Taylor Swift concert tickets 'disappear' after families paid hundreds to StubHub
NEW YORK (WABC) -- Some fans experienced a Taylor Swift concert catastrophe after tickets worth thousands suddenly disappeared.
It comes after last fall when Ticketmaster's site crashed, leaving parents scrambling on the secondary ticket market.
Seventh-grader Rosie Shalom and her big sister Anna have kept a Taylor Swift countdown for months.
They even made their dad his own bedazzled Swifty Shirt to wear to the concert.
But with three days to go until the show, the South Orange family got bad news.
"We apologize but unfortunately your seller is not able to provide the tickets you originally purchased," dad Alex Shalom read.
They bought four ticket for the MetLife concert back in November for $1,800 on Stubhub.
"Because it was a reputable site, we gave it to them as their only gift, even back then the prices were really high, not as astronomical, but it was a big splurge," Alex said.
It was also a big splurge for Rosemary Byrnes. The Westchester mom spent $1,200 for two tickets to surprise her daughter and granddaughter for holiday and birthday gifts.
"I got an email from Stubhub that the tickets were no longer available and couldn't go to the show," Byrnes said.
The StubHub "FanProtect Guarantee" assures customers they could either get a full refund or comparable tickets.
Sellers do "Face penalties" and are "not allowed to cancel a sale and then raise the price."
However, Byrnes said the tickets in row 332 are now about $4,400 apiece.
Alex Shalom said there's now nothing comparable because the tickets went up so much. He called Stubhub when the tickets went up to $5,000 each for the upper tier.
"They were deeply apologetic but said there was nothing they could do," he said.
So 7 On Your Side contacted the secondary marketplace giant which investigated both transactions and within hours replaced Byrne's Taylor tickets.
And StubHub even came through with a surprise upgrade for the Shalom family -- no more nosebleeds for those Swifties.
StubHub apologized to both customers, acknowledging it has created confusion with communicating policies.
But after 7 On Your Side's calls, it vowed an update to its website and conduct training for customer service reps to better communicate customers' rights.
ALSO READ | Attention Swifties: What to know about Taylor Swift Eras Tour at MetLife Stadium
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