Selling Guide

How to Sell to Other Fans

This Guide Will Cover These Sections:

1. Buyer Pays First

2. Paypal Goods and Services (G&S)

3. Where to Sell Tickets

4. Buyers To Watch Out For

5. How to Provide and Protect Your Proof of Tickets

6. How to Sell Tickets Safely - The Basic Steps

7. If You Are Concerned About the Paypal Hold on Buyer Payment

8. How to Protect Your Tickets (copied from Buying Guide)

9. The Buyer is Disputing the Paypal Transaction

10. The Buyer Says Their Tickets Have Been Voided by Ticketmaster

11. Local Cash Deals

12. Selling on Stubhub/Tickpick/VividSeats/GameTime/Seatgeek

13. Taxes on Ticket Sales (1099-K Form)

14. Questions?

1. Buyer Pays First

As a seller, you are in an advantageous position. Because the buyer needs to pay you before you send them tickets. They have to trust you first. The only easy way for a buyer to scam you is to get you to send a ticket(s) before being paid. So don't send them anything unless you have been paid and verified that the funds are in your Paypal account. This is the biggest thing to remember. If they claim to have sent payment and you don't see it in your paypal account, don't send tickets no matter how much they protest. They can always file a dispute if needed through Paypal G&S, but Ticketmaster can be far less reliable at helping sellers who have been scammed. From what I have heard, Seatgeek might be even less helpful on that front.

If you think that there has been a legitimate error on Paypal's end (extremely rare) and the buyer insists that they have paid, you can screen record yourself going from your chat with them to your paypal account to show them the lack of payment. You can also ask them to forward the paypal email showing that they paid or ask them to send a screenshot or screen-recording of their payment receipt. Keep in mind that some scammers may try to forward you a fake paypal email that they made themselves or fake a screen recording. Do not send tickets unless you have payment in your account. Contact paypal to confirm what happened, let the buyer file a dispute if needed (if they haven't actually paid they won't be able to obviously). But do not send tickets until payment has been received.

Conversely, if you sent the tickets to the buyer and they claim they haven't received the tickets, do NOT refund the buyer through paypal unless they have not accepted the tickets yet and you can still cancel the ticket transfer. And make sure you do cancel the ticket transfer(s) before refunding anything. You will receive an automatic email from ticketmaster/seatgeek showing that you sent the tickets and who you sent them to, and you will also receive an email when the buyer accepts the tickets. If the buyer has accepted the tickets, you are not obligated to refund them anything at this point. You can forward the emails as proof that the tickets have been sent and accepted. This is all covered in more detail in Section 6 below.

2. Paypal Goods and Services (G&S)

As a seller, you will be expected to accept payment through Paypal G&S. As a warning, this payment method will not allow you to withdraw payment for 2-21 days in most cases, depending on how Paypal assesses the transaction risk, see Section 7 below for more details. Insisting on other payment methods is grounds for banning in many resell groups, because it is what almost every scammer does. So if you want to sell on those groups, be ready to use Paypal G&S.

If a buyer insists on paying using another method, I would be very wary of them. I don't know what the scam would be (getting their bank or credit card to reverse the transaction maybe?), but paypal offers protection for both buyer and seller and is the accepted mode of payment for resales. So stick to that.

3. Where to Sell Tickets

You have a lot of options if you want to sell tickets, especially if you are selling at or near face value. Stubhub and other resale sites will be covered in a separate section below. Some good options if you want to sell to fans and receive payment before the event happens (you won't get paid out until after the event on official resale sites):

List of facebook groups that I would recommend (read group rules before applying, posting or commenting):
https://www.facebook.com/groups/taylorswifteras - My Favorite - Face Value Only, Heavily Moderated to Remove Scammers
https://www.facebook.com/groups/641021527186195 - Face Value, Higher Prices allowed if you bought on resale and are reselling, Good Moderation
https://www.facebook.com/groups/658417809253511 
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1307255519690386
https://www.facebook.com/groups/655468609445926
https://www.facebook.com/groups/449457823627413
https://www.facebook.com/groups/428866215158476  - mostly merch
*Run away from any FB group that is public or wants to use admins as a middleman, they are full of scammers.

