Ticket sellers.

Plain English Breakdown

The official source material does not provide specific details about enforcement mechanisms or penalties.

Rules for Ticket Sellers

AB-1720 sets rules for ticket sellers, resellers, and marketplaces to prevent unfair pricing practices by requiring them to disclose original prices and limiting resale fees.

What This Bill Does

• Defines a ticket seller as someone who sells tickets for compensation or otherwise.
• Prohibits ticket sellers from selling tickets at more than the original price plus an additional 10% if they got it directly from the event organizer.
• Requires all mandatory fees and charges to be included in advertised prices.
• Limits resale marketplaces' fees to no more than 10% of the original ticket price.
• Requires sellers to show the original purchase price on tickets.

Who It Names or Affects

• Ticket sellers
• Resellers
• Event organizers
• Consumers buying tickets

Terms To Know

Primary contractor

The person or organization responsible for organizing an event and selling tickets.

Reseller

Someone who buys a ticket from the original seller and then sells it to someone else.

Limits and Unknowns

• Does not specify what happens if sellers do not follow these rules.
• The bill does not explain how it will be enforced or what penalties apply.
• It is unclear who exactly would be responsible for enforcing the new regulations.

Official Summary Text

AB 1720, as amended, Haney.
Ticket sellers.
Existing law provides for the comprehensive regulation of ticket sellers, including a requirement to maintain records of ticket sales, deposits, and refunds. For purposes of these provisions, existing law defines a ticket seller as any person who, for compensation, commission, or otherwise, sells admission tickets to an event, and defines a primary contractor as the person or organization who is responsible for the event for which tickets are being sold. Existing law makes it unlawful for a ticket seller to represent that they can deliver or cause to be delivered a ticket at a specific price or within a specific price range and to fail to deliver within a reasonable time or by a contracted time the tickets at or below the price stated or within the range of prices stated. Existing law requires a ticket seller to disclose that a service charge is imposed by the ticket seller and is
added to the actual ticket price by the seller in any advertisement or promotion for any event by the ticket seller. Existing law makes a violation of the laws regulating ticket sellers a misdemeanor.
Existing law, with specified exceptions, makes unlawful advertising, displaying, or offering a price for a good or service that does not include all mandatory fees or charges other than taxes or fees imposed by a government on the transaction, as specified.
This bill, except as specified, would prohibit a ticket
seller,
reseller,
as defined, from selling a ticket for more than the equivalent of the original price for the ticket
if it
has been acquired directly from the primary contractor plus 10%. The bill
plus 10%, as specified, and
would also prohibit a ticket
seller
reseller
from advertising, displaying, or offering a price for a ticket that does not include all mandatory fees or
and charges
charges. The bill would prohibit a ticket resale marketplace, as defined, from charging more than 10% of the original face value of the ticket, as specified,
and would require a ticket
seller
resale marketplace to require the ticket reseller
to disclose the original price of the
ticket to the consumer.
ticket, as described. The bill would require an original seller, as defined, to print or display on a ticket the original purchase price of that ticket.
Because the bill would create new crimes, it would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would make
a ticket seller
an original seller, ticket reseller, or ticket resale marketplace
that violates these provisions subject to specified civil penalties and would authorize the Attorney General,
or a district attorney,
county counsel, or city attorney to assess and recover those penalties in a civil action. By expanding the scope of an existing crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions
establish procedures for making that reimbursement.
This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.

Current Bill Text

Download Bill PDF