According to a report by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) on July 2nd, hundreds of fans who purchased World Cup tickets through the second-hand ticketing platform StubHub reported that the tickets they bought were canceled near the start of the tournament. Many fans had spent a lot of money traveling to the event, only to be turned away from the stadium.
At the age of 45, Montalvo spent $1,700 on tickets through StubHub. He planned to take his father to watch Messi’s game as a surprise on Father’s Day, hoping to have an unforgettable viewing experience. However, reality did not match his expectations: he traveled all the way from Mexico to Dallas to pick up his parents, and the combined costs of round-trip flights and hotel accommodations amounted to nearly $6,000. In the end, his family was stopped outside the stadium, leaving them in a difficult situation.
Just one day before setting off for Dallas, StubHub suddenly informed Montalvo that the seller was unable to deliver the tickets. Due to the soaring ticket prices, the platform also refused to provide him with alternative tickets of equal quality. Nevertheless, the family still arrived at the stadium on time, hoping to get tickets. One hour before the game started, Montalvo continued to call StubHub's customer service to communicate.
Forty-five-year-old Montál Wo and his family came to Dallas, Texas, to watch a game. They were told they couldn't receive their tickets purchased on a second-hand website. BBC
The report indicates that Montalvo’s miserable experience is just a microcosm of this “largest ticket collapse in history”. During this World Cup, the lifelong dreams of many fans to watch the games became a thing of the past due to the unilateral cancellation of orders by second-hand ticketing platforms just before the tournament.
The industry believes that the root cause lies in a disorder known as “speculative ticket sales” within the industry: sellers who lack the necessary qualifications list their tickets for sale before actually possessing them. They bet that they can sell the tickets at a lower price near the start of the tournament to make a profit. When market ticket prices soar, these sellers simply cancel the transactions and sell the tickets at a higher price. Buyers are only able to recover the cost of purchasing the tickets, while the high costs of transportation and accommodation incurred before watching the matches remain uncompensated.
This ticketing crisis is escalating, with various related companies shifting blame and blaming each other endlessly.
It is reported that all genuine World Cup tickets can only be purchased and traded through the official website of the event organizer, FIFA.com, or its official app. Therefore, tickets purchased on second-hand resale platforms like StubHub must be transferred within the official FIFA system.
StubHub blamed the issue on FIFA, stating that FIFA’s new ticketing app had "serious performance issues" before the event, which affected the ticket transfer processes through all secondary reselling platforms.
FIFA refutes this claim, stating that official channels are the only reliable way to purchase tickets, and they cannot endorse tickets sold through third-party platforms. FIFA says they “disagree” with the claim that problems in the transfer process of tickets through second-hand trading platforms are caused by FIFA’s system.
Regarding this, Friedmann, co-founder of the ticketing information platform Ticket Talk Network, said bluntly, “100% of the responsibility lies with StubHub. Just for this World Cup, I have gathered over 600 complaints from consumers.” He also added, “FIFA isn’t without problems either. Their ticketing system is extremely poor, and its technical level is comparable to old software from 1999.”
Reports indicate that it is still unclear how many consumers have encountered problems after purchasing tickets through StubHub and other second-hand ticketing platforms. Hundreds of fans have filed complaints online, and there are reports that as many as thousands of consumers have had their orders cancelled.
As the World Cup enters a more competitive stage of knockout competitions, industry regulators warn that the crisis caused by cancellations of orders may worsen. More families will arrive at the stadium with great anticipation, only to be turned away and suffer huge losses for an experience that should be unforgettable for a lifetime.
