Frustration

[susandennis]

I'm not a concert goer. The only time I ever use Ticketmaster is once a year when I pay for my Mariners tickets. Except today. I've never actually heard Ticketmaster referred to lovingly but I've never actually suffered the actual torture of it until today.

If this were 1994 and the web was new-ish, Or their main business was say tagging whales and selling tickets was a side gig, I could maybe understand. But this is 2021 and their business is selling tickets and they just flat suck at it.

I killed maybe 2.5 hours today fucking with that damn site. And it's not user error. And my lowest internet speed today was 732 Mbps which is not slow. But the fucking pages took forever to load. And what I needed to do involved several pages. I just cannot understand why/how an operation like that is allowed to exist.

I wanted to return one ticket and buy one for a different day. Not fucking brain surgery. Hang Tight We're working on your request - while the circle circles, is not acceptable. We were unable to load the page you requested, Try later. Fuck me. Over and over again. And if not that, then just waiting for shit to load. So so so bad.

I finally got it done but even so, there is no 'account history' or 'purchases' list or any other way to verify the details of what I did. I mean really. Ridiculous. Why are they allowed to exist???

In former years, I've been able to pick up a bit o' cash by selling (via Stub Hub) the parking pass that comes with my ticket. An email this morning said that we were not to sell our parking passes but 'return' them. On The Ticketmaster site, the 'return' option is not available for parking passes.

AND if all that was just unicorns and rainbows, I was able to charge the ticket I bought against the balance that I have in my account. Except, inexplicably, a $4.00 service charge. So they needed a credit card. I put in the credit card information. "The information in our records does not match, please re-enter." This is the same issue I ran into last time I tried to pay for something on Tickemaster. It's a card that pays 4% cash back on entertainment charges like ticketmaster. So, it's the card I want to use. It has a $10,000 limit and a $0.00 balance. Tickemaster would not take it. I used another card.

Capital One says it's Ticketmaster's issue. They are probably right. Last time this happened, my Mariners sales guy fixed it. He will be doing that again, next time I have a Mariners charge of more than $4.

But, now I'm done. I got free tickets as part of the pandemic deal, and today I got those tickets. Two extra games and a ticket for Frank to come with me to one game. Done. Done. Victory.

Comments

[adminbear.livejournal.com]

Join the TicketMaster haters club. I swear they run their whole web service off of some ancient laptop on a dialup link to the 'net.

[susandennis]

my theory is carrier pigeons — underpaid

[msconduct.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I don't normally have website problems with Ticketmaster here, but I bitterly resent their random fees. I buy symphony tickets as a gift for my mother say seven or eight times a year, and every time there are at least two random fees for no reason other than because you have no option but to get tickets from them and they can hold you to ransom. Bastards.

[richaarde.livejournal.com]

Ticketmaster needs some serious competition. Mariners fans need to bug the franchise and demand that they either handle ticketing themselves or hand it to another ticketing vendor.

[susandennis]

i wonder if it's the Mariners or MLB. the tickets are actually locked into another app — Ballpark — which i thought really sucked until i spent the day in Battle Of Ticketmaster. and i know the Ballpark deal is MLB.

[sleepybadger.livejournal.com]

I had to use them for some event a few years back and I was ready to tear my hair out. They claimed it was due to higher than normal usage, but come on man.

[amw.livejournal.com]

Maybe they should get their coders to actually write some decent software instead of hacking their competitors: https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/30/22206955/ticketmaster-songkick-crowdsurge-hacking-deferred-prosecution-fine

[lenine2.livejournal.com]

I had an interview at Ticketmaster in the summer of 2017. Their developers sit in a huge room at tables. No cubicles, no desks, just developers sitting at tables wearing headphones so they can concentrate. One interview was with a manager who had an office, but the walls did not go all the way up to the ceiling. There was a Ping-Pong game going on just outside of the office, and I could barely hear the guy due to the noise.

It was a five hour interview. One 30-minute segment was with a woman who looked like she hadn't combed her hair when she got out of bed. I remember thinking that when she came into the room. I'm pretty forgiving about appearances, but when you know you'll be interviewing a job candidate, wouldn't you make a bit of an effort? The woman spent the entire time chewing me out, saying I had no business applying for the job because I don't have a computer science degree. My 30+ years of experience didn't count for anything. She told me I should go back to school and get a computer science degree because, without it, I won't be able to find a job. Within a minute of being exposed to this person I knew I wouldn't work there, so I just started saying things like "Wow, thank you so much for the advice. I'll get right on that." There was a second interviewer with her (they did tag teams) and he seemed rather embarrassed by her.

At the end the VP met with me. I told him if I had been currently working I would have been angry that I burned a vacation day. The lack of professionalism and the awful environment killed any interest in working there.

I know that doesn't help you get your tickets changed and your parking pass credited, but you have my support in your contempt!

[susandennis]

It does not help me with my tickets but it sure does help me with my attitude. You describe exactly what I pictured the place and the people to be. That's how they got to the shitty pile o' crap they call a product. What remains a mystery to me is why anyone buys it.

Thanks for sharing your interview. I've been on some wild ones myself but yours takes the cake.

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

They have always sucked and we pay for it

[river57.livejournal.com]

I would complain to the Mariners

[susandennis]

Haha. They actually sent me a survey asking about my ticket buying experience. They got the full load.

[letmesaythis.livejournal.com]

Half way through that ordeal and I would have been looking for someone to yell at. Sheesh!