Twitter: twitter.com/ErasTourResell  - vets seller proof and posts ticket info so buyers can DM you. Paypal G&S required as always.

4. Buyers To Watch Out For

See Section 3 of the Buying Guide for a description of what scammer profile's look like and how they talk. Obviously the dynamics are different here on the selling side, buyers will be eager to buy from you if you are selling anywhere near face value, that's a given and not a red flag. In addition, most scammers pose as sellers, not buyers. It is much harder to scam a seller than it is to scam an unwitting buyer. Just don't let anyone push you into sending any tickets until you have confirmed that payment has been received.

Expect that the buyer may ask for proof of ticket ownership in the forms of screen recordings or to facetime with you - see buyer's guide for more details. This is normal and expected given the amount of scammers that are out there. If you are a legit seller, then supplying proof should be no problem. Refusal to supply proof of ticket ownership, within reason, is grounds for banning in many resell groups. If you are suspicious that the buyer is trying to steal your proof so they can scam with it, you can cancel your deal with them, but you will be expected to show the proof to a group admin if asked. But as long as the buyer is polite about everything and is not sending red flags, do your best to assure them that you are a legit seller.

As a seller who is selling tickets for reasonable prices, you have wide discretion to choose who you sell to. You will probably get a lot of messages from potential buyers as soon as your post is made. You can choose to go by a first come first serve basis (common) or look through the profiles of potential buyers and talk to them to make sure they are a true fan. You could also leave your post open for some time then do a drawing to see who gets first shot at the tickets (by numbering the comments and using a random number generator or something similar). No matter what method you choose, I would scan the buyer's profile to see that it has some posts/interaction and is not a burner account. And if you get any bad vibes from the buyer, it is absolutely within your rights to move on to another buyer or cancel your sale. 

5. How to Provide and Protect Your Proof of Tickets

It is a good idea to include watermarked screenshots of the tickets themselves and maybe your ticketmaster email in your selling post, if possible. The buyer will be asking for proof of tickets unless they are clueless. They may ask for more than one form of proof. See the Section 4 of the Buying Guide for a detailed description of what they might ask for and why. What does it mean to protect proof? Well you want to make sure scammers won't take it and use it to scam someone else. The basics:

Screenshots of tickets: Use the screenshot feature on your phone (preferred) or computer to screenshot a picture of the tickets in your ticketmaster/seatgeek app or ticketmaster account. You don't need to show the barcodes (screenshots of barcodes will not work for ticketmaster anyway, and seatgeek claims they won't work on their platform either). Use the iphone photos app editor (edit then marker button in upper right) to write your name on the screenshot. Make sure your name covers a good portion of the ticket. MS Paint can be used on computer. Android should have a similar editing feature as well.

Image 1: Example Ticket Screenshot with Watermark

(Seat details blacked out for privacy - you should be willing to show the seat details)

Image 2: Example SeatGeek Ticket (Glendale and Arlington shows only)

(QR code does not strictly need to be blacked out as screenshots cannot be used to enter venue)

Screenshots of emails: Screenshot the email showing you got the tickets from ticketmaster or seatgeek and you can black out the order # if you want. Write a watermark on the screenshot as described above.

Image 3: Example Ticketmaster Email with Watermark

Screen recordings of tickets: Use your phones record feature (google if you don't know how) to record yourself going from the chat with the buyer to the tickets you will be selling in the app. Do something unique like clicking the transfer button and writing the buyer's name into the transfer field. You won't accidentally transfer the ticket unless you put an email in and hit send, so don't worry about that. For computer you can use a free screen recording software but phone recordings are preferred as they are harder to fake. You can use editing software to watermark your video but it is not commonly done. If your buyer seems suspicious I would not trust them with a screen recording and move on to another buyer. 

