Ed Sheeran steps up war on touts by canceling 10,000 resold tickets

Written by . Published: July 17 2017

Ed Sheeran has stepped up his war on ticket touts by canceling 10,000 tickets that were snapped up for his U.K. tour by resellers.


Tickets for the singer/songwriter's eleven-date 2018 stadium tour were sold out within minutes. Even though more tickets were added a few hours later, it quickly became clear that many of the tickets had been bought by touts, who were then trying to sell on the tickets for vastly overinflated prices, such as $225,000 for one pair, on resale sites.

Promoters of Ed's tour had previously stressed that anyone who turns up to the shows and cannot provide the original booking information, valid ID and the credit card they used to book the tickets, will be refused entry.

But now they have taken things one step further, with Shape of You star Ed's spokesperson stating on Monday (17Jul17) that the majority of tickets purchased at inflated prices have now been canceled.

"Most ­profiteering companies heeded promoters’ warnings not to trade and resell tickets that would instantly be canceled. This resulted in 90 per cent of tickets being delivered into fans’ hands at the face value," the representative said in a statement.

"The process of analysing sales and canceling tickets purchased for purposes for resale will continue until the tour takes place."

The promoters of the tour and the National Trading Standards' cyber crime team teamed up to monitor purchases when the tickets initially went on sale.

In recent months, Ed has been very vocal about his dislike of the “fraud and hideous overpricing” on resale sites and has urged fans to only buy tickets through Twickets. The ticket resale site has strict rules whereby users can only sell tickets for face value or less.