‘Web touts sold £4m of tickets for over £10m’

‘Motivated by greed’

TWO internet ‘touts’ bought millions of pounds worth of tickets for everything from Ed Sheeran concerts to the Chelsea Flower Show then sold them on at inflated prices, a court has heard.

Peter Hunter and David Smith exploited the ‘love and passion’ of real fans through their fraudulent online business, it is alleged.

Computer software allowed them to make multiple applications to primary ticket selling sites such as Ticketmaster, posing as individuals and concealing their true identities, jurors were told.

The pair ‘harvested the tickets in large numbers’ then sold them through the ‘big four’ resale sites – Viagogo, Get Me In, Stub Hub and Seatwave – prosecutor Jonathan Sandiford told Leeds Crown Court.

In total they bought up tickets for more than £4million and then sold them on for more than £10million, it was said. Tickets for sporting events and West End shows including Harry Potter And The Cursed Child were also bought, the court heard.

Mr Sandiford said: ‘The two defendants were effectively internet ticket touts and they were also dishonest fraudsters motivated by greed who, over a number of years, exploited the love and passion that many people have for their favourite pop music artists and bands to milk them for profit.’

The alleged fraud was a ‘double win’ for Hunter and Smith, who traded as Ticket Wiz and BZZ, because it reduced the number of face-value tickets and drove up prices on resale sites, he said.

Between June 2015 and December 2017, they spent more than £4million buying tickets from primary ticket sites, the court heard.

The prosecutor said AXS was the site on which they spent the most money, followed by Ticketmaster, with more than £1million spent with both.

More than 30,000 tickets were bought through AXS, it was alleged.

Over the same period, the pair sold £10.8million worth of tickets on secondary sites, jurors heard.

Mr Sandiford said that when National Trading Standards officers searched the defendants’ home they found 112 payment cards in 37 names, including their own.

They also allegedly discovered more than 290 email addresses associated with identities linked to the defendants, which were set to automatically forward emails to a single address connected to their firm.

Hunter, 51, and Smith, 56, both of North London, deny fraudulent trading and possessing an article for fraud.

The case continues.