I just saw a report about a ticket scam on our local Fox TV station and I thought it might be worth mentioning with the hope of warning others about these kinds of scams.

A woman and her daughter who are all huge Boston Red Sox fans bought a tour package from a local company. The package included tickets to two Red Sox/Yankees games at Yankee Stadium in New York City.

When the women arrived at Yankee Stadium, they were not allowed in since the tickets they had been given were already used.

I was not aware of this, since I don’t buy tickets very often, but apparently, you can buy tickets online and print them out yourself these days. Very convenient, but like any other convenience it tends to open doors for criminals who figure out ways to exploit these things.

It should be noted that the company that sold the women the tour package was not to blame. They bought the tickets off of eBay, assuming they were legitimate. In fact, the guy that sold the tickets to the tour operator was not even the one to blame!

It turns out that the fellow who sold the tickets to the tour operator also purchased them on eBay from a guy who turned out to be a crook. The TV station’s investigative reporter attempted to track the crook down but since he had used a phoney address, the reporter had no luck finding him.

Certain unscrupulous individuals are purchasing these “print-them-yourself” tickets and just copying them and selling the same tickets to multiple victims.

The good news for the women who would up at the gates to Yankee Stadium with bogus tickets is that they were somehow able to get in to see the game anyway. It was not clear how that was accomplished, but it sounded like someone from the Yankee’s organization arranged it or something like that.

The advice from the reporter was to make sure you use a credit card if you purchase any tickets online since you can file a complaint with the credit card company and have a much better chance of getting your money back.

Anyway, for people looking to purchase tickets to various events, I do know of a legitimate ticket seller on eBay named Michael. I have worked a little bit with Michael, talked to on the phone on more than one occasion and I know he is on the up-and-up.

If you’d like to check out Michael’s eBay ticket listings, here is the link:

Michael’s Tickets

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Tags: ebay, events, sports, ticket scams