A devoted fan of WNBA star Caitlin Clark was thrilled to score tickets to see her play against the Chicago Sky in June, but encountered issues when trying to use them.
Out over $1,000, she turned to NBC 5 Responds for assistance.
“When Caitlin Clark joined the WNBA, I immediately went online to purchase tickets for the Sky,” said the super fan, who we’ll refer to as Jackie for privacy.
She bought four tickets from the third-party site Tick Pick for $600. The tickets were transferred to her Ticketmaster account as usual, but when she arrived at the game, they didn’t work.
“I scanned all four tickets, and they showed up as they’re not working,” said Jackie.
Confused, she sought help at the Ticketmaster window.
The agent informed her that the tickets had been transferred to someone else the week prior. Jackie believed her account had been hacked, but didn’t want to miss seeing Clark play, so she bought new tickets for $1,300.
After the game, she contacted both Tick Pick and Ticketmaster multiple times and eventually received a promise of a refund from Ticketmaster.
However, Ticketmaster mistakenly refunded her $129 for a comedy show instead of the lost Fever tickets. That’s when she reached out to NBC 5 Responds for help.
Tick Pick stated they have no control over cybersecurity practices and Jackie needed to contact Ticketmaster for assistance.
A Ticketmaster representative mentioned that Jackie’s account was likely compromised by a bad actor in an isolated incident. They are refunding the $1,350 she paid for the replacement tickets as a “one-time courtesy” and replacing her Green Bay Packers season tickets as they couldn’t confirm if those were also compromised.
Jackie remains skeptical as there have been previous data breaches at Ticketmaster. The company has offered impacted customers 12 months of free identity monitoring.
She has since secured her account and NBC 5 Responds helped her to reclaim her money, a total of $1,352.
Ticketmaster advises that if tickets were purchased through a third-party site, like Tick Pick, refunds should be sought through the third-party.
Key takeaways:
Prevent ticket theft by regularly changing your passwords for ticketing websites/accounts.
Enable two-factor authentication on your accounts to add an extra layer of security.
