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Football club’s sponsorship-for-tickets scheme sent to Fair Trading
By Max Maddison
NSW Fair Trading is probing concerns A-League Women’s club Canberra United breached the state’s scalping laws by offering access to tickets for the Matildas’ sold-out World Cup semi-final in exchange for sponsorship of $2500.
With the near 75,600 tickets to Wednesday’s game against England sold out, NSW Better Regulation and Fair Trading Minister Anoulack Chanthivong said any endeavours to exploit the Matildas’ historic success were “pretty low”.
A Facebook post from Canberra United offering access to Matildas’s tickets in exchange for sponsorship.Credit: Facebook
On Monday night, Canberra United – an inaugural member of the W-League – said businesses who committed to sponsoring the football club for the upcoming 2023-24 season could “gain access” to tickets for the semi-final, with offers starting from $2500 plus GST.
Ticket prices ranged from $30 to $1100 for the semi-final at the Olympic Stadium.
The club’s social media posts were deleted on Tuesday.
NSW laws introduced in 2018 make it an offence to resell a ticket to an event for more than 10 per cent of the original price plus transaction costs.
With the Matildas buoyed by record interest across the country, Chanthivong said he was pleased the post had been removed, but had asked Fair Trading to write to Canberra United to “let them know their obligations when reselling tickets for events in NSW”.
“The Matildas have delivered an incredible moment of national pride, you’d have to be pretty low to take advantage … Fair Trading has ramped up proactive monitoring of online platforms to catch out those ripping people off,” he said.
“At face value this doesn’t look acceptable, but Fair Trading will need to look into the specifics.”
Canberra United chief executive Ivan Slavich and a club spokesman were contacted for comment.
Better Regulation and Fair Trading Minister Anoulack Chanthivong says any efforts to exploit the Matildas’ success are “pretty low”.Credit: Chris Lane
Across Facebook and Twitter posts, Canberra United wrote: “If your business commits to sponsoring Canberra United for the 2023/2024 Liberty A-League season by 2pm tomorrow, Tuesday 15 August, you can gain access to tickets for the sold-out Australia v England FIFA Women’s World Cup Semi-Final in Sydney this Wednesday.”
Slavich had told The Canberra Times on Tuesday: “Reach out, we have tickets available which people cannot access any other way.”
The Matildas’ heart-stopping penalty-shootout win over France on Saturday captured the nation’s attention, with an estimated average audience of 4.904 million Australians, according to VOZ figures, making it one of the nation’s most-viewed TV sporting event in almost two decades.
The fervour around Wednesday’s match led the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission deputy chair Catriona Lowe to warn of scams ahead of the game
“Understandably, Australians are inspired by the phenomenal success of the Matildas, but fans should be very careful when last-minute ticket shopping for hugely popular events such as the World Cup finals,” Lowe said in a statement.
“We are already seeing initial reports of scam activity, particularly on Facebook, where scammers are responding to posts from people looking for tickets and using compromised accounts to sell non-existent tickets.”
NSW government sources said so far there had not been a huge uptick in complaints about scalping for the Matildas’ clash, with only one specifically noted by Tuesday.
An inaugural member of the W-League, Canberra United have won the competition twice (2011-12 and 2014) since the club was established in 2008.
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