Dems propose a more consumer friendly market for live events

The latest plan to update New York’s soon-to-expire live-event ticketing rules and regulations could make the landscape more consumer friendly.

Legislation introduced on Friday would cap reasonable service charges on tickets at 25 percent of the price of a ticket, update the refund policies for delayed events, restrict speculative ticket selling on the secondary market, promote the disclosure of tickets being held back for sale by an event promoter, and allow musicians to ban tickets from their shows being resold at a profit on the secondary market.

The measure governing live-event ticket regulations is set to expire this summer and the law would be extended for three years with the new proposal.

The bill was introduced by state Sen. James Skoufis, an Orange County Democrat, and Assemblyman Ron Kim, a Queens Democrat, who chair the committees overseeing this issue in their chambers. Skoufis has been at the forefront of this issue in New York since 2019, and was the driving force behind the 2022 overhaul of the law, which included the adoption of all-in ticket pricing requirements and restrictions on charging delivery fees for tickets transmitted digitally.

“We have the opportunity to build a ticketing structure that protects consumers–everyday New Yorkers who want to enrich their lives or the lives of their families by seeing live performances–and we have an obligation to fight as hard as we can to make that possible in these next three weeks,” Skoufis said in a statement.

“Too many customers are now victims of bots that drive up prices to outrageous figures, fake websites or scams promising tickets that don’t exist, or sticker shock at the checkout page caused by exorbitant fees,” Kim said in a statement.

A group representing ticket sellers on the secondary market warned in a statement that this legislation’s restrictions on reselling tickets for a profit only seems “like a win for fans.”

“It would destroy competition and put all the power into the hands of primary ticketing giants like Ticketmaster — the very companies already frustrating fans,” said a spokesperson for the coalition.

Speaking recently on The Capitol Pressroom, Kim said he and Skoufis see “eye to eye on many issues” and that was the basis for the legislation they crafted with their staff. He blamed the late budget for creating an end-of-session time crunch that limited their ability to tackle all of the items that Skoufis and Assemblymember Bobby Carroll, a Brooklyn Democrat, proposed addressing in an even more aggressive bill from January.

On May 9, Kim led an Assembly hearing into live-event ticketing practices and enforcement, which featured testimony from consumer advocates, event venues, ticket sellers, and talent representatives.