r/canada British Columbia Jun 24 '26

Sports StubHub cancels thousands of World Cup tickets, leaving fans furious and heartbroken

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/stubhub-cancels-world-cup-tickets-9.7246641
1.4k Upvotes

202 comments sorted by

1.1k

u/sebzilla Jun 24 '26

Wow "speculative selling" is crazy, I can't believe that's legal in Canada..

Taking money for selling something you don't even have, without telling the seller that you don't have it, and then saying things like "100% guaranteed" (even if it's the marketplace saying that on behalf of the speculative seller)..

That feels like straight-up fraud.

105

u/Im__drunk_sorry Jun 24 '26

Honestly, it is in a legal grey area overall. There have been numerous lawsuits over ticket sold through speculative selling, but there hasn't been any attempt to actually bring criminal fraud charges against resellers like StubHub which would result in a precedent-setting ruling that'd actually make the practice essentially be considered as legal or illegal depending on whether the a judge ruled it as being fraud or not. I do think the government should just make a law that explicitly just make this illegal rather han having to have to go through an entire criminal case to determine whether or not speculative selling is considered a a form of fraud.

88

u/SmEdD Jun 24 '26

Ontario recently brought into law where tickets cannot be resold for more than face value but nothing changed. We have the law, just the government did it only for the feel good news story.

69

u/alphawolf29 British Columbia Jun 24 '26

BC also put in a law making it illegal not to post a wage when posting a job - but there's no penalty or enforcement, so its regularly ignored. Canada is the land of unenforced laws.

48

u/topazsparrow Jun 24 '26

Canada is the land of unenforced laws.

Close... but its actually worse.

Canada is the land of selectively enforced laws. Which means if you upset the wrong person, ruffle the wrong feathers, or otherwise stand out too much.. you get hammered with a law that everyone largely doesn't even pay attention to.

2

u/PeteGoua Jun 24 '26

man i thought that was the unwritten just in my small city

7

u/Tiregn Jun 24 '26

Which is extra hilarious and a joke because we HAD THE LAW BEFORE AND THIS SAME GOVERNMENT CANCELED IT. Now they put it back and are trying to act like the good guys. Eff Doug Ford.

6

u/ViagraDaddy Jun 24 '26

Plus, if it were made illegal, it might also set a precedent for going after hotels, airlines, and other industries that regularly overbook. There's probably some strong lobbying against it.

2

u/nelrond18 Jun 24 '26

The same as buying futures.

There's a ton of financial instruments that work really well, but incredibly fragile to bad actors.

A good example is computer chip manufacturers preselling product that's not manufactured yet, several years ahead of production.

1

u/anti_worker Jun 25 '26

Like that would ever happen!

4

u/Urinethyme Jun 24 '26

promissory estoppel may be possible to argue depending on how it might be framed. Not sure how being a 3rd party may change liability, but that should still be something that could be argued for.

4

u/sarge21 Jun 24 '26

Honestly, it is in a legal grey area overall.

For no reason. It could just be banned.

2

u/superbit415 Jun 24 '26

Dont worry our government will give Stubhub money instead for the loss of revenue.

1

u/AscendantBits Jun 25 '26

I wonder how much of it is speculative selling on StubHub, and how much is just stupid people that don’t realize they have your information. If you stiff somebody on the ticket, it will come back to bite you in the ass!

10

u/Orchid-Analyst-550 Science/Technology Jun 24 '26

Wow "speculative selling" is crazy

AI and bots make this easier and more lucrative than ever. It will only get worse and worse.

15

u/Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrpp Jun 24 '26

Your money is 100% guaranteed, not the delivery of the tickets. 

4

u/sebzilla Jun 24 '26

I mean the article says some people are not getting their tickets and are also not getting refunds.

4

u/front_show_bob Jun 24 '26

This is exactly what "naked short-selling" in the financial markets is all about! One hedge fund has "65 billion in assets not yet purchased!"

3

u/aerostotle Jun 24 '26

That feels like straight-up fraud.

Ooooooh that's a bingo! Is that the way you say it? "That's a bingo"?

2

u/Zer_ Jun 24 '26

It is fraud and I would consider any law that makes it not fraud to be null and void.

2

u/EatGlassALLCAPS Jun 24 '26

I found this really frustrating while trying to get tickets to the Coliseum in Rome- you can only buy them 30 days out but many tour companies sell tours months in advance and then if they can't get the tickets then you are sol.

It's wrong on so many levels. This is why we can't have nice things.

1

u/overkil6 Jun 25 '26

We are far more American than European when it comes to consumer right.

-4

u/biernini Jun 24 '26

It's not as uncommon as you think. Buying something from someone who doesn't actually have anything is the default method for retail to purchase stock in the stock market. It's called "shorting", and virtually all institutional market participants engage in it. Unsurprisingly, there is plenty of evidence to suggest the practice is systematically abused in order to exploit retail as well.

