Rochester,N.Y. -- The Rochester Broadway Theatre League said its patrons have faced numerous problems with secondary ticket sellers of late, particularly from websites unaffiliated with the RBTL.
"It's awful because it always happens during the really popular, hot shows," said Linda Glosser, Executive Vice President of the RBTL.
There are two problems related to tickets, according to Glosser.
The first, pertains to people reselling tickets on websites that appear to be affiliated with the RBTL, but are not. Some customers have purchased tickets, well above their face value and later told the RBTL they thought they were buying from the RBTL.
Sites such as rochestertheatre.org sell tickets up to $555, more than five times the face value of many tickets.
Secondly, some sellers have arraigned ticket sales with customers who never received a valid ticket.
"People purchase those and they get here to pick up the tickets or present a ticket they receive from these websites," said Glosser. "Sometimes they are not real."
In New York State, there is no legal limit for ticket resale, but websites doing so must be licensed, according to the Attorney General's Office.
Messages left for rochestertheatre.org and rochesterboxoffice.org were not immediately returned.
13WHAM News contacted Geva Theatre, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and Water Street Music Hall. None said that they have experienced the ticket problems described by the RBTL.
