Just a few minutes ago, tickets to see Blind Guardian at The Showbox in Seattle went on sale. I jumped on it, because I've loved them for years but never did catch an opportunity to see them before. Ticket is $45. Great! I figure there'll probably be an $8 service fee; sucks but that's just how things are now, right?

$16.21 service fee. $1.50 handling fee. That's a 40% upcharge for absolutely no reason.

Even the venue's phone number just redirects to the AXS line; the same company charging the ridiculous fee online.

I'm not paying that. I'll keep watching local bands instead.

How much is too much for you guys?

Yea, they're the same around here in MI.

They're exorbitant and there isn't a god damned thing we can do.

Out of curiousity, I went on ticketmaster last summer to check on Kiss tickets. For me and my wife, it wouldve been roughly $220 for almost nosebleed tickets. The fees were almost $50 each. A week later, Cradle of Filth announced they were coming here on the same day and I got a deal on Labor day, which was less than half the price of the Kiss fees.

I recently saw Metallica(the service fee was $20 I think) and the last arena concert I saw was Transsiberian Orchestra(probably $25 fee). Ridiculous fees, but it was worth it.

Ticketmaster's fees seem ok here in New Zealand. It may be the effect of our govt's Commerce Commission. The fee for my recent purchase was only 5.3%. A couple of smaller venues here have made deals with Moshtix now (part of Ticketmaster since 2010) and fees are about 5% on there as well.

Though fees for smaller/local shows via the locally-owned ticketing companies can work out to 10% or more. I just looked up Cosmic Ticketing and it puts 33% (including credit card fee) on a $10 show, but their fee % reduces down towards 5% as the ticket price gets higher.

I've been wondering tho if the ticket prices themselves are more expensive here compared to overseas but have never been able to make exact comparisons. I know they've obviously got extra costs to get here but I'm still curious. The Iron Maiden ticket I bought cost a bloody fortune, great seat tho.

You have the ideal example for a direct comparison right there as Maiden's touring the USA late next year too. One concert I looked up (Baltimore) appears to be US$154.50 for normal seats and US$124.50 for standing (excluding fees). Whereas here I think it worked out to a little under US$120 + fees for either based on the comments I saw.

Mr. Bungle/Melvins is about 10% more expensive in Australia compared to here. We're a small country with inferior wages so makes sense I guess.

This is one of the reasons I've all but quit going to shows from mainstream bands. Sometimes the ticket
price will be double once you get to the final check out page. Fuck that.

I've mostly been to more underground shows in the past couple of years, so I haven't seen such fees. That's pretty high. My most recent ticket purchase had a C$3.50 fee. It was more if you wanted the ticket mailed, but the extra fell in line with mailing cost + handling, nothing outrageous. I just selected "will call" - it's always worked for me at that venue before.

I'm thinking of seeing Iron Maiden in October in Quebec City if there's still some tickets left in a few months (they put them on sale a few days short of one year before the show - I hate that). It's at an NHL-size arena, so no doubt the fees will hurt.