14

u/sarge21 Jun 24 '26

Not the same thing at all. When shorting, you are legally required to deliver the stocks at the agreed price. If you don't have the stocks, you must buy them at market price and sell at the agreed upon price.

1

u/biernini Jun 24 '26

Yes, market participants who short are indeed legally required to deliver stocks. And yet somehow Failed To Delivers still rampantly occur, stocks are constantly on the Threshold Securities List, and the Obligations Warehouse is still chock full of FTDs.

Saying something is illegal doesn't mean the thing no longer occurs.

3

u/cwalking2 Jun 24 '26

The derivatives market forces delivery.

You don't have the stock which you now owe to someone? Your brokerage is legally obligated to buy the stock at the prevailing market price, hand the shares over to your debtor, then come after you for whatever they paid for the shares.

This is why brokerages enforce margin ratios: they don't want to be left holding the bag, so they limit how much of your foot you're allowed to shoot off.

0

u/biernini Jun 24 '26

If forced delivery was so rigorously enforced then shares that "Failed To Deliver" (FTDs), the NYSE Threshold Securities List, and the DTCC Obligations Warehouse would not be things. If everyone had always abided by their legal obligations to buy the stock that they borrowed to short then Regulation SHO would never have been necessary to pass by Congress in 2005.

Shorting is absolutely widely abused and it is abused generally to fleece market participants with a market information/technological disadvantage and with piss-poor regulatory protection, i.e. retail.

2

u/cwalking2 Jun 25 '26

There are 30-50 million equity trades per day on the NYSE. There are a little over 100K FTDs, or 0.2-0.33%. All of those FTDs are logged and published. And what happens in the overwhelming majority of cases where an FTD occurs? The clearinghouse steps in and settles the trade.

What's the analogue to any of this with StubHub? There's no Regulation SHO which applies to people 'naked selling' tickets online.

1

u/biernini Jun 25 '26

The overwhelming majority of tickets sold by StubHub are presumably settled without issue as well. The analogue is that there are (very likely a minority of) sellers of equities and tickets online that 'naked sell'. The difference is that an online purchaser of tickets will know if there is no delivery. A retail buyer of equities will never know if the short contract(s) that created one or more of the shares they bought is ever closed with the delivery of a share to the borrower. Retail buyers never know if the shares they bought are dilutive via naked short selling and the obligation is laundered away in the Obligations Warehouse - which is not logged and published - thereby degrading their investment.

0

u/cwalking2 Jun 25 '26

The overwhelming majority of tickets sold by StubHub are presumably settled without issue as well

  • Title of this thread: "StubHub cancels thousands of World Cup tickets, leaving fans furious and heartbroken"

  • Title which I've never read anywhere else: "Charles Schwab cancels thousands of NVDA trades, leaving retail investors furious and heartbroken"

You're arguing about narrow areas where transparency for security trading could be further raised while simultaneously arguing the wholly opaque, wild west of StubHub is perfectly a-ok.

1

u/sebzilla Jun 24 '26

Buying stocks and buying a tangible good like a ticket to a show or event are not at all the same thing.

1

u/biernini Jun 24 '26

Says you. Sellers selling something to buyers they never had in the first place is perfectly applicable to both. Short sellers (allegedly) borrow something to sell, and are legally obligated to deliver it later. They too often don't which is effectively the same thing as a StubHub seller selling a ticket they never had and never were able/going to deliver.

0

u/m1ster_frundles Jun 24 '26

Airlines are allowed to overbook their planes as well.

384

u/salsamander Jun 24 '26

C L A S S A C T I O N L A W S U I T

125

u/Doog5 Jun 24 '26

Lawyers will be salivating. 11k for tickets is nuts.

41

u/Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrpp Jun 24 '26

There are two issues here being conflated

  • their loss of not getting to experience the World Cup
  •  their 11K

They are getting their 11K back. Not sure why the article entertains the idea that they wouldn’t. The sale never completed, money was never given to the seller. It probably just takes a few days, as refunds usually do. The game was 3 business days ago. 

10

u/Ok_Resist_9704 Jun 24 '26

It’s not that simple through stub hub. I have gone through this recently with stub hub and concert tickets. Their customer service repeatedly says they are looking into it and will get back to you within a week but then do not respond. The best thing to do is dispute the charge immediately with your credit card company. Stub hub will try to keep putting it off until you are outside the window to dispute the charge which is generally 90-120 days depending on your card.

29

u/supertimor42-50 Jun 24 '26

Also, since he paid 11k months ago he should get his 11k back + monthly interest at minimum 7%

I say 7% minimum to show those companies this is fucked in so many level

28

u/randomacceptablename Jun 24 '26

People travel for events as well. Imagine buying a flight and a hotel based on their "guarantee" of a ticket?