Screen recordings of Emails: Uncommon but if asked for, you would record yourself going from the chat with the buyer to the ticket receipt email in your inbox. Be aware that unless you edit this using an editing app, the buyer will see your order # (which from what I understand is not an actual risk - they can call ticketmaster and ask about the order but ticketmaster has other ways to verify your identity and won't transfer tickets just because someone has an order #). You can use editing software to watermark your video but it is not commonly done. If your buyer seems suspicious I would not trust them with a screen recording and move on to another buyer.  

Facetime+Screenshare: If you and the buyer both have iphones or androids, you can facetime each other and share screens. Then you would show them the tickets in your app similar to the screen recording of tickets described above. Even if you don't have the same phone type, you can use fb messenger, whatsapp etc. to facetime and verify that you are both real people, if you want to do that.

Forwarding Ticket Receipt Email: This is a very good form of proof, but you will have to forward an email that has both your order # and potentially the last 4 digits of your credit card to the buyer. To my knowledge, sharing that info should not be dangerous for you, but I would only forward a ticket receipt to a buyer who you trust.

6. How to Sell Tickets Safely - The Basic Steps

We are going to assume you have made contact with a reputable-looking buyer and agreed upon a price at this point (and agreed whether that price includes the 3% Paypal G&S fee). We will also assume that you have a Paypal account, as that is how you will be receiving payment. Next steps:

1. Provide proof of tickets if asked. See above Section 5 above for more details.

2. Verify that the buyer has a ticketmaster account set up (or seatgeek if it is a Glendale or Arlington ticket), as that is how they will be receiving the tickets.

3. Once the buyer is satisfied that you have the tickets and are legit, you have a few options:

• You can ask for their paypal email, search for them on paypal, and request the agreed upon amount from them. Make sure that in the notes you include that the transaction is for Taylor Swift tickets, the number of tickets they are buying in that transaction, the venue and date for the tickets, the ticket section/row/seat number(s), and the email of the buyer that the tickets will be sent to. See Section 4 of the Buying Guide for more details on this. Buyer will have to hit pay on your request then go through a couple menus to select their payment type, to select goods and services and finally hit send to transfer the payment. 

• If you have a business account, you can send an invoice to the buyer for the tickets. This invoice will automatically have buyer protection, just make sure that you have described the tickets properly as stated in the previous bullet.

• If you are feeling lazy or if the buyer asks to(they might if they read this guide), they can send you the payment through good and services. In that case they will be asking for your paypal email and the money will arrive in your account. You can request that they buyer screenshot the payment screen before hitting send to make sure that everything looks good. Make sure that the amount is correct and that they have described the tickets properly as stated in the first bullet point above.

4. Once you have verified that the funds are in your paypal account, you can transfer the tickets to the buyer. Note that there will probably be a paypal hold on withdrawing the buyer funds but it is nothing to worry about, see Section 7 below. Verify that the buyer's ticketmaster or seatgeek email is the one stated on the paypal G&S payment/invoice as described above. Then go to your ticketmaster or seatgeek app or website if on computer. 

For the ticketmaster app , go to the tickets you want to sell and click the blue transfer button below one of the tickets you are trying to sell. Now a menu will pop up where you can click the ticket or tickets you want to transfer. If you bought the tickets together from ticketmaster or they were transferred to you from someone as a group of tickets, then you can transfer multiple tickets to the buyer at once. Otherwise you will need to transfer the tickets individually.

Either way, you will select the ticket or tickets and then click the "Transfer To" button in the bottom right. Then you will select manually enter a recipient and type in the buyers first and last name and their email that is included in the paypal payment description as shown in Image 4 below. You can also add a note if you want. Then you click "Transfer X Tickets" in the bottom right where "X" is the number of tickets you are sending.

