Public Statement: Disclosure of Facts Regarding the Sale and Resale of Concert Tickets for BTS WORLD TOUR ‘ARIRANG’ IN BANGKOK
Public Statement: Disclosure of Facts Regarding the Sale and Resale of Concert Tickets for BTS WORLD TOUR ‘ARIRANG’ IN BANGKOK
“Thai BTS ARMY fans,” as consumers and the primary supporters of the BTS WORLD TOUR ‘ARIRANG’ IN BANGKOK concert, wish to disclose to the public the facts and evidence relating to the sale and resale of tickets for this concert. Those directly affected are the large number of consumers who attempted to purchase tickets through the normal process and were unable to complete their purchase, while resellers offered tickets at prices many times above face value within a short period after the sell-out was announced.
Live Nation Tero Co., Ltd., as concert organizer, and Thai Ticket Major Co., Ltd., as ticketing agent, opened ticket sales between 9–11 June 2026. During the sale, the system experienced severe technical failures that affected a large number of buyers.
After the sell-out was announced on 11 June 2026, a large volume of tickets appeared on the resale market almost immediately, at prices significantly above face value — despite the organizer having publicly announced measures prohibiting the use of automated programs and prohibiting ticket resale. To date, the organizer and ticketing agent have not fully enforced these announced measures.
Denied access by the system via Error 418 — a code the system uses to interpret the user as a bot — despite being genuine buyers waiting in the normal queue, and were forced to restart the queue each time
Experienced prolonged queue freezing — some had been queuing since the 9:00 AM opening and were only able to purchase between 4:00–4:10 PM
Experienced a system crash during seat selection or payment
Across every ticket sale round on the ticketing agent’s website, access was denied to a large number of genuine buyers, with the system interpreting normal user access as automated-program access. At the same time, the resale ticket pattern documented in evidence — showing show dates, zones, rows, and consecutive seat numbers appearing in sequential sets — occurred in a manner consistent with bulk purchasing via automated programs. The organizer had publicly announced Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions prohibiting the use of automated programs and prohibiting ticket resale before ticket sales opened. However, the most recent ticket eligibility verification measure announced by the organizer covers only cases where the name on the ticket does not match the attendee.
It should further be noted that users were blocked by Error 418, a code commonly used as a bot-blocking signal by website anti-bot protection systems. However, consistent reports from affected users indicate that they were genuine buyers queuing through the normal process, who did not use any automated program or assistive tool. Their click rates and page refresh rates were consistent with normal user behavior — not repetitive or abnormally rapid — yet they were repeatedly denied access by the system.
A large proportion of tickets listed for resale display show date, zone, row, and seat number data appearing in consecutive sequential sets — consistent with bulk purchasing via automated programs — and this pattern occurred across all three sale rounds.
After the sell-out was announced on 11 June 2026, third parties began progressively listing tickets for resale, while large numbers of buyers who had queued normally still had not gained access to the seating chart. According to compiled evidence, the cumulative overcharge total surged from ฿6.6 million to ฿27.3 million within just days.
Total documented overcharge ฿27,377,551, with a maximum resale price of ฿175,000 per ticket.
“The following policies will be strictly enforced” — announced by Live Nation Tero Co., Ltd. on 22 May 2026 and 2 June 2026, publicly before ticket sales opened
The name on the ticket must be in English and match the concert attendee. No exceptions. A valid ID will be required at entry. Power of attorney letters will not be accepted — only the original ticket holder will be admitted. If buying 4 tickets, 4 different English names must be entered, each matching the attendee’s ID. If a ticket with a duplicate name or a name not matching the presented document is found, the organizer reserves the right to deny entry without refund.
Buying or reselling tickets through unofficial sources — whether online or offline — may lead to your tickets being immediately canceled and invalid for entry. Tickets purchased from third parties or unauthorized sellers may be considered void. If this happens, you may be denied entry to the event, lose access to any included benefits or perks, and all related orders under the same account may be canceled without any refund.
Any transaction found to have been made through an automated computer program (“bot”), or by a buyer who created duplicate accounts to purchase tickets, or any action indicating tickets were purchased beyond the permitted limit, will have its order canceled without prior notice.
Tickets resold by third parties — other than the authorized agent Thai Ticket Major — may not be used for concert entry in any case.
1. The name on the ticket must be in English and match the concert attendee. No exceptions. A valid ID will be required at entry.
2. Power of attorney letters will not be accepted — only the original ticket holder will be admitted.
3. Buying or reselling tickets through unofficial sources may lead to your tickets being canceled and invalid for entry. Tickets purchased from third parties may be considered void — you may be denied entry, lose all benefits, and all orders under the same account may be canceled without refund.
Ownerships of Ticket and Wristbands
Any and all tickets and wristbands shall remain the property of the Concert/Event Promoter at all times and non transferable/non re-sellable without the Promoter’s prior consent. Any unlawful/unconsented transfer or reselling (or attempting to do so) is prohibited and may result in the seizure or cancellation of the tickets/wristbands without any refund or compensation and/or the ticket/wristband holders being refused entry to or removed from the Venue.
The organizer and ticketing agent have previously addressed issues of the same nature — both domestically and through their international parent company group.
Thai Ticket Major Co., Ltd. previously audited transactions found to involve the use of automated programs (bots) and returned the tickets obtained through those transactions to the system for resale — demonstrating that the ticketing agent has both the technology and the process to identify and resolve the same type of issue.
