By PYMNTS
Publication Date: 2025-11-17 23:21:00
UK ministers are reportedly planning to make it illegal to resell tickets to live events at more than face value.
The plan will be announced on Wednesday (Nov. 19) and will include tickets to concerts, sports, comedy and theatre, according to the Financial Times. reported Monday (Nov. 17), citing government and industry sources.
Ministers also intend to limit service fees charged by resale platforms and prohibit people from reselling more tickets than they were entitled to purchase in the initial sale of the tickets, according to the report.
The guardian too reported about the ministers’ plan. That report said the level of the service cap has not yet been set and that the ban on reselling tickets at a price above face value will also apply to social media sites.
A spokesperson for the ticket resale company. StubHub International He told The Guardian, according to the report: “With a price cap in regulated markets, ticket transactions will move to black markets.”
The Financial Times report says the announcement of the plan will come after widespread consumer complaints about resellers selling tickets at prices far above their original value. For example, some tickets to Oasis concerts in London during the summer cost more than 4,000 pounds (about $5,263).
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The announcement will also come about a week after several artists issued a statement calling on the Prime Minister Keir Starmer to limit ticket resale prices, according to the report.
The Financial Times report also highlighted an analysis published in July by a telecommunications company and ticket seller. O2 Virgin Media who discovered that tickets to some of London’s most popular concerts were being resell for up to five times its nominal value.
In a press release announcing the analysis, Virgin O2 Media said that 72% of music fans support regulating ticket resale and that the company was “urging the government to act quickly (to) end the dispossession of fans.”
In June it was reported that the British government was considering plans to limit ticket resale at its original price or limit increases to 30%.
International CEO of StubHub Bob Kupbens He told the Financial Times at the time that the crackdown could scare away legitimate resellers and force ticket buyers to use social media black markets, where they would risk being scammed.
Kupbens said: “Even at 30%, we firmly believe that would make it very challenging for us to operate” in the UK.