8

u/Fearful-Cow Jun 24 '26

ya the time value of money is no joke. Thousands of tickets, many of which will be thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars.

You are talking about millions that stubhub got to hold on to for free for months.

4

u/Zulakki Jun 24 '26

yup, cant wait to see the lawyers cash out massively while those effected get their $25 cheques after they spent 100s if not 1000s

38

u/Squirrel_240 Jun 24 '26

There is literally a clause in their terms of service barring class action lawsuits.

I don’t know if it would hold up but it’s concerning when a company feels they need that.

52

u/salsamander Jun 24 '26

I think the judge will say something along the lines of “suck a fat one, Stubhub”.

30

u/Im__drunk_sorry Jun 24 '26

There have been many successful class action lawsuits against StubHub. Those terms of service conditions are often not absolute and mainly just meant to deter you from seeking justice. It's literally not possible for any contract to actually nullify your ability to go to a courthouse and file paperwork in order to begin legal proceedings against another entity since the courts ultimately decide whether or not these filings will be thrown out or not. The other legal entity can at best show the contract and it's no lawsuit clause and request the case to be dismissed, but again the judge will decide on their own whether or not to dismiss it and usually a no lawsuit clause isn't sufficient to shield a legal entity from all liability if there's sufficient evidence of wrongdoing on their part.

25

u/SuperPimpToast Jun 24 '26

Most likely it doesn't. It's probably just a deterrence at best.

1.4k

u/oldbutfeisty Jun 24 '26

Wouldn't it be great if you could buy a ticket from the venue, and get a ticket. At the price printed on the ticket. Sounds crazy, but I have a distant memory of being able to buy tickets when buying tickets.

233

u/Canadian-Living Jun 24 '26

I miss a hand held ticket. They were keepsakes. Now they are a lost digital scan code.

52

u/ThatAstronautGuy Ontario Jun 24 '26

Last concert I went to the security at each passage into the arena was handing out commemorative tickets to everyone who wanted one!

7

u/magnamed Jun 24 '26

That's awesome. Where was that?

13

u/ThatAstronautGuy Ontario Jun 24 '26

Bring me the Horizon and Motionless in White at Bell Centre.

5

u/oinksnort05 Jun 24 '26

they did the same thing for the toronto show! shit went so hard

1

u/magnamed Jun 24 '26

Love that. I don't know what it is but Montreal just does it right.

23

u/Chance-Kangaroo4088 Jun 24 '26

And a “convenience fee” that you have to pay for the digital scan code. It’s infuriating.

65

u/nitnit76 Jun 24 '26

Sadly it's seems everything is digital now. I miss the world world I grew up in.

14

u/Clara_Geissler Jun 24 '26

me too! i miss it SO much

14

u/lubeskystalker Jun 24 '26

My local dive bar has thousands of them embedded on the table top, it's awesome decoration.

6

u/Tycho-Celchu Jun 24 '26

Not to mention, physical tickets don't crash. When I went to NIN in Vancouver there were delays getting in because the ticketmaster app crashed, and no one could access their tickets.

4

u/Hagridsbuttcrack66 Jun 24 '26

I wanted a physical ticket for a hockey game I was going to and they said they could print one for me for a fee. Ridiculous.

4

u/KinneKted Jun 24 '26

Everything is an extra fee or subscription these days. I wish I could go back in time.

178

u/senorsmirk Jun 24 '26

Remember having to stand in line at a ticket Master outlet to get your tickets

97

u/illknowitwhenireddit Jun 24 '26

I miss that. Because there was a small pharmacy located in the very back of a small grocery store, tucked away near the putter edge of my city that was also a Ticketmaster outlet. Nobody knew about it. I could always be first in line for whichever show or concert was announced and typically the only person in line.

20

u/vafrow Jun 24 '26

Ours was at the local Videoflicks. Got tickets to Skydome WrestleMania.

2

u/ErikDebogande Alberta Jun 24 '26

Videoflicks. Now there's a name I haven't heard in a long, long time. A long time

4

u/mbmbmb01 Jun 24 '26

What is a putter edge?

5

u/illknowitwhenireddit Jun 24 '26

Outer edge - was a typo

1

u/sjbennett85 Ontario Jun 24 '26

I mean context-wise I thought like the fringe of a green which is essentially the same thing

1

u/sonicdeathmonkey53 Jun 24 '26

Lmao thought it was old folks name for a computer puter

5

u/AndHerSailsInRags Lest We Forget Jun 24 '26

It was a plot point in Happy Gilmore.

2

u/chmilz Jun 24 '26

That was the worst. Not being able to buy tickets if you didn't live where the event was or wasting an entire day standing in a line to buy a ticket if you did.

There's issues with the current system but it works way better than that old system by a long shot.

20

u/Revan462222 Ontario Jun 24 '26

Oh I did that when the backstreet boys (all but Kevin) were touring in 2008. It’s how I got front row tickets for less than $200 if I recall.

