Ticket Scalping on E-Bay???

Factual Questions
1

'ello, Folks.

I friend of mine and I went to buy tickets to a Rush concert that is being performed in our area. Upon contacting Ticketmaster, we discovered, much to our shagrin, that the show was sold out.

But no need to fear!!! We went to the wonderous E-Bay, perhaps the greatest gift mankind has procured from the internet (next to the wonderous Straight Dope, that is), and found that there were, in fact, auctions going on for these tickets.

Now, correct me if I’m wrong: on E-bay, when someone bids the maximum amount of $$ that is required to purchase a given item, the auction ends, and that person wins, right? Well, we found that these auctions were still going, even though it seems as though the face value of the tickets was previously bid. So begs the question…is it legal to auction concert tickets on E-Bay for a price higher than face value? Isn’t privately selling concert tickets through ANY medium for a price higher than face value considered scalping, and therefore illegal?

Thoughts? I think I’ll add the Amish guy here, for flavor…;j

Thanks, Y’all! - Freewill39.

2

I think I can answer this one. In most auctions I’ve seen on ebay for tickets, the ticket in question is sold along with another item. Legally, you’re bidding on both the ticket and the item, so the seller can claim that the ticket itself is being sold for face value. It seems like a shady dodge, but it apparently works, as its quite common. I always get a laugh out of these…“Yankees tickets, and a hat!”, heh.

3

LOL, that’s pretty clever, though fairly underhanded.

These tickets we are looking at don’t have anything attatched to them, just the tix. So am I to understand that they tickets can’t be sold for higher than the face value unless an additional item is included in the bid?:confused:

4

Ticket scalping is legal here. Where do you live?

5

Ebay’s policy on selling Event Tickets