When will the "difficulty in refunding" in the performance market be solved?

Since the beginning of this year, the entertainment performance market has continued to be hot, and various types of performances such as concerts, music festivals, dramas, and musicals have not only met the spiritual and cultural needs of consumers, but also provided more choices for people when formulating travel plans for the "May Day" holiday. However, in parallel with the prosperity of the market, there are market chaos such as sky-high scalper tickets, high refund fees, and "water injection" of performance content. It is difficult for consumers to buy tickets and it is even more difficult to refund tickets, which makes people can't help but ask: Among the buyers and sellers in the performance market, have the audience completely become "lambs to the slaughter"? The "May Day" holiday is approaching, and this reporter has launched an investigation into the problem of "difficulty in refunding tickets" in the current performance market.

Controversy:

Why is it "expensive and difficult" to refund tickets for performances?

From April 20th to 21st, the Phoenix Legend "Auspicious Ruyi" 2024 tour kicked off in Changzhou for the first time. However, after the performance, the topic of "watching the Phoenix Legend concert but buying a 'pillar ticket'" rushed to the hot search. The so-called "pillar ticket" means that consumers buy seats with obstructed vision and blind spots without knowing it. According to the party Ms. Wang, she spent 960 yuan to buy two tickets for the Phoenix Legend concert on April 21, but when she arrived at the performance site, she found that the view of the seat was almost completely blocked by the pillars of the venue, which seriously affected the viewing effect, so she asked the ticket seller Damai.com for a refund, but Damai refused. After the incident continued to ferment on the Internet, on April 24, Phoenix Legend heroine Linghua posted on her social media platform to support fans to defend their rights, and expressed her willingness to reserve two tickets for Ms. Wang for her concert held in the Bird's Nest in Beijing during the "May Day" holiday as compensation. Damai also issued an apology on the same day, saying that it had reached a consensus with the consumer and began to apply for the corresponding refund process.

While praising Linghua's behavior of speaking out for fans, netizens also questioned the long-term refund system of ticketing platforms represented by Damai and Maoyan. "If it weren't for the fact that the matter was so big, would it be that the reasonable demands of the audience would never be taken seriously by the platform?" asked a consumer. In fact, it is not the first time that the "pillar ticket" issue involved in the concert has been complained about. Last year, nine audience members sued the organizers of Liang Jingru's Shanghai concert, claiming that their seats were blocked by stage pillars almost all the time, and their request to "refund one and pay three" to Damai was also refused.

In addition, the high handling fee for consumers to refund tickets before the start of the show has also been a point of contention for a long time. Considering the scarcity of some performance lineups and contents, organizers often start selling tickets months before the start of the performance, and audiences often choose to place orders immediately when tickets are issued in order to ensure that they can successfully purchase tickets. However, due to the long time before the start of the performance, consumers will inevitably need to refund their tickets due to force majeure changes in the itinerary while waiting for the performance, and the high refund fee will become an insurmountable threshold. "Because I was sick and hospitalized, I was asked by the doctor not to watch the performance for a month, so I applied to the organizer, but I didn't expect to charge a handling fee of nearly 1,000 yuan. Zhenjiang consumer Yue Yue (pseudonym) suffered such a bad thing. She argued that she had nearly a month before the start of the show when she applied for a refund, which would not affect the resale of the tickets, but even if she provided a hospitalization certificate, the organizers did not approve her request for a full refund.

The reporter noticed that on March 14, Black Cat complained about the release of the "Top Ten Consumer Alerts in 2023", which included "it is difficult to get tickets for concerts, and it is even more difficult to refund and change tickets, and the platform's 'overlord clause' should be changed". According to the statistics of the Black Cat Big Data Center, there are more than 27,000 concert-related complaints on the Black Cat complaint platform, of which more than ninety percent of the complaints related to ticket refunds and changes are highlighted, including difficulties in canceling and changing tickets for concerts, and high handling fees.

Survey:

The refund rules are still "customized" by the organizer

In fact, in order to strengthen the standardized management of large-scale performance activities, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the Ministry of Public Security jointly issued the "Notice on Further Strengthening the Standardized Management of Large-scale Commercial Performance Activities and Promoting the Healthy and Orderly Development of the Performance Market" in September last year, which clearly requires that the performance organizer should establish a refund mechanism for large-scale performance activities, set a reasonable fee standard for ticket refunds, and protect the legitimate refund rights of ticket buyers. However, in practice, many consumers are still rejected by the platform when applying for a refund: "Performance tickets are not ordinary commodities, but carry cultural services and are time-sensitive and scarce, so they do not support refunds".

