Taylor Swift Fans Sue Ticketmaster Following Disastrous Eras Tour Presale

Hell hath no fury like a Taylor Swift fan scorned. Thousands of Swifties are still livid over the disastrous ticketing of the singer's upcoming "The Eras" tour, and now a group of fans is suing Ticketmaster for making the process tough for everyone.

After pre-sales for a handful of dates kickstarted on Ticketmaster in November 2022, fans were quick to point out a lack of planning on the company's part. Problems began almost immediately. Aside from the site crashing, thousands of Swifties complained about long wait times and dynamic pricing, which made some of the most coveted tickets less accessible. The debacle even caught the attention of several politicians, triggering a U.S. Senate antitrust hearing.

Ticketmaster, for their part, issued a lengthy apology on their site. The company explained that while they predicted record demand for Swift's tour, measures put into place were not enough to keep up with the unprecedented number of fans vying for tickets. "We want to apologize to Taylor and all of her fans – especially those who had a terrible experience trying to purchase tickets," the company said, adding that a "staggering number of bot attacks" and "fans who didn't have codes" were responsible for the issues with their site. Over the course of ticketing, they revealed that they had "3.5 billion total system requests – 4x our previous peak." Despite their explanation, fans still want to take the company to court.

Taylor Swift fans are convinced that Ticketmaster wasn't being entirely truthful in their explanation about the botched "Eras" tour ticketing. According to Deadline, a handful of Swifties are taking the ticketing powerhouse to task for "fraud, price-fixing, and antitrust violations." The fuming fans claim that the company was deceitful, as their system enables scalpers to hoard tickets, which are resold at much-higher prices on secondary markets. Per the suit, the company was "eager to allow" resellers to gain access to the presale, and they had "taken steps to make additional profit from the scalped tickets."

This lawsuit comes on the heels of a Justice Department antitrust investigation into Ticketmaster's parent company, Live Nation. As The New York Times reports, officials will be looking at whether the company has a monopoly over its industry and whether it has taken advantage of its position for profit's sake. 

Unsurprisingly, Swift is siding with her fans. The "Anti-Hero" singer recently broke her silence on the ticketing fiasco to express her disappointment, revealing that her team was assured by Ticketmaster that they could keep up with the demand. The singer described the experience as "excruciating," but she hopes to "provide more opportunities for us to all get together and sing these songs" in the future (via NBC News).