Image 4: Sample Transfer Screen

You will receive an email from ticketmaster immediately after transferring the tickets stating that you sent them to the buyer as shown in Image 5. This email will show the buyer's name and email. If for any reason you need to cancel the transfer, you can do that with one click from the ticket screen, as long as the buyer has not accepted the tickets yet. You will also receive an email after the buyer accepts the tickets as shown in Image 6. At this point you cannot get the tickets back unless the buyer voluntarily sends them to you or if you get ticketmaster involved, if by some chance the buyer scammed you (so make sure payment has been received before you send anything). These emails are your main form of proof that you delivered the tickets. You can also screen record yourself sending the tickets and take screenshots of the messages with the buyer as extra proof.

Image 5: Sample Email - Tickets have been sent

Image 6: Sample Email - Tickets have been accepted

For the Seatgeek app, go to the ticket(s) you want to send and click the "Send" button under the ticket. Then type in the buyer's email that is included in the paypal description and click the "send to [buyer's email]" option that appears below that as shown in Image 7. Verify that the buyer's name looks correct on the next screen and then click "Send Ticket" as shown in Image 8. I don't know if you can send multiple tickets at once on Seatgeek, but sending them individually is fine.

Image 7: Seatgeek screen that appears after you click "Send"

Image 8: Seatgeek screen that appears after you click the buyer's email. "Send Ticket" sends the ticket to the buyer.

You will receive an email after the buyer accepts the ticket(s) as shown in Image 9, and you can cancel the transfer anytime before the buyer accepts the tickets if needed. Be aware that the seatgeek transfer email does not list the email you sent the tickets to, just the buyer's name, so it might be a good idea to screen record yourself sending the tickets to the buyer as added proof. Taking a screen recording or screenshots of your messages with the buyer is also a good idea.

Image 9: Seatgeek email showing that the buyer accepted the ticket

The process for transferring tickets through the Ticketmaster/Seatgeek website is very similar to the apps, you will just be clicking on the computer instead of tapping your phone. 

5. Once the buyer accepts your tickets, wish them a good time and be happy you helped a fan get tickets. Also screen record or screenshot your digital communication with the buyer, just in case you need to document anything later.

7. If You Are Concerned About the Paypal Hold on Buyer Payment

So the buyer sent you payment through Paypal G&S and Paypal put a hold on their payment so you can't immediately withdraw it to your bank. This payment hold is standard and can be removed in 2-21 days, depending on how Paypal assesses the risk of the transaction (it is on the longer end of that scale for new paypal accounts or accounts with low activity). Sometimes the hold can be lifted on the earlier end of this range if the buyer clicks a "confirm receipt" button that appears at earliest 48 hours after payment has been sent (this button only appears on the paypal website, not the paypal app for some reason).

Sometimes this button will not appear at all and you will have to wait 21 days to withdraw the funds from Paypal. But either way, the funds belong to you after they have been sent, and the only way for the buyer to reverse the transaction is to file and win a dispute. So the standard practice is for you to send tickets immediately after verifying that the money has been received in your paypal account, regardless of the hold. This is how ebay works for most sellers as well. Stubhub and other resell sites won't even pay sellers until after the event occurs. So selling to an individual using Paypal G&S is the fastest (safe) method to get paid other than a local cash deal. 

If you are absolutely against sending tickets before the Paypal hold is removed, you need to tell the buyer that upfront and expect that they might not be willing to proceed any further. In some cases you could also be going against group rules for wherever you are selling. If you find this guide and are reading this section after they buyer has paid and you didn't know about the hold, you can ask the buyer if they are comfortable waiting until after the hold is cleared before you send tickets. Expect them to say no in most cases because it will be a 21 day hold if they don't click the confirm receipt button (you could also ask them if they are comfortable waiting until that button appears, then you send the tickets, then they click confirm receipt - but that button may never appear in which case you and the buyer would be waiting the full 21 days). If they are not ok with waiting to receive the tickets, you should refund them immediately.

