Ontario has levied three administrative penalties totaling C$25,000 against SeatGeek Canada for violations of the province’s ticket resale rules, as a dispute between the government and resale marketplaces over a price cap that took effect in April continues to escalate.
According to Ontario’s Consumer Beware List, the penalties were issued on August 28 and include C$10,000 for making a ticket available or facilitating a sale that exceeded the resale-price cap, C$5,000 for failing to disclose the total price paid to the primary seller, and C$10,000 for facilitating a sale without receiving proof of that original price. The penalties were first reported by The Globe and Mail.
No criminal charges accompany the penalties. Administrative penalties under Ontario’s Ticket Sales Act are enforcement measures rather than convictions and can be appealed. SeatGeek did not say whether it plans to appeal or provide details about the transactions involved.
How the Penalty Amounts Were Calculated
Ontario regulations classify violations by severity, setting corporate base penalties of C$3,000 for minor violations, C$5,000 for moderate violations and C$10,000 for major violations. Violating the resale-price cap and facilitating a sale without proof of original purchase price are both classified as major violations, while failing to disclose the original price is classified as moderate. SeatGeek’s penalties of C$10,000, C$5,000 and C$10,000 correspond to those respective base amounts. Ontario announced in June that penalties can escalate for repeat violations, reaching as much as C$25,000 for a third or subsequent order involving the same statutory provision.
SeatGeek Says Compliance Guidance Is Still Missing
SeatGeek’s vice president of government affairs, Joe Freeman, told TicketNews the company has spent months trying to get Ontario officials to clarify how independent resale marketplaces are supposed to comply with the requirement to verify an original ticket price. “We continue to engage with the Ontario government in good faith to get clear guidance on how to comply with this law, and we have not yet received meaningful direction,” Freeman said.
Freeman said the central issue remains unresolved even after the province began issuing monetary penalties. “The core challenge hasn’t changed,” he said. “Many sellers, including season ticket holders, don’t have access to the original face value of their tickets.” He added that the information needed to verify an original price “sits with the primary ticketer, and Ticketmaster has not been forthcoming with it,” limiting independent platforms’ ability to obtain or verify what a seller originally paid.
Ticketmaster has previously disputed SeatGeek’s characterization, saying primary ticket purchases come with receipts documenting the amount paid and that such information can be provided to resale platforms by sellers.
SeatGeek says it has notified third-party sellers using its marketplace that Ontario’s law is in effect and that sellers are expected to comply. When Ontario earlier placed SeatGeek and StubHub on its Consumer Beware List this summer, both companies said they had been seeking additional guidance from the province on how the system was meant to work.
An Unresolved Question Over Proof Standards
The dispute centers on what qualifies as acceptable proof of an original ticket price and how an independent marketplace is expected to verify it. Ontario’s Ticket Sales Act bars a seller from listing a ticket through a secondary marketplace unless proof of the total original price is provided, and bars the marketplace from facilitating the sale until that proof is received.
The law gives Ontario’s Minister of Public and Business Service Delivery and Procurement authority to make regulations “specifying what constitutes proof” for these requirements. TicketNews reported it has not located a regulation defining a specific authentication standard, and that Ontario’s public consumer guidance does not specify what form proof must take or whether platforms are expected to independently verify its authenticity.
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