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The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

theleadsports.com

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Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#41

Post by soneca »

mikeash wrote: post #15
whack wrote: post #10

To be fair, the very first section of the StubHub user agreement warns about this scenario: "1. Using StubHub Ticket Marketplace. StubHub is a marketplace that allows users to buy ("Buyers") and sell ("Sellers") tickets, related passes and merchandise or other goods (collectively, the "tickets") for events. As a marketplace, StubHub does not own the tickets on the Site nor does it set prices for tickets. Because sell…

That's just ridiculous. Nobody reads user agreements, everybody knows nobody reads user agreements, and pretty much everybody expects that if you purchase something through a company, that company is responsible for delivering. You can't reasonably set up a marketplace, be the middleman for buying and selling, then throw up your hands and say "sucks to be you" when the product you advertise doesn't get delivered to b…

Not sure you can hold a marketplace to the same standards of a company delivering its own product.

I don't need to reed any user agreement to know that. And Stubhub is clearly a marketplace. I would assume this site is just the same as eBay or Airbnb. I know that are some responsibilities of a marketplace, but I also know that I'm ultimately trusting the other transaction part (not the marketplace).

If I think this risk is too high, I don't use a marketplace (personally, I never bought anything through eBay or equivalents myself precisely because of this).

Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#42

Post by mikeash »

pc86 wrote: post #38
mikeash wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are they set up this way? The purchase should confer ownership at the time of purchase, or within a reasonable time afterwards, in such a way that it is physically impossible for the seller to take back ownership without the cooperation of the buyer.

> in such a way that it is physically impossible for the seller to take back ownership without the cooperation of the buyer. I'm not sure how this is logistically possible without the seller sending SH tickets when he or she wants to sell them, in which case we'd just be reading an article about how SH accidentally sent out $6k in tickets that were never paid for.

Why would you need to send them to SH? It would go like: buyer pays, seller gives buyer tickets. "Give" may mean mailing physical tickets, or an electronic transfer.

It sounds like there are some ticket issuers which make this impossible, but I don't see how giving tickets to SH makes any difference.

Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#43

Post by pc86 »

awakeasleep wrote: post #32

Does anyone know how this compares with Bait & Switch laws? It seems like the merchant's behavior fit the definition perfectly (but im not a lawyer) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bait-and-switch

No, B&S (of which only the seller would be guilty not the marketplace) would be advertising tickets for $900 now but saying "oh they don't exist anymore but here are some for $6,000.

Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#45

Post by hotgoldminer »

mikeash wrote: post #30
hotgoldminer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Age old problem. It is why PayPal exists. Arbitrage on transactions where trust is a problem. SH could warranty to make a comparable ticket available on any consummated transaction - probably they should given the reputational loss they've incurred.

They currently guarantee "comparable replacement tickets or send you a refund." It sounds like in practice they try for the "comparable replacement tickets" first... except that according to them there were none in this case, because all the remaining tickets were really expensive!

Eesh. Comparable replacement tickets refers to a similar seat at the same event - price really isn't a factor. Nice piece of acrobatics on their lawyer's part tho.

Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#47

Post by theseatoms »

Frondo wrote: post #34
theseatoms wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Morally, yes, they should be responsible. But StubHub only has an obligation to act legally, not morally. There should be laws in place to deal with this situation. Maybe there already are?

I would like to offer the controversial response that we all have a responsibility to act morally, all the time. "It was legal" should never be an excuse.

The act of breaking each responsibility differs with regard to consequence. "It was legal" is a perfect legal excuse. But I agree that as consumers we should each voluntarily avoid doing business with immoral business entities. Better yet, we should denounce immoral actors and call public attention to their transgressions.

I realize that this is an idyllic notion, and that it is hard to organize boycotts in practice. But it does happen. Corporations react to public outrage more so than ever these days.

Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#48

Post by QuotedForTruth »

th0br0 wrote: post #21

Looks like "ticketsforless.com" got some great free PR (if they manage to spin the media on this) - from the FB comments: Jason Durbin · VP of Ticket Operations at Tickets For Less Jesse Sandler – I’m the VP of Ticket Operations at Tickets For Less. We’ve reached out to TheLeadSports.com and are trying to contact you. We have four seats for you in section 106 for Kobe’s last home game. Please contact me or our Presid…

Stubhub also said they'll get him to the game. No mention of changing policy so that it doesn't happen again. Next time it wont go viral and they wont have to fix it.

https://twitter.com/StubHub/status/684906796813697024?

Re: The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

#50

Post by herbig »

strommen wrote: post #49

Update: StubHub, via their Twitter account, has promised to get this guy to the Kobe game. https://twitter.com/StubHub/status/684906796813697024

Not good enough. They should also announce how they're going to fix this situation in the future.
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