Going to see your favorite singer or band in-person can be quite an investment, since the average concert ticket price hovers at roughly $86. So it really stings when that ticket deal turns out to a scam.
And that happens all too often.
About 12 percent of people report they have purchased a concert ticket online that turned out to be a scam, according to a new poll of 1,000 U.S. adults from ticketing technology vendor Aventus. About 94 million people in the U.S. are expected to attend a music event this year, according to Statista, so that means roughly 11 million will likely be victims of a ticket scam.
Overall, about two-thirds of those surveyed said they feared unintentionally buying fake tickets or getting scammed when purchasing concert passes. Men are 2.5 times more likely to be scammed than women.
The scams occur because of unfair ticketing practices, Annika Monari, co-founder of Aventus, tells CNBC Make It. Ticket-buying computer bots now sweep up huge quantities of tickets before consumers can. Pew found that bots bought up as many as 40 percent of the tickets to some performances of "Hamilton."
"A lot of bot behavior leads to tickets selling out very quickly ... and then those tickets being listed at very high prices in the secondary market — prices that the artist never really intended them to sell at," Monari says.
With bots buying up the tickets, desperate consumers turn to resale sites and scalpers — and risk fraud. "A consequence of this exact problem is that there are a lot of counterfeit tickets," Monari says. The survey found that one in five millennials had purchased tickets from a scalper.
How to protect yourself from scams
To avoid scams, the Federal Trade Commission recommends trying to get in on pre-sales. Many times artists will release tickets ahead of the general sale to fans who sign up for emails or follow them on social media.
Credit cards like Citi, Chase and American Express also offer fans exclusive access so, if you're a card member, make sure to take advantage of this perk.
If you do purchase tickets through a re-seller, the FTC recommends paying with a credit card rather than a debit card or cash. Using a credit card allows you to dispute the transaction before the money leaves your bank account if the tickets never show up or prove to be fake.
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