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Robert Smith’s social media tirade convinces Ticketmaster to refund “unduly high” fees

The Cure’s Robert Smith is fighting the good fight

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Image: Jim Dyson/Getty Images

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Robert Smith’s rage against Ticketmaster appears to have worked, as Ticketmaster has agreed to give partial refunds to fans who purchased tickets to The Cure’s upcoming North American tour.

“After further conversation, Ticketmaster have agreed with us that many of the fees being charged are unduly high, and as a gesture of goodwill have offered a $10 per ticket refund to all verified fan accounts for lowest ticket price transactions,” Smith announced on Twitter. “And a $5 per ticket refund to all verified fan accounts for all other ticket price transactions, for all Cure shows at all venues.”

“If you already bought a ticket you will get an automatic refund; All tickets on sale tomorrow will incur lower fees.

Smith explained earlier in the week that he chose to use a “verified fan” approach for their ticket sales, in an ongoing effort to dissuade the second-hand ticketing market.

However, things didn’t go according to plan after he soon criticised Ticketmaster’s “sickening” high fees, despite promising to help against scalpers and price surging.

“We were convinced that Ticketmaster’s … ideas could help us fight the scalpers,” the singer wrote. “We didn’t agree to the ‘dynamic pricing’/‘price surging’/‘platinum ticket’ thing, because it is itself a bit of a scam? A separate conversation!”

“We know it is a far from perfect system,” he continued. “But the reality is that if there aren’t enough tickets on sale, a number of fans are going to miss out whatever system we use. At least this one tries to get tickets into the hands of fans at a fair price.”

It seems as if Smith has done all he can to protect his fans from absurd ticket pricing. While this is only a temporary solution, it is certainly a step in the right direction.

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