Broadway.com a rip off?

So my friend and I are heading to the city at the end of the Month and she surprised me with tickets to Shuffle Along (I know...she's a pretty epic friend.) She forwarded me the ticket email and I was SHOCKED that the mezz tickets she bought came to $499 total. After a closer look, there was a service fee of $121 and a "charge" of $40. I did some research, and the same tickets would be more than $150 cheaper going through telecharge. Is Broadway.com just ripping people off left and right? What is the draw for purchasing tickets through outside sites, rather than the obvious cheaper option of telecharge? Any thoughts or knowledge would be great! (On a related note...I'm telling my friend to try and get a refund and just purchase them through telecharge...)

Why yes, yes it is. Is that news?

As are dozens of other ticket resellers and brokers. Why are they successful? SEO, and stupid people who don't pay attention to what they are buying and where they are buying it from.

Teach your friend about Telecharge and Ticketmaster and the legit discounters (Playbill, Theatermania, Broadwaybox, Today's Tix). Otherwise she'll never learn.

Updated On: 3/1/16 at 04:31 PM

Yes I completely agree. After I stopped crying from her sweet gesture, I told her to contact them and cancel the order if possible. I wish she had checked with me first because I absolutely would have stopped her before buying them through that site.

I guess this post was more of a vent, so sorry if I was repeating another thread! I just wanted to hear what others had to say about this shady business!

Updated On: 3/1/16 at 04:35 PM

Just checked and it looks like they are charging 100+ in fees for Shuffle Along tickets. What a joke.

They are the absolute worst. The problem is that they spend lots of money to appear first on search engines and know how to use SEOs to boost their spot in search results. Going to google and typing "Hamilton Broadway", "Wicked Broadway" etc will almost always display Broadway.com as the first option (oftentimes they are the first two options at the top of the page because they will be the sponsored result as well as the top result). 90% of the time they appear before the shows actual official page. So many unknowing customers never even get to the telecharge or ticketmaster site and assume the outrageous fees are just part of broadway.

The fees are also hidden. For me on the mobile website you have to click "view details" before it gives you a breakdown of the face value of the tickets and the amount of added fees. The fee also seems to be different for each show.

CATSNYrevival said: "The fees are also hidden. For me on the mobile website you have to click "view details" before it gives you a breakdown of the face value of the tickets and the amount of added fees. The fee also seems to be different for each show."

This just keeps getting more ridiculous. I wish more people (outside of the theater world) knew about these crazy things some websites do. It's such a shame. :/

CATSNYrevival said: "They do, however, allow you to print the tickets for free. The fees are not waived there's just no additional charge. Isn't that nice of them?"

I take back every mean word I said about them. Printing at home is definitely worth the $80 service charge.

Phantom of London said: "Also you can dodge all fees if you go to the box office, even with a discount code and save sheds. I know you guys in America don't mind paying fees, well if I am headed to New York and want to see a few shows, I neve book in advance and never pay premium."

While I try to go to the box office (for rush at least) when I can, it's difficult for me to do that for every show, especially when I am only in NY for a limited time. The week I am in NYC, Shuffle Along is dark for 6 days. I would HATE for the show to be sold out by the time I got to the box office, so this is one show I'm absolutely buying in advance.

I commend you for being able to do that...I would if I thought there would be tickets available for this specific show!

They are, and a relative keeps giving me gift certificates to their site. I don't know a good way to tell them, without seeming ungrateful , not to purchase them there. It takes awhile to find something reasonable even with a gift certificate.

For a milestone birthday this past month, my generous family gave me Broadway.com gift certificates which in their minds, should have enabled me to see at least 7-8 shows. I did not have the heart to tell them that the reality was, I could only see about 4 shows since it is a huge ripoff. Plus the 4 shows I can see I have to go by myself or I could only go to 2 if I had to buy a companion ticket.

if they had just given me the cash, I could have gotten discounted tickets for 7 shows for myself without paying the full price plus a surcharge. I was so sad that they had no idea how to go about it and just figured that Broadway.com would be the best way to go.

i get that it's a business but it is a rip off and by using Broadway in their title, it's deceiving to many who are not savvy about the best way to purchase tickets for Broadway shows.

Not knowing that isn't the only way to get tickets.

I have prevented many colleagues from paying inflated prices for concert tickets because many of the first hits for concert ticket sales are not from the venue, even though the url is designed to look like it is. They have no idea and the sites do their best to conceal that.

So calling folks who think that's the only way to get tickets "stupid" is actually, in my opinion, victimizing them again.

And that's what Paul is counting on. It's sick.