, it's a gamble, but you can try to score a ticket on Craigslist. This past summer, I got two tickets to Journey/Heart/CheapTrick on Craigslist and saved some money.

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I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it!

Oh BTW I forgot about stub hub till I logged in my yahoo account to check my emails. Stub hub sent me a update on concerts , events coming up. I did a search on fees heres what stub hub charges.

What are the fees for buying tickets and what do they cover?
A:
We will show you your order total before you place the order or bid on tickets. The total amount of your StubHub ticket purchase equals:

• The full price of the tickets (or, for auction-style sales, the full amount of your winning bid), plus
• A service fee equal to 10% ($5 minimum per order) of the full ticket price (or winning bid amount), and
• A delivery fee (per order)
  • Shipping Services: $11.95 to $24.95 (depending upon where your tickets are being shipped and the shipping option you choose)
  • eDelivery Services: $4.95
  • Last Minute Services: $15.00