Target: Jill Krimmel, President of StubHub Inc.
Goal: Curb speculative ticketing and limit damages incurred from deceptive practice.
A once-in-a-lifetime experience has turned sour and financially devastating for many hopeful World Cup attendees. Anecdotes abound of individuals paying thousands of dollars for multiple tickets on the StubHub platform, only to have those tickets abruptly canceled, at times mere hours before the events. Although the tickets were reportedly refunded, these families lost thousands more dollars in travel expenses for an event they ultimately could not attend. At least two affected ticket purchasers have filed a class action lawsuit against StubHub.
Most of the incidents have resulted from so-called speculative ticketing, in which sellers who are unverified list tickets for sale that the sellers do not yet possess. If the seller is ultimately unable to secure the tickets, then they will simply opt out of the transaction. StubHub is accepting no blame for these disastrous transactions and has claimed they ban the practice of speculative ticketing, but guidelines against the action remain unclear, and unscrupulous sellers seemingly still populate the platform in large numbers. The football/soccer association StubHub has tried to blame, along with consumer advocates, point the finger back at StubHub. Even sellers who do have tickets have complained of having transactions inexplicably canceled and being levied large fees as a result. Critics allege StubHub is using intimidation and misdirection to avoid responsibility for its own failings.
Sign the petition below to demand this popular resource crack down on harmful practices that are proving costly to consumers.
PETITION LETTER:
Dear Ms. Krimmel,
“I was so sad and so frustrated, and so filled with rage, anger.”
“My son was just devastated. It was a super-sad weekend.”
The aforementioned quotes are representative of the many experiences shared by people who purchased tickets to the World Cup and traveled countless miles (at the cost of many more thousands of dollars) only to be left stranded on game day. StubHub may finger-point. StubHub may shift responsibility for speculative ticketing: a practice that remains rampant on the platform despite StubHub’s claims of a ban. And StubHub may have the financial resources to bury these accusations in a court of law.
But what does “the world’s top destination for ticket buyers and resellers” owe its loyal consumers? It owes them a stringent and vigorous vetting system that assures predatory practices do not have a home on StubHub. It owes them a compensation and alert system for both buyers and sellers that takes into account the many additional expenses incurred for an excursion that never happens. And most of all, it owes them an apology for its shortcomings and a vow that everything will be done to ensure no more once-in-a-lifetime dreams turn into waking nightmares.
Sincerely,
[Your Name Here]
Photo Credit: Grimey821
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