missroserose | Face to face with a modern horror

I'd heard in the past, in much the same way one hears urban legends regarding missing kidneys and ice baths, that Ticketmaster charges completely unreasonable fees for their services in helping you procure a ticket to the live event of your choice. The tales, while good for the occasional sleepover scare, never left me with more than a vague chill at the base of my spine - after all, large-scale live events were a rarity in Juneau, and those requiring Ticketmaster's services completely unknown.

Suddenly, however, I find myself in a situation where I might actually wish to purchase tickets to a live event! Hesitantly, I type in Ticketmaster's address, and navigate through the surprisingly easy-to-use interface, and select the seats I wish to purchase.

Then we get to the checkout page.

$41.50 x 2 tickets, base price. (This was expected, obviously.)
$2.00 x 2 tickets, "facility charge". (All right, the venue wants a cut, fine.)
$8.40 x 2 tickets, "convenience fee". (WTF?!)

$103.80 for two tickets that were *supposed* to be $83. Note the more-than-20%-markup.

But they're not done. Oh, no.

Scrolling down to the "shipping" options, I see (placed first and highlighted) their "Most convenient delivery option: Print your tickets whenever you want!". For an additional $2.50. Following that are various physical shipment options, all involving UPS and none less than $10 (for a couple of slips of paper?!), and then finally, at the very bottom, "Will call" (which requires the original purchaser holding the credit card used for the purchase and a government-issued ID) for no extra charge.

It gets better.

Scroll down further, and they offer the "opportunity" to make a donation to St. Jude's Children's Hospital, conveniently packaged with your Ticketmaster purchase. Because Ticketmaster is such a generous institution, that they even offer a "Yes! Please send the more-than-one-fifth-of-my-ticket-price-that's-not-paying-for-the-actual-ticket to help those poor bald children in the cancer ward!" No, wait, they don't, because that would actually require some sacrifice on their part. As it is, they can claim altruistic intentions (prominently advertised is the claim that "100% of your donation goes directly to their program!" That's, like, your whole donation! And it all goes to the place you're supposedly donating to!) without putting forward one whit of effort.

Thank you, Ticketmaster. You've made a believer of me. I'll be doubly thankful the next time I'm traveling on business and someone offers to buy me a drink.