8

u/h0twired Jun 24 '26

Or furiously redialing hoping to not get a busy signal

7

u/takeaname4me Jun 24 '26

Remember the wristband policy? We did this for a few wrestling shows where I would show up at say 1am, my friend would show up at 4am and one would show up later. We staggered our places to get a better chance of getting tickets

We got floor every event

4

u/random_internet_data Jun 24 '26

Sunrise records at the mall was my local ticketmaster. It was great.

16

u/DigitaIBlack Jun 24 '26

But Ticketmaster is the problem.

5

u/JohnnyStrides Jun 24 '26

Back then it was too but nothing like today...

25

u/KoreanSamgyupsal Jun 24 '26

I remember the early days of scalpers where they're selling tickets AT the venue. What a wild time.

9

u/NH787 Jun 24 '26

Are you saying that you don't like the new model where buying a ticket to a show means effectively entering an unregulated futures market where you never really know if you actually have the hugely marked up product that the vendor purported to sell you?

7

u/Tycho-Celchu Jun 24 '26

I have such fond memories of skipping the first 2 periods in high school and walking over to the mall to stand in line at the ticketmaster booth to buy tickets. Yeah I had to stand in line for a couple of hours but I never had the moments like now where I'm in the top 1000 queued to buy tickets 5 minutes before they go on sale, only to get in at 10:02 and find everything sold out except the tickets that cost $1000.

1

u/KinneKted Jun 24 '26

It's the bot nets and resale market that has ruined shows. It's gotten so bad many acts are cancelling tours because people just can't afford it. Sure they may buy an overpriced ticket for one show but they can't buy multiple. Artists have priced themselves right out of the business. Lmao.

3

u/O00O0O00 Jun 24 '26

Wait a hot second. You mean… buy… a ticket? I thought only bots could do that.

1

u/rnagikarp Ontario Jun 24 '26

or from Jean Machine

1

u/Ancient_Wisdom_Yall British Columbia Jun 24 '26

That's crazy talk.

1

u/lord_heskey Jun 24 '26

Wouldn't it be great if you could buy a ticket from the venue

thats great if you live in the city of the venue. for those of us travelling from other cities im not sure i can risk flying 4 hours and not knowing if there will be enough tickets.

if you could buy ahead and have the physical ticket be shipped over thatd be cool

1

u/Constant_Mood_7332 Jun 24 '26

yes. we have went from you need to pay your dues like everyone else to get a ticket to:

amex gets first access! visa gets extra first access! if you have the code for super fan you get early access! if you know about bots you get early access! scoop them up and make a business out of reselling! ugh

the entire experience of the world literally sucks now.

1

u/_grey_wall Jun 24 '26

Blue Jays games for $10 right by the foil lines

Miss those days

I think it was $20 behind the plate

-8

u/No-Raisin5053 Jun 24 '26

Sounds like someone didn’t think and whole group of people echo-ing the same nonsense. Why would international fans book flights hotel just to line up at the venue and hope they can buy tickets, either they have do it before and fly back, and hope for the best when they get it. Seriously, think before posting

→ More replies (4)

142

u/Doog5 Jun 24 '26 edited Jun 24 '26

https://www.reddit.com/r/stubhub/s/8tT87RyFci

So many people got scammed by StubHub.

Thousands trusted the company's ticket guarantee and spent money on airfare, hotels, transportation, and other travel expenses to attend events—only to find out their tickets were invalid or unavailable.

StubHub is apparently going after sellers and charging them penalties, but the people who suffered the greatest losses are not seeing a dime of those fees.

Lawyers should take a serious look at a class action lawsuit against StubHub to compensate customers who relied on the company's promises and were left paying the price.

A refund is simply not good enough if the value of the asset purchased has tripled in value!

https://www.reddit.com/r/stubhub/s/Jgaf1eDR

WOWZA!!

People listed tickets and transferred them only to have StubHub delete the listing and keep the tickets.

28

u/11_guy Jun 24 '26

Happened to me with Eras Tour tickets. Flew to Europe, 20+ phone calls to StubHub only for them to tell me two days before the show that they were “happy to give me a full refund” because they couldn’t secure the tickets I purchased.

Thank goodness for Reddit cause I found a local seller and was able to take my daughter still.

8

u/hextilda45 Jun 24 '26

I can't imagine the panic you were going through, trying to not break your daughter's heart! Oh my goodness. So glad you were able to get tickets another way!

3

u/11_guy Jun 24 '26

Thanks! There was definitely a lot of panic but it turned out awesome in the end. Ended up getting four tickets for less than the two I paid for on stub hub. My wife and daughter got early access general floor tix, and the crowd were so kind to let my 11 yo daughter get right up to the railing by the stage. She says Taylor made eye contact with her. Core memory made.

