With Coronavirus pandemic making huge waves across the world, people are requested to not come off of their houses. The music industry has lost billions of dollars is the last few weeks and musicians are just waiting for the day when COVID-19 ends.
Now with thousands of live gigs cancelled/postponed till this pandemic ends, fans have been expecting a refund.
Here’s what concert industry website Pollstar says:
“In the last few weeks, 28,000-plus events have been cancelled, postponed or rescheduled – 23,000 in the U.S. alone”
“Given the unprecedented impact the coronavirus has had on the live events industry, we have adapted our policies in the U.S. and Canada while continuing to go above and beyond for our customers.”
Ticketmaster recently changed the wording of its policy, which had previously said that fans could receive a refund if their concert was “postponed, rescheduled or cancelled”; now it only lists cancellation as a reason for buyers to get their money back. It’s these “adapted” policies that have angered some fans.
A music fan who is extremely pissed with how these companies are handling the cancellations said:
“This is my money that they are holding hostage”.
Ticketmaster says:
“In the past, with a routine volume of event interruptions, we and our event organizers have been able to consistently offer more flexibility with refunds for postponed and rescheduled events.”
“However, considering the currently unprecedented volume of affected events, we are focused on supporting organizers as they work to determine venue availability, new dates and refund policies while rescheduling thousands of events in what continues to be an evolving situation.”
StubHub says:
“It is currently impossible for us to offer immediate cash refunds to all buyers.”