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The Surreal Story of StubHub Screwing Over a Kobe Fan

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

#81

Post by Dylan16807 »

GigabyteCoin wrote: post #74
mbcrower wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on the customer service emails it looks like StubHub knew full well what was going on and aided the seller in pulling out of the agreement.

Of course they knew what was going on. A seller "made a mistake" in listing the tickets, thus the tickets didn't actually exist in StubHub's eyes and they were forced to cancel the transaction. It is impossible to know if the seller is telling the truth in this situation or not. Everybody makes mistakes, this seller just claims to have made a more costly one than usual. StubHub is a marketplace, they can't investigat…

>It is impossible to know if the seller is telling the truth in this situation or not. Everybody makes mistakes

When the reason given for the 'mistake' is obviously false, it's not impossible.

>they can't investigate every time somebody claims to have made a mistake in listing their tickets

They certainly can investigate every case of purchases in the $900+ range. You know, as part of their multiple hundreds of dollars in fees.

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

#82

Post by eli »

joshuaheard wrote: post #44

That's clearly a breach of contract. The buyer could sue the seller for damages.

The buyer already got their money back, so what is the damage?

Sure if the buyer booked a nonrefundable plane ticket in anticipation of going to the game, that would be something. Absent something like that, I'm not sure there's a case.

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

#83

Post by kentt »

The is normal for stubhub. Here's an article from last where the same thing happened to a friend of mine: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/super-bowl-ti...

tldr, bought tickets for Superbowl, prices went up, order was cancelled, was refunded and given credit which would not cover the cost of the increased cost of tickets. Then repeated the same thing with another reseller.

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

#84

Post by etherealmachine »

eli wrote: post #80
bradleyjg wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does Stubhub release the sellers information to the buyer? It looks to me like the buyer has a claim in contract against the seller for $5100. That's within the small claim limit in California.

IANAL, but I think you'd have a hard time convincing a judge of that math.

Curious - why do you think that? The seller obviously sold the tickets for a higher price, and can be forced to give the buyer the price difference, allowing the buyer to buy new tickets at the new price, fulfilling the purpose of the original contract. Why do you think a judge would disagree?

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

#85

Post by michaelt »

QuotedForTruth wrote: post #39
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…

They also have the following policy for sellers: "If your tickets have sold but you cannot fulfill the order (also referred to as 'dropping a sale' or a 'dropped sale'), StubHub may charge your payment method an amount equal to 20% of the price of the ticket sold to compensate us for the losses we incur to meet our obligations under the FanProtectTM Guarantee. In some cases involving dropped sales that result in unus…

  They have given themselves the ability to make this right
  and go after the seller for the costs of it, but they are
  choosing not to, screwing the buyer instead.
You're right in general, but just to nitpick: If there are only 100 real tickets to an event, and 110 tickets have been promised by StubHub, 10 customers will go without tickets regardless of StubHub's willingness to pay the market rate for extra tickets.

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

#86

Post by karzeem »

hotgoldminer wrote: post #6
ascagnel_ wrote: post #3

The better question is why SH allows sellers to cancel complete orders where payment has already been taken. Frankly, it's ridiculous that the seller had any input a month after the order was marked as confirmed, and I can only assume that payment was taken if SH was willing to issue a nearly $1,000 credit.

SH has no mechanism to ensure delivery of the ticket. The seller holds the ticket, so how can SH compel them to hand it over - short of not releasing the buyer's payment to the seller. Short being the operative word. SH is running a speculative marketplace against n% insurance fee on unfulfilled sales.

They could charge sellers the greater of the purchase price or the market price of the ticket at the time of cancellation.

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

#87

Post by Dylan16807 »

mikeash wrote: post #59
QuotedForTruth wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would be fine if they weren't advertising a "Fan Protect Guarantee." They are offering additional safe guards or at least the appearance of them to encourage buyers to take on that risk. It is extremely shady when they then don't follow through.

They technically did follow through. Their guarantee is to provide comparable tickets or a refund. Comparable tickets were not available (because their idea of "comparable" includes "at the same price," ha ha ha) and they provided a refund.

They did not follow through on actually protecting the fans, just restoring the original money. They are presenting the appearance that they will ensure the purchase, while the terms actually promise no such thing.

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

#89

Post by Dylan16807 »

strommen wrote: post #61
golergka wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did the promise not to cancel orders that they received the payment for in the future?

How could they possibly make that promise? They don't own the tickets, and they're not really selling them. They're facilitating a transaction between two parties.

They could stop making it profitable to cancel to the point of assisting in the cancel, at the very least. They could threaten to sue by themselves when the seller breaches contract on a major purchase. They could improve their guarantee.

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

#90

Post by encoderer »

michaelt wrote: post #85
QuotedForTruth wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also have the following policy for sellers: "If your tickets have sold but you cannot fulfill the order (also referred to as 'dropping a sale' or a 'dropped sale'), StubHub may charge your payment method an amount equal to 20% of the price of the ticket sold to compensate us for the losses we incur to meet our obligations under the FanProtectTM Guarantee. In some cases involving dropped sales that result in unus…

They have given themselves the ability to make this right and go after the seller for the costs of it, but they are choosing not to, screwing the buyer instead. You're right in general, but just to nitpick: If there are only 100 real tickets to an event, and 110 tickets have been promised by StubHub, 10 customers will go without tickets regardless of StubHub's willingness to pay the market rate for extra tickets.

In practice this is not how markets work. More tickets become available, even if just arb from earlier buyers, as the price increases. And regardless it's not what happened here.
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