Thai Ticket Major previously issued a public warning directly to the Tixxa website for openly listing tickets for resale without rights or lawful authorization from the organizer — demonstrating that the ticketing agent has previously taken proactive measures against identified resale platforms.
The Live Nation/Ticketmaster group — parent company of this concert’s organizer — previously cancelled tickets found to have been obtained through automated programs for the Oasis Live ’25 reunion tour — demonstrating that this type of measure is a practice the parent company group has successfully carried out before.
These three precedents demonstrate that both the domestic ticketing agent and the international parent company group have the capability, technology, and practical track record to successfully address issues of automated-program use and ticket resale. The demands in this statement therefore ask that an existing, already-proven practice be applied — not a new demand without precedent.
Thai BTS ARMY fans submitted an open letter to the organizer and ticketing agent on 12 June 2026, calling for the Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions already announced to be seriously enforced — including auditing transactions that violate the stated conditions, pulling violating tickets, and returning them to the system for resale, with the results disclosed to the public — citing the precedents described above.
On 15 June 2026, a follow-up letter was submitted to demand progress, as no clarification or update had been received regarding the 12 June letter, while evidence of resale across all three show dates at prices above face value continued to appear publicly.
This letter pointed out that, since the purchase process requires buyers to enter the attendee’s full English name for every ticket before payment is processed — and the name is locked at the time of purchase — every ticket listed for resale will automatically have a name mismatch. Thus every ticket listed for resale inherently meets both the name-on-ticket condition and the ticket-ownership condition that the organizer and ticketing agent had themselves announced. This can be done proactively, without waiting for the concert date — seat number and zone data from resale listings can be directly cross-referenced against Thai Ticket Major’s own sales records.
The publicly reported cumulative overcharge total rose from ฿6.6 million to ฿27.3 million within 4 days, while the organizer and ticketing agent have not clarified or taken any public action.
Live Nation Tero Co., Ltd. issued an announcement of a ticket eligibility verification process, requiring buyers whose ticket name does not match the person presenting it to verify their identity between 20 June and 4 July 2026, failing which the ticket will be cancelled and returned to the system.
The issues that Thai BTS ARMY fans have reported are not limited to whether the name on the ticket matches the attendee. Yet this announcement references only the single name-matching requirement — while the Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions concerning bots and third-party ticket resale, which directly address the issue reported, are not addressed in this announcement at all.
On this same issue of the name on the ticket, there are also reports from multiple consumers of irregularities occurring directly at the ticketing agent’s own service counters, which suggest that the name-on-ticket issue may have a broader dimension than this eligibility verification announcement covers.
Data collection has found cases of third parties offering tickets listed for resale while stating that they could arrange for the name on the ticket to be changed to match the new buyer. In some cases, this was arranged to take place directly at the ticketing agent’s counter, and the newly issued ticket at the counter showed the new buyer’s name in place of the original buyer’s name.
In addition, cases have been found where the date printed on the physical ticket (or the “sale date” indicated on the ticket) falls after 11 June 2026 — the date the organizer announced that all rounds were sold out.
The above information is still being compiled and systematically verified, so it cannot yet be concluded whether this conduct is widespread or isolated, and no claim is made that any specific counter staff member was involved.
However, if these reports prove accurate, they would represent an important observation regarding the Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions the organizer itself announced, stating that the name on the ticket cannot be changed under any circumstances. If a channel for changing the name does in fact exist at the point of service, then the conditions the organizer has announced may not be consistent with actual practice.
Publicly clarify whether the announced ticket eligibility verification process covers the Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions concerning the use of automated programs and third-party ticket resale, and continue to update the public on progress.
Fully enforce all policy and terms & conditions announced — not only the name-matching requirement.
Return tickets verified to violate the announced Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions to the system for resale, in order to fairly distribute tickets to consumers.
Investigate whether publicly announcing Important Ticket Policy and Terms & Conditions and then failing to enforce them constitutes unfair conduct toward consumers under the Consumer Protection Act.
Order or recommend that the organizer and ticketing agent return tickets to the system for resale, if it is found that tickets listed for resale resulted from transactions violating the stated conditions.
Publicly disclose the results of any action taken, so that consumers still waiting to purchase tickets receive complete information.
Investigate whether the advertised resale of concert tickets at prices significantly above face value constitutes unfair trade practice or unfair pricing under the law.
Investigate whether the organizer and ticketing agent announcing a prohibition on resale and then failing to enforce it constitutes facilitating or permitting unfair trade.
Order or recommend that the organizer and ticketing agent enforce the announced policy and terms & conditions, to prevent further harm to consumers before the concert date.
Investigate whether the ticket purchase pattern shown by sequential seat numbers and zones appearing in sets across every sale round constitutes the use of automated computer programs or the creation of duplicate accounts for bulk ticket purchasing in a manner that constitutes an offense.
Coordinate with the ticketing agent to cross-reference ticket purchase transactions against the resale listing evidence, which details show date, zone, row, and seat number.
Investigate whether the pattern of concert ticket resale shown in the extensive evidence constitutes conducting business or engaging in regular trade activity subject to income tax under the law.
Consider approaches for auditing income from this type of ticket resale, both from sellers operating via social media and via intermediary websites, to ensure complete and lawful tax collection.