Broadway.com 40% service charge on Gift Certificate?

[theaternut]

Went to use a gift certificate this morning and they charge a 40% service charge? The hell with that!

[Jordan Catalano]

Doesn't surprise me. I worked for them for exactly one week many years ago and quit because their charges made me so uncomfortable when dealing with customers.

[ljay889]

Well they're ticket brokers, aren't they?

[theaternut]

It is such a rip off.

[dramamama611]

I would say Bway.com is about the worst place to buy tickets. They appear as a ticketmaster-esque system, but they are a broker with insance mark ups and service charges.

I'm guessing that the service charge has little to do with the gift certificate.

Additionally, if you don't use the GC....you let them simply keep all the money that was spent.

I have steered many a person away from purchasing GC and tickets from them.

[Jordan Catalano]

And what's so horrible is that they're BROADWAY.COM. I mean, if you're planning a trip to NYC and googling Broadway and tickets, they're going to pop right up and they seem like (obviously) the best place to get your tickets.

SUCH A SCAM.

[theaternut]

It is a scam aimed at the innocent tourist or first time ticket buyer.

[broadwaydevil]

It's highway robbery. No one should ever buy tickets from that horrific website. I'm sorry a presumably well-intentioned person tried to give you what they thought would be a nice gift not realizing that 40% of the money would go to this horrendous company.

[CapnHook]

The major reason why they can charge that much and get away with it is because they ARE Broadway.com. The tourists and first-time ticket buyers innocently think that Broadway.com is somehow "official.". No red flags get raised. So Broadway.com can get away with charging whatever they want because people don't know any better.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

I've gotten a bunch of Bway.com gift certificates as gifts in the past, and made sure to tell family members not to buy them anymore because they are an absolute ripoff. A $200 gift card barely buys one ticket.

And it doesn't help that a majority of the people I've dealt with on their customer service phone line are rude.

[Visceral_Fella]

Wow, I never knew this. I've ordered group tickets to around 10 shows from Broadway.com. I always thought I was getting a good price. Where should I purchase group tickets from?

I must admit that I've never purchased single tickets from them because of the outrageous prices, but the group rates seem fine.

[bdn223]

Group tickets are a different story. Broadway.com is the #1 groupsales agent for Broadway. Group sales prices are also set by a shows producers usually giving the sales agency x% of each ticket they are able to sell so that they don't charge service fees. I have used both Broadway.com and Telecharge Group sales and they have the same prices. To be honest I just like using Telecharge Group Sales more because I find that the company has better customer service and I trust them more since tickets in general are Telecharge's business.

[Visceral_Fella]

Ah, I see. Thanks for that. I always order on behalf of a residence hall so we get the group and sometimes student discount. That makes sense.

[Mr Roxy]

Another name besides greed is usery

[theaternut]

I have a feeling they make most of their money from unsuspecting foreign tourists. I have no idea about group sales.

[broadwayjim42]

Daym...thanks for the heads up although really, so many of the ticket sources outside Telecharge and Tickemaster seem to be ripoffs. Even with concert tickets, I tell kids and friends to avoid thrid-party suppliers.

My kids and ex gave me Telecharge gift certificate for Christmas and given my thrifty ways, a $75 certificate almost paid for two full shows. I went straight to the box office and each transaction was drama-free. I'll stick with them.

[dramamama611]

Anything outside of those two (or the box office) are brokers.