8. How to Protect Your Tickets (copied from Buying Guide)

In order to minimize the chance that your tickets are stolen from you before you sell them, do these things:

1. Make sure your ticketmaster/seatgeek password is complex enough (following standard password guidelines) and that the password is unique to your ticketmaster account. Hackers can obtain lists of emails and password leaks from other compromised sites and then try to use that info to log into any other service, including ticketmaster. For seatgeek, you can and should set up 2 factor authentication as well.

2. Be careful who you hand your phone/computer to - the ticketmaster/seatgeek apps do not authenticate with face-id or password, and anyone that enters the app can transfer tickets out. That goes for browser windows that have saved logins for the websites as well. Side note - just don't hand your phone unlocked to strangers period. There are common scams where the person will try to transfer money out of your venmo etc. or go through your email. If they need to make a call and you really want to help, you can put them on speaker and hold the phone in a way they can't grab it easily. Or direct them to the front desk of a nearby store or gas station. 

3. Follow all best practices for cybersecurity aka don't download malware or give strangers remote access to your computer.

4. Ticketmaster has a password reset feature where you enter your email and they text you a reset code. Request a reset code and mute that phone number. I'm not going to explain why, but it's a good idea. 

9. The Buyer is Disputing the Paypal Transaction

If the buyer disputes the transaction and you actually scammed them, well they are going to get their payment back and you are wasting your time. If you did send them the tickets and they accepted them, you will have proof in the form of emails from Ticketmaster/Seatgeek (see images in Section 6 above) and extra proof if you recorded yourself sending the tickets and saved your communication with the buyer. Paypal will be contacting you to state your case and to send them evidence that the tickets were delivered. Send them the evidence and it should resolve in your favor. In the off-chance that Paypal doesn't resolve things correctly, you can call the ticketmaster Fraud Prevention line at 888-731-4111 to get them involved. 

10. The Buyer Says Their Tickets Have Been Voided by Ticketmaster

See Section 9 of the Buying Guide for an explanation of what a voided ticket looks and why they can be voided. If the buyer claims that the ticket(s) you sold them have been voided, it's time to think about a few things. 

If you were the original purchaser of the tickets aka you bought directly from ticketmaster/seatgeek, it's extremely unlikely that the fault for the voided tickets lies with you, unless you performed a credit card chargeback on ticketmaster (very hard to do and would be fraudulent obviously). I would call the Ticketmaster fraud line at 888-731-4111 to try to get more info on what happened if you are the original purchaser. This situation should be extremely rare, I haven't heard of it happening.

If you were not the original purchaser of the tickets and you obtained them from an individual, it's possible that whoever sold them to you obtained them illegitimately, or that someone further up the chain of buying/selling/trading was acting illegitimately. This is one reason why the buyer's guide recommends buying from original purchasers when possible. At this point you can try contacting whoever sold you the tickets to find out how they got them, if you didn't verify that info already when you purchased them.

Things can get very messy here, the buyer might file a Paypal dispute on you if you don't agree to refund them, but you in turn could file a dispute on whoever sold you the tickets if you think they are the bad actor/scammer. But it may be harder to prove the scam to paypal since the tickets changed hands since you bought them. And the scammer may be further up the chain as well. If you can work things out with other people in the buying/selling chain to go after the likely scammer (if you can even identify one) and not go immediately to a paypal dispute arms race where everyone files a dispute on each other, that is probably ideal. 

11. Local Cash Deals

Cash is preferred by some sellers as it guarantees no refunds can be given to the buyer without your consent or the force of law. I think they are inherently disadvantageous to the buyer, but many buyers will accept cash deals. They will likely ask for higher standards of proof than a Paypal G&S transaction and for good reason, see Section 12 of the Buying Guide for more details on what the buyer's perspective might be on this type of transaction. As a seller, the basics for you are:

1. Check that the buyer has a legit looking profile and talks like a normal person.

2. Provide whatever digital proof of tickets the buyer asks for.

3. Agree on a price with the buyer.

4. Have a facetime with the buyer where you show each other your IDs. Can cover the address with tape if you are worried about the buyer knowing where you live.  Look up the buyer's name to verify they aren't a dangerous/untrustworthy person, to the best of your abilities.

