The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced settlement between Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. and its affiliates, who were earlier charged with practicing misleading strategy for selling event tickets to 14 Springsteen concerts in 2009. According to the settlement, the consumers who bought the tickets for high prices would get refund for the expenses.

FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said, “Ticketmaster’s refrain is that it sold through TicketsNow to give consumers more choices. But when you steer consumers to your resale Web sites without clear disclosures, and they unknowingly buy tickets at higher prices, they'll be left with a sour note”.

The tickets were sold through its Website TicketsNow and in the settlement, the company has agreed upon refunding with an assurance of clarifying costs and risks of buying through its reseller sites. U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois charged the Ticketmaster under violation of FTC Act after tickets went on sale on February 2, 2009.

Tickets were made available for Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band concerts in May and June and many other concerts in October 2008 and February 2009. It has been said that Ticketmaster displayed a message addressing “No Tickets Found" on its Web page, hence misguiding the consumers. Then this Web page was used to redirect ignorant consumers to TicketsNow, where they had to pay more than four times the face value of each ticket.