Consumer protection organizations claim bill to limit ticket fraud actually creates ‘concentrated power’

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Consumer protection organizations across the country supported a proposed state legislation that would protect consumers from fraudulent concert and sports ticket sales. But as of Wednesday morning, these organizations are now calling on Governor Jared Polis to veto the bill.

Senate Bill 23-060 named "Consumer Protection in Event Ticketing Sales" was introduced earlier this legislative session to allow venues and promoters to limit the resale of tickets.

Brian Hess, the executive director of Sports Fans Coalition, a non-profit that claims to protect buyers by fostering more competition between ticket sellers, said the original bill created a concentration of market competition.

“The bill actually concentrated power into a few large entertainment conglomerates,” he said. “It did nothing to protect consumers, despite its name.”

Hess lobbied against the bill, along with resale companies StubHub and SeatGeek.

After passing the Senate, the House introduced a number of amendments to the bill that increased consumer protections. One required companies to report bots to law enforcement that buy up tickets and then resell them at an increased price.

Another amendment was transparency with the number of holdback tickets. Venues and promoters, like Ticketmaster and AXS, are accused of withholding a number of tickets to release them later at a higher price when there is increased demand. As reported by the Wall Street Journal, this is what happened with the Taylor Swift tour — 94% of tickets were held back for those with special or exclusive access.

“Consumers don't know how many tickets are actually for sale at the time of the sale and may be waiting in line for 10 hours to get tickets when there's really only a few actually available,” Hess said.

With these two added amendments, Sports Fans Coalition and other consumer protection organizations changed their minds and supported the bill. That is until Wednesday morning.

The Senate didn’t agree with the House’s amendments, so it sent the bill to the Conference Committee on Wednesday, where many of the House amendments were taken out of the bill, saying they were “unworthy and unworkable,” according to Hess.

Hess claims the decision was made in backrooms with the companies this bill actually protects, he said. According to the Colorado Secretary of State lobbyist search, Live Nation, the owner of Ticketmaster, AEG, AXS, and Kroenke Sports Group, who owns Ball Arena, are lobbying in support of the bill.

Hess said the bill no longer protects the resale of tickets, which allows for competition, keeping prices low.

“It doesn't protect consumers, because it's giving a monopolist and its second largest competitor in the space all of the power over the consumer welfare,” Hess said.

Republican State Senator Mark Baisley, District 4, disagrees. As one of the prime sponsors of the bill, he said it gives control to the artists and venues. He said it will negatively affect resellers but “that’s ok because they are the ones racking up prices.”

Democrat State Representative Steven Woodrow, District 2, is a consumer protection attorney when he isn’t at the capital. He said he has filed lawsuits against teams and venues for unlawful ticket practices and supported the House’s version of the bill.

“(Ticket companies) understand that competition on the secondary market puts downward pressure on their own prices on the primary market, so they have every incentive to try to restrict the resale and the free movement of tickets,” Woodrow said.

While Hess and other consumer protection groups have now pulled their support for the bill. He said there are still some good amendments, including all-in pricing, which means the first price you see when buying tickets is the final price you will pay.

The bill will now have to go back to the House following the removal of some amendments. If approved, it will go to the Gov. Polis’ desk for him to sign.

“We believe that Governor Polis knows what's best for Colorado is best for consumers, and we hope that he will veto the bill,” Hess said.