5. Agree on a time and a public, busy place to meet. Police station is highly preferred as a meeting place for obvious reasons. 

6. If you want, suggest to the buyer that you record the whole transaction (with a second phone and/or another person) for both of your protection(against potential violence or false allegations). If you are in a one-party consent state (wiretapping law), you don't need the buyer's permission to covertly record the entire transaction.

7. Double check that the buyer has a ticketmaster or seatgeek (Glendale/Arlington shows only) account set up to receive the tickets.

8. When you meet the buyer, introduce yourselves and then the buyer should show that they have the cash. Then you should show the buyer the tickets in your app. The buyer should then hand  you the cash, and then you transfer the tickets to the buyer. Make sure that the buyer has communicated electronically what email the tickets should be transferred to. Verify that the buyer has received the tickets.

9. Once the transaction is done, both you and the buyer should message each other electronically verifying that you have received the cash and that the buyer has received the tickets. Make sure to screen record or screen shot all electronic communication, as messages can be unsent on many apps.

12. Selling on Stubhub/Tickpick/VividSeats/GameTime/Seatgeek

These sites aren't really in the spirit of this guide, but I will cover them here anyway as they are an option. Resale sites are often where people go to get the highest prices for their tickets, as it is a completely open market with no rules about selling at face value. Another good thing about the resale sites is that most of them are good at verifying whether you have fulfilled your end of the deal aka sent the buyer the tickets. Just save your transfer emails from ticketmaster/seatgeek and screen record yourself sending the tickets as an extra layer of protection.

 There are many downsides to selling on these sites however, some of which are:

1. You will not be paid for your tickets until 5-10 business days after the event happens.

2. If your tickets differ in any way from what you describe them as (wrong row, obstructed view printed on ticket that you fail to disclose, wrong date), you can be penalized with a fine equal to the price you sold the tickets at, or penalized at the price required for the site to obtain replacement tickets acceptable to the buyer, if that replacement price is greater. For Taylor Swift tickets, these penalties can go up into the thousands of dollars. Sometimes you can get a one-time forgiveness or reduction in the penalty, but I wouldn't count on it. You may also be able to avoid the penalty by finding replacement tickets yourself that are acceptable to the buyer, but that can be tricky and expensive as well.

3. If you fail to deliver tickets that you listed, possibly because you sold them somewhere else and forgot to remove the listing, the same penalty described above will apply. 

4. If you fail to deliver the tickets by the date you promise to in the listing, the same penalty applies.

5. All of these sites will charge hefty fee to sell your tickets, oftentimes 10-30% of whatever the buyer pays will go to the resale site.

So if you don't need to be paid for your tickets anytime soon and you are sure that you can create an accurate listing and deliver the tickets on time, these sites are an option. Just be aware that the penalties for any kind of failure to deliver are high, and those penalties scale based on the value of the tickets in question.

13. Taxes on Ticket Sales (1099-K Form)

New rules are in effect for any tickets sold in 2023 or later. You will now receive a 1099-K tax form if you receive more than $600 for tickets sold through Paypal G&S or any resale site. The good news is that you are only taxed on your profits, so if you sold tickets at your face value (including Ticketmaster and Paypal fees), you can claim that as your cost basis and you won't owe any taxes on your sale. If you sold tickets for more than you paid, the profits will be taxed as capital gains (will be equal to your ordinary income tax rate in most cases).  Consult tax specific guides or a tax professional for more details.

14. Questions?

If you have any questions not covered by the guide, feel free to email me at taytixofficial@gmail.com.

Paypal Donation Link