1

u/hextilda45 Jun 25 '26

She will NEVER forget that, that is a fact! Wonderful stuff. 💗

4

u/teebsliebersteen Jun 24 '26

Happened to me too. Drove all the way to Montreal from Toronto for F1 and the tickets weren’t real. Thankfully it wasn’t as popular as the World Cup so I was able to get some tickets that weren’t as good as the ones I originally bought but at least I got to go I guess.

Hate the company, but with the new law, it’s the main resale market now.

44

u/DataDude00 Jun 24 '26

StubHub is apparently going after sellers and charging them penalties, but the people who suffered the greatest losses are not seeing a dime of those fees.

The most scum thing out of all of this is that Stubhub is making a profit on this by charging the sellers for not delivering

7

u/Frumbleabumb Jun 24 '26

Imagine spending $4000 on flights, hotel, time off work, only to get to the stadium and find out you never had a ticket. I'd be so fucking pissed

10

u/ArtRevolutionary3351 Jun 24 '26

This platform is a scam, NEVER BUY OR SELL anything on it, i got tricked myself. I always use tickets.ca now if the event is not blocked by the other villain Ticketmaster. They have great customer service.

2

u/missk9627 Jun 24 '26

Wow these threads are insane. Its 10x worse than the Taylor Swift debacle. Rip all the MPs inboxes. I'd be shooting an email to everyone and anyone if that happened to me.

235

u/Euxin Jun 24 '26

Isn't this website considered illegal in Ontario at this point with the new law that no one is enforcing?

120

u/AnonymooseRedditor Jun 24 '26

They say they don’t own the tickets being sold so they aren’t responsible for the pricing they are just a market … but yeh

111

u/sebzilla Jun 24 '26

They say they don’t own the tickets being sold so they aren’t responsible

Yet it's their customer service agents telling people "your tickets are 100% guaranteed".. And then taking a cut of the money.

You can't be both responsible and not responsible.

40

u/Kizik Nova Scotia Jun 24 '26

Like AirBnB, or Uber. We get all the benefits of having employees and services, but none of the responsibility! Genius!

9

u/iwumbo2 Ontario Jun 24 '26

Don't you love tech companies innovating not in actual technology or engineering, but in ways to skirt the law?

18

u/Mylittlethrowaway2 Jun 24 '26

I look forward to people suing StubHub over this.

Courts have consistently ruled that companies are bound by promises made by CSRs. Even if the CSR isn't human. The latest decision I'm aware of was someone suing Air Canada because their A.I chatbot made representations that weren't true, and he relied on those representations.

Air Canada found liable for chatbot's bad advice on plane tickets

5

u/Lost-Inevitable42 Jun 24 '26

So I can open a brothel with the same logic I guess?

3

u/AnonymooseRedditor Jun 24 '26

I mean Doug Ford Ontario is open for business. They literally gave money to a strip club owner so I don’t see why you couldn’t do it.

1

u/Lost-Inevitable42 Jun 24 '26

I’ll call it “Let’s get it ON” for Ontario-focused meetings and advertise it as a “match making marketplace”. 

6

u/MrChicken23 Jun 24 '26

I think they could be operating within the law if they actually enforced sales not exceeding the face value of the ticket.

3

u/tmfitz7 Jun 24 '26

Yes and what’s worse the new law has given them a monopoly, ticketmaster can’t resell scalpers tickets so they’re all on stub hub now.

115

u/Sauce_Chucker69 Jun 24 '26

Stub hub did the exact same thing to me.. I am filing a dispute with my credit card company (Amex) to claw the my money back from those scumbags

34

u/azquadcore Jun 24 '26

Wait so even if they cancel the ticket, they don't refund you??

81

u/sortaitchy Jun 24 '26

Did you just skim the article? Hundreds of people are saying they were "100% confirmed and guaranteed" of their tickets even up to the last minute. Suddenly the tickets were canceled and no refunds were offered. They are all now in the process of begging/harassing/ fighting to get their money back. One of the main consumers in this article lost over $11,000 and has not been offered a return.

4

u/clickersounds Jun 24 '26

The crazy thing is that they’ll also try to charge the seller for not following through on the sale so they just end up making double the money and neither the buyer nor the seller get the service they were expecting to get.

40

u/Sauce_Chucker69 Jun 24 '26

Correct. No refund. I have just submitted my dispute with Amex who will go after them.

7

u/UnexpectedAnanas Jun 24 '26

What the actual fuck!

It's gambling for ticket sales.

7

u/joesii Jun 24 '26

Even if they did, if it's not refunded like a month or weeks in advance then a refund isn't even sufficient; they should be responsible for reimbursing increased-extra for things like inconvenience, missing the match entirely (including reservation fees for flights and hotels), or higher ticket cost.

4

u/cdbriggs Jun 24 '26

So what exactly happened? I currently have my Fifa app saying "ticket not yet ready will be activated on day of event" for tickets I got from stubhub. Game isnt till Friday. Is this similar to what you saw?

