Harry Potter and the Cursed Child: Ticket-holders turned away as seats are touted for up to £6,000

Roaring success: the first preview of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
Nigel Howard
Jamie Bullen15 August 2016

Dozens of ticket-holders have been refused entry to the new Harry Potter stageplay as producers try to tackle rampant touting which has seen seats go for more than £6,000.

Sixty people have been turned away from the Palace Theatre ahead of performances of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child after staff were ordered to deny admission to those who bought tickets using unauthorised retailers.

It comes as tickets for the hugely popular West End play, which have a face value of up to £70, are being made available online for more than £6,000.

A ticket to watch one part of the show was reportedly up for sale on the Viagogo website for £6,213.76, while Stubhub were apparently offering two tickets for both parts for £4,999 each.

Producers described the secondary-ticket market as an “industry-wide plague” as they pledged to crack down on profiteering touts.

Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender said: "Our priority is to protect all our customers and are doing all we can to combat this issue.

“From the outset accessible pricing has been of paramount importance to us.

“We have already been able to identify, and refuse entry to a significant number of people who purchased tickets through resale sites and will continue to track down touts and refuse entry to anyone who has knowingly bought a ticket from a tout through the secondary market."

Re-selling tickets is not illegal but producers warned any sold online or elsewhere will be “automatically void”.

The show is sold out but 40 tickets are released every Friday in an online lottery for a performance the following week.

Earlier this month, 250,000 new tickets were snapped up by fans for the eagerly anticipated play.

The Standard has contacted Viagogo and Stubhub for a comment.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in