Stubhub To Pay $10m To Settle Ftc Allegations Over ‘deceptive’ Ticket Pricing

StubHub has agreed to salary $10 million to settee Federal Trade Commission allegations that nan summons marketplace grounded to intelligibly disclose nan afloat value of tickets.

The national agency said successful a projected colony revenge connected Thursday that StubHub violated nan FTC Act and its Rule connected Unfair aliases Deceptive Fees by “deceptively” advertizing summons prices connected its website without intelligibly disclosing upfront what nan full costs would be, including each mandatory fees.

In May 2025, nan FTC began requiring summons marketplaces to guarantee value transparency astatine each stages of nan ticket-purchase process. The agency’s title alleges that aft nan norm went into effect, StubHub advertised its summons prices without disclosing nan afloat price.

“Given StubHub’s acquisition and nationalist support for nan rule, I was disappointed to study that it was allegedly 1 of nan rule’s first awesome violators,” FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson said successful his statement. “[…] StubHub chose to slow-walk compliance pinch nan norm successful portion because nan NFL was astir to merchandise its regular-season schedule. The title notes that nan NFL schedule merchandise is ‘a 99th percentile postulation event’ for StubHub and alleges that executives decided that nan competitory advantage from misleading consumers outweighed nan consequence of being caught.”

The FTC sent a informing missive to StubHub connected May 14, 2025, and nan institution fixed nan rumor nan adjacent day.

The $10 cardinal secured by nan FTC will screen StubHub’s 3 days of noncompliance pinch nan norm and will beryllium utilized to return “ill-gotten” profits to consumers done refunds of nan fees paid to StubHub, Ferguson wrote.

“We person agelong supported all-in pricing because it provides clarity for fans,” a StubHub spokesperson said successful a connection to TechCrunch. “This colony covers a constricted number of transactions, spanning conscionable 3 days successful May 2025, wherever immoderate listings connected our tract whitethorn person displayed summons prices exclusive of fees. While we powerfully disagree pinch nan FTC’s position of nan case, we are addressing their concerns by refunding a information of those buyers’ fees.”

The lawsuit against StubHub marks nan FTC’s latest crackdown connected summons marketplaces. Last September, nan agency sued Ticketmaster and its genitor company, Live Nation, for engaging successful forbidden summons resale strategies and deceiving consumers astir value and summons limits. The companies person asked a national judge to throw out nan case.

Last August, nan FTC sued a Maryland-based summons broker for allegedly utilizing unlawful strategies to bypass summons purchasing limits for celebrated events, specified arsenic Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, and past reselling those tickets astatine importantly higher prices.