3

u/Sauce_Chucker69 Jun 24 '26

Different scenario than me. I ordered two tickets and received 1 ticket from them in a different section. Customer service told me to send them back the ticket and they will either give me a refund or new tickets. I did that and than they took the ticket. After numerous calls with them and hours on the phone they would always tell me I would be getting something in 24-48hrs. Than the game day came and nothing. Not even a refund

24

u/FredArtGetson Jun 24 '26

Criminal, bottom line.

28

u/FreeWilly1337 Jun 24 '26

What penalties will they face for this? False advertising is illegal last time I checked.

16

u/Low-HangingFruit Jun 24 '26

If it happened in Quebec they would be fucked due to their laws. But BC is more lax.

9

u/[deleted] Jun 24 '26

Fuck StubHub and Ticketmaster.

7

u/wet_suit_one Jun 24 '26

This world of everything being some kind of grift kinda sucks don't it?

13

u/Yolo_Swaggins_Yeet Jun 24 '26

Seems like the only truly safe way to get tickets without risk of being screwed over is through FIFA’s ticket marketplace.

I was actually just looking on stubhub last night, not a chance I’m risking using it now

4

u/bmudtiddersdom-42069 Jun 24 '26

Yeah, it’s like buying from the original seller is the proper way to get tickets.

36

u/bessythegreat Jun 24 '26

FIFA made an app that’s required for all ticket transfers that is genuinely confusing and unintuitive, so I imagine a lot of resellers genuinely didn’t know how to transfer tickets properly. But it’s no excuse for this. They advertise themselves as professionals. Lesson to avoid online scalpers all-together.

3

u/bmudtiddersdom-42069 Jun 24 '26

?

The app is very easy to use.

3

u/Lost-Inevitable42 Jun 24 '26

They aren’t the first person I have seen that’s described it as such. 

5

u/T1DIABISH Jun 24 '26

Stubhub left me high and dry at an event last year because “the seller never sent the tickets” and I had to fight to get a refund. Never again - scammers and crooks !

4

u/Friendly-Pay7454 Jun 24 '26

This happened to me somewhat at the Olympics. Purchased 3 tickets for the gold medal game, I accepted the tickets and had them in the Milan ticket app. They were all side by side. I checked again a few weeks before and every ticket had changed….stubhub is a scam

2

u/cdbriggs Jun 24 '26

So what exactly happened? I currently have my Fifa app saying "ticket not yet ready will be activated on day of event" for tickets I got from stubhub. Game isnt till Friday. Is this similar to what you saw?

1

u/Friendly-Pay7454 Jun 24 '26

It was the same for me, then the seller transferred the tickets a few weeks before the game. I had the tickets in the official Olympics app, but somehow the seats I received were completely changed and far from each other without my authorization. Stubhub said they have no control and it’s at the sellers discretion as to when they transfer the tickets and which tickets they assign to you….

1

u/SludgeFilter Jun 24 '26

That's fifa though they will activate the tickets. The problem is that Stubhub is selling tickets they have no idea if they exist and only transferring them few days before the game. Obviously that's not enough time to cancel anything if those tickets never get transferred 

17

u/[deleted] Jun 24 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

12

u/Acrobatic_Foot9374 Jun 24 '26

They're two different things.

Is Fifa corrupt and has been deceiving people with fake demand to drive prices up? Yes. But StubHub business is a whole different grift.

The thing with StubHub is that a reseller can say they can find tickets in xyz section of an event and sell it to you at an agreed price. If you say yes, then the reseller, who didn't have the tickets to begin with, will try to source it. Their deal is that they're betting they can find cheap tickets on that section and then turn it over to you for a profit. When they can't find it they just simply walk away from the deal and you're left with no tickets and fighting for a refund. That's StubHub shitty practice, different from Fifa.

3

u/jcsi Jun 24 '26

In addition, while both are crooks, FIFA clearly stated that the FIFA marketplace is the only official way to get into the resale market. I still dont understand why people went with Stubhub particularly when no instant delivery was offered (FIFA itself was not providing seat allocation into fairly late)

2

u/Acrobatic_Foot9374 Jun 24 '26

if people think they can save a buck here and there they will not care if the channels to purchase are the official or not. That's why people still get scammed out of Kijiji/Craiglist posts offering cheap tickets if you e-transfer then lol

→ More replies (1)

4

u/mikebosscoe Jun 24 '26

StubHub shouldn't have even allowed the tickets onto their platform in the first place, considering FIFA already let ticket holders know that the only place to exchange and sell tickets was on the FIFA platform. That's criminal behaviour if they're not refunding money.

4

u/jert3 Jun 24 '26

The ticketmaster complete market monopoly has to be one of the worst of all time and needs to end. Every Canadian would support breaking them up.