After checking the refund policies of many performances on multiple ticketing platforms recently, the reporter found that because the above notices of the two departments did not specify the handling fee ladder and the method of refund, the right to formulate the rules is still in the hands of the organizers. For example, Li Zongsheng and Zhou Xingzhe are scheduled to hold concerts in Nanjing recently, and the ticket purchase instructions are Jiangsu Dongsheng Performing Arts Co., Ltd., and the refund rules are also unconditional free refunds within 48 hours after the tickets are pre-sold, and then 20% and 30% of the actual amount of the order are successively according to the time limit Xue Zhiqian's concert in Zhenjiang from April 26 to 27 opened for pre-sale on April 11, but stopped processing refund applications when there was still a week before the official start of the performance; the more controversial is Eason Chan's concert, for example, the show scheduled to be held on April 26 will be ticketed on March 20, and if consumers apply for a refund after April 12, the platform will charge 80% of the face price will no longer accept refunds until 0:00 on April 19. However, on April 16 and 23, the platform successively carried out two and three rounds of ticket release, and clearly stipulated that the refund policy was the same as the first round, which also meant that consumers who grabbed tickets in the later period lost the right to refund tickets almost from the beginning.

Even if it does not affect the secondary sales, why can't performance tickets be returned for seven days without reason like physical online shopping? The reporter consulted people in the legal circles on this. "If the consumer is unable to watch the performance due to force majeure for personal reasons, he or she can refund the ticket before the performance, but he shall notify the operator in a timely manner, provide the corresponding proof of force majeure, and shall bear certain liability for breach of contract. The performance operator shall reduce or waive the handling fee or liquidated damages according to the impact of force majeure. Wu Zhengying, a lawyer at Jiangsu Yongheng Law Firm and a public interest lawyer at the Provincial Consumer Protection Commission, told reporters. However, he also said that the specific liability of the consumer for breach of contract is usually stipulated in the consumer contract between the two parties, and the consumer contract is generally formulated by the operator himself without consultation with the consumer, so it is a legal standard contract. According to the provisions of the Civil Code on the fair and reasonable determination of the rights and obligations of both parties, the provisions unilaterally formulated by the performance operator to charge a high handling fee for the refund of the ticket of the consumer not only aggravate the responsibility of the consumer, but also infringe on the legitimate rights and interests of the consumer, and should be invalid.

Suggestion:

Establish fairer and more reasonable rules

Protecting the rights and interests of consumers

According to industry insiders, since the organizer needs to pay a lot of expenses in the early stage of performance preparation, such as preparing the venue and inviting singers, the restrictions on ticket refunds are also for the sake of controlling operating costs and preventing malicious competition. Wu Zhengying suggested that performance operators can learn from the rules of 12306 train ticket refunds, determine a fair and reasonable standard of cascade handling fees or liquidated damages according to the length of time before the performance, and at the same time reduce or reduce the handling fees or liquidated damages accordingly according to the force majeure proof provided by consumers.

In the face of the upcoming "May Day" holiday, how should consumers protect their legitimate rights and interests in watching performances?", it is recommended that consumers carefully check the number of performances, the time and place of performances, the price of tickets, whether real-name viewing is required, and the refund policy before purchasing performance tickets. On April 25, the Provincial Consumer Protection Committee issued a reminder for the consumption of cultural and entertainment performances, and Lei Yitian, head of the complaint department of the Provincial Consumer Protection Committee, reminded that during the "May Day" period, the flow of people is large and the cost of travel increases. At the same time, you should do what you can, stay rational, and avoid buying tickets that exceed your ability to afford because of a momentary "top".

Lei Yitian also said that if consumers encounter problems such as serious occlusion of seats and large blind spots that were not informed before ticket purchase, they can contact the venue staff to change seats in time, or provide equivalent services to other consumers at the same price. In case of other problems that infringe on the legitimate rights and interests of consumers, such as changes in casts, lip-syncing, and shrinking performance duration, consumers can retain evidence and complain and report to the relevant departments after the performance, so as to bravely defend their rights.

Jiangsu Economic News reporter Jin Cai