Ticketmaster Agrees To Settlement

Ticketmaster has agreed to a tentative settlement of a protracted class-action lawsuit that, if approved, would give $400 million in credit to 50 million ticket buyers.

The lawsuit, filed in 2003, centers on TM’s add-on fees of order processing and UPS delivery, which were actually profitable to the company. The fees were on top of convenience and facility fees, which were understood by the five plaintiffs to be profit centers, according to the Wall Street Journal.

If the plaintiffs had known the first two fees were also “secret profit generators,” they might not have purchased tickets at all, according to the lawsuit.

Live Nation Entertainment, which merged with TM in 2009, declined to comment. Ticketmaster was a subsidiary of IAC/InterActiveCorp when the lawsuit was filed. As part of the settlement process,

Ticketmaster changed the language on its website to clarify that order-processing and delivery fees may include a profit for the company.

If the settlement is approved, 50 million patrons of the website from Oct. 21, 1999, to Feb. 27, 2013 will receive $386 million in discounts on future purchases, the paper said.

TM will issue 161 million credits for $2.25 each and 4.9 million credits for $5 each. Tickets to certain events will be available for free to class members on a first-come, first-served basis over four years if members redeem less than $10.5 million worth of the coupons each year, according to the WSJ.