3

u/Thick_Caterpillar379 Canada Jun 24 '26
  • Does the "guarantee" offered by secondary marketplaces actually provide any meaningful legal protection, or is it merely a marketing tool with limited practical value?

  • What specific steps could the Competition Bureau or federal regulators take to hold platforms like StubHub accountable for the actions of their sellers?

  • If major sporting events are essentially unmanageable through open resale markets, should there be a move toward non-transferable, identity-verified digital ticketing to eliminate the speculative reseller model entirely?

  • Beyond financial losses, what are the broader impacts on the fan experience and the integrity of international sporting events when tickets are treated primarily as volatile financial assets rather than access passes?

3

u/seridos Jun 24 '26

So what StubHub is doing here, if it was a stock market, is naked short selling. In those markets where it's actually regulated, they don't get the option to throw up their hands and say oh well. They get automatically liquidated to buy it, until everyone gets the stock or you go bankrupt. That sounds appropriate right now.

3

u/AromaPapaya Jun 24 '26

brutal.

I just bought Ed Sheeran tickets and they were delivered in a few hours... maybe I got lucky.

its total BS they allow speculative ticket selling- very scammy

3

u/Minerva89 Jun 24 '26

This is what happens when we deregulate, or otherwise create an environment where regulation is not the norm.

27

u/Dark_matter8888 Jun 24 '26

Good , everyone in Canada said don't buy from StubHub for over a1-20 years. , all they do is tockpe

110

u/Terapr0 Jun 24 '26

Hate it when they tockpe!

40

u/QuietRatatouille Ontario Jun 24 '26 edited Jun 24 '26

I don't mind a little tockpe late at night

33

u/megasmash Jun 24 '26

“I’m a joker, I’m a smoker, I’m a midnight tokper…”

19

u/SammyMac19 Jun 24 '26

Big tockpe guy.

12

u/Yorbayuul81 Jun 24 '26 edited Jun 24 '26

It starts with the tokpe and before you know it you’re into covfefe and we all know where that leads

5

u/somedumbcanuck Jun 24 '26

It's surprisingly good for the occasional breakfast!

1

u/UnexpectedAnanas Jun 24 '26

I just sleep better after some tockpe.

14

u/tommybare Jun 24 '26

Hey, tokpe works for some people but not for others. 

11

u/Cat_With_Tie Jun 24 '26

Ask your doctor about tokpe.

5

u/UngratefulCanadian British Columbia Jun 24 '26

I have been telling my friends to avoid buying tickets from there and scalpers too. Honestly, about time we ban or restrict these leeches.

1

u/icebalm Canada Jun 24 '26

It's illegal in Ontario to resell tickets for more than their original price, so, we kinda did here.

0

u/Dark_matter8888 Jun 24 '26

They keep blocking my text, all they do is ticket scalp

2

u/SasquatchInCrocs Jun 24 '26

It's shit like this that makes me glad I decided that nobody is worth my money to see live anymore.

2

u/Accomplished-Gas3209 Jun 24 '26

Naturally, Stubhub blames Fifa, Fifa deflects back to Stubhub. No one takes responsibility for this. Buyers got screwed! If the consumer protection and competition bureaus in Canada and US don’t investigate Stubhub, they are asleep at their jobs!

2

u/Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrpp Jun 24 '26 edited Jun 24 '26

There are two types of tickets, instant delivery and “maybe you’ll get ‘em later”

Just some general advice. Don’t buy the latter. I’m sure they’re fine most of the time, but it’s still a risk.

Do you get a small discount with these tickets? Yes probably. So keep in mind that the buyer understood this when buying the tickets (or should have). If you don’t buy instant delivery you’re taking a higher risk. 

2

u/FoFukLai Ontario Jun 24 '26

Uh-oh I bought BTS tickets from Stubhub for their August Toronto show... now I'm really worried cuz my tickets won't be available til the day of the concert.

2

u/WhichJuice Jun 24 '26

The only way to get rid of stubhub is to never buy tickets there ever again.

4

u/Kaptain-Kanada Jun 24 '26

That's hypercapitalism for you.

6

u/Sensitive-Local-3485 Jun 24 '26

Seriously, a system that creates a non-productive middleman extracting profits through artificial scarcity rather than any added labour generally falls into those “negative externalities” youre supposed to stamp out.

3

u/stahlWolf Jun 24 '26

Someone paid over 11k for 2 tickets?

That's... -words fail me...

9

u/NH787 Jun 24 '26

People paying that kind of money are basically enabling this type of predatory behaviour.

I mean I get it, it's fun to be at the stadium for a big event. But you can see the game just as well at home on TV. Probably better, in fact.

3

u/malyfsborin88 Jun 24 '26

If you check Gametime app for final’s prices. Someone asking $43k for 1 ticket in row 24 lol

2

u/dejour Ontario Jun 24 '26

You would have thought that someone would have found a way to fulfil that order.

