Zach Bryan and AEG potentially face millions in fines for alleged violations of Virginia’s Ticket Resale Rights Act.
Country singer Zach Bryan and event organizer AEG could face as much as $100 million in fines for disregarding the state of Virginia’s Ticket Resale Rights Act, passed in 2017. Bryan’s Burn, Burn, Burn Tour made headlines when tickets first went on sale after the singer ragged on Ticketmaster — then announced he would bar all ticket resale or transfer of tickets sold for the shows.
Presumably, shows in states like Colorado, Virginia, and New York, where there are state laws in place making restrictions on purchased tickets against the law, would not allow a policy like Bryan’s due to the risk of massive fines. But many reports surfaced from impacted customers for whom ticket transfer was never activated for the show at the John Paul Jones Arena in Charlottesville, Virginia, despite a page on the venue’s website explaining otherwise due to state law.
Passed in 2017, Virginia’s Ticket Resale Rights Act states clearly:
“No person that issues tickets for admission to an event shall issue any such ticket solely through a delivery method that substantially prevents the purchaser of the ticket from lawfully reselling the ticket on the internet ticketing platform of the ticket purchaser’s choice.”
Disregarding this state law could result in penalties ranging from $1,000-$5,000 for each violation. As John Paul Jones Arena has a listed capacity of 14,593, the fines for issuing that number of tickets violating state law could range from $14-72 million.
Fan complaints about the transfer restrictions surfaced on Facebook, with some posts indicating that fans were “forced” to attend the show themselves when they had purchased tickets for friends or family due to the inability to transfer the tickets to those individuals. Others reported that ticket sales on resale platforms were fulfilled through the seller enabling access to the account where the tickets were purchased.