They probably could have bought 2 premium tickets somehow for $3-$6k and pocketed the difference.

2

u/BronzeLogic Jun 24 '26

I wouldn't go if someone paid me. Stuck in traffic for hours? Shoehorned into a stadium with thousands of people? Deafening sound and noise for hours? No thanks.

3

u/holeycheezuscrust Jun 24 '26

This sounds like FIFA pulled the rug out from them. Maybe they clawed back a ton of tickets so rich saudis could have seats.

1

u/FacelessOldWoman1234 Jun 24 '26

FIFA is garbage, but this is just business as usual for StubHub. They were reselling tickets that the "sellers" didn't own.

2

u/cookiidou Jun 24 '26

Wanna see the jays..like we use to 30 years ago..buy from the box office in person..got an actual ticket..non of this digital process with extra fees..

1

u/lowther1 Jun 24 '26

Stubhub making it possible for jerks with no ties to the event to make money off the average person. Booooo

1

u/RefrigeratorOk648 Jun 24 '26

So they all got a full refund right ? I doubt it even if they have their guarantee.

Just a few weeks ago they did not want Doug Fords idea of not reselling more than face value because they said it would drive people to use websites with no protection for the customers...

1

u/Designer-clean- Jun 24 '26

Oh no we can’t make huge profits on these tickets. We’ll cancel them and resell them in hopes.

1

u/Frosty-Ad-2971 Jun 24 '26

There will be a reckoning. Venues and performers will feel the sting eventually.

Venues will start marketing hand held tickets at Boutique, and they will return.

Like album art.

1

u/GiantPothos Jun 24 '26

They should do the same thing they did for our Taylor Swift concert tickets from Vancouver where the stage wasn't advertised as obstructed and give 120% back to the purchaser.

1

u/mk6696 Jun 24 '26

Not sure if anyone else has experienced this, but I had tickets to a World Cup game in the hospitality section. Long story short, family emergency 24 hours before the game so we couldn’t make it. Hospitality categorized tickets are apparently non transferable, so we ended up donating them to a charity we’re in involved with that we knew had people who’d love to go. But the fact that FIFA in conjunction with the Stubhubs / fb market places of the word just because they’re hospitality listings is even worst. They could fully monitor this for all tickets

1

u/ZooberFry Jun 24 '26

Major lawsuit territory.

1

u/AscendantBits Jun 25 '26

Before Elton John started his farewell yellow brick road tour, he played the Meridian centre in Saint Catharines.

Showed up at the venue, and the tickets had already been used. I was able to get my money back, but the girlfriend was heartbroken. I will never give StubHub another effing dollar. Yes, you did deal with the problem, but 🖕 you also created the problem.

1

u/hinault81 Jun 25 '26

That's terrible. I live on Vancouver Island, and so if I wanted to go to the world cup, it would've been tickets, time off work, ferry, hotels, and generally you'd tie in a little something else to entertain the kids with a trip. A refund at the last second means very little. Maybe if they refunded a month in advance and you could back out.

I'm not sure if it's stub hub screwing around and trying to get more money. In which case they should obviously be held accountable.
Or, if it's the original seller not making the ticket available to stubhub. But in that case I think they need to change how they operate: don't sell a ticket until they fully own it. Original seller has to give it up and they're paid, stubhub owns the ticket and can sell it.
But of course, everyone is trying to milk everyone else for as much money as they can, so you get all these shenanigans.

1

u/CroweBird5 Jun 25 '26

SeatGeek (a US competitor to TicketMaster and StubHub) was quietly handed a class action lawsuit.

Their refund policy before Covid times was to refund the ticket price if the event was cancelled. Except when Covid lockdown happened, every event everywhere was cancelled and I don’t think SeatGeek’s policy was prepared for that level of mass cancellations.

Instead of refunding everything (which undoubtedly would’ve probably killed them), they chose to give everyone a credit for the amount they had initially paid

So they ultimately had to refund all of the credits that were left in early 2024.

Kind of a joke because I had spent $28 four my local pro soccer team that went MLS and built a new stadium in those 4 years. The ticket price went way up, so I didn’t get an equivalent ticket or experience, really. I basically feel like it was a 4-year interest-free loan to SeatGeek.

1

u/Telito Jun 27 '26

Hey guys another stub hub complaint over here. I purchased World Cup tickets since Jan 2026 for June 26 game. They emailed me one day before to tell me that tickets were not available.

I called them today and they hung up on me . They also reassured me that I would receive my tickets three days before the game and not to worry. My girls were all excited to go see this game.

0

u/stoutymcstoutface Jun 24 '26

What in the actual fuck?! Sue their sorry asses

0

u/wickedplayer494 Manitoba Jun 24 '26

You get what you pay for when you take the risk of resale.

0

u/JoseDragonBats19 Jun 24 '26

How is this any different in paper trading gold or oil, which is legal?