Ticketmaster made me cry today, and it is a grudge that will burn in my heart until the heat death of the universe. Do you want to avoid getting stuck with tickets 4x the price? Let me guide you.
I was trying to buy tickets for Dimension 20: Gauntlet at The Garden, as many thousands of people were when tickets opened at 10 a.m. ET on April 10. This was supposed to be a presale, meaning that the next few days would offer additional tickets for people. Nope. Madison Square Garden completely sold out — well, not exactly.
You see, Ticketmaster has a habit of raising prices when tickets are in high demand. (People have sued Ticketmaster for it.) I was on Ticketmaster at exactly 10 a.m. and I was behind only one person in the queue to buy tickets. I enter and then my browser is "Suspended" from the session. I had to rejoin the queue and waited nearly an hour to see that $120 tickets turned into $500+ tickets.
So what happened? To be clear I blame Ticketmaster, but it blamed my browser. Here's what you can do to avoid this.
How to avoid "Suspended" session — TL;DR
- If Suspended — Try again from a different device or a different location
- If Suspended — Ensure you have enabled JavaScript in your web browser
- If Suspended — Remove any third party browser plugins that may be running
- If Suspended — Try a different browser
- If Suspended — Try using mobile data
- If Suspended — Try disabling your VPN or anything that can block trackers/cookies
- If it's too late — Go to Stubhub (do not buy Ticketmaster's overpriced tickets)
How to avoid "Your Session Has Been Suspended"
First things first. If you're waiting for tickets to go on sale, the absolute first thing you should do is see if you can access any concert's tickets. If you're able to get to the purchasing screen, your browser will be fine. Otherwise, continue.
If "Your Session Has Been Suspended," you need to run through a checklist to see if you can get it back up and running. Ticketmaster claims that these three items may fix the issue:
- Try again from a different device or a different location
- Ensure you have enabled JavaScript in your web browser
- Remove any third party browser plugins that may be running
If none of these fixed your issue, just like it didn't fix my issue, then let's move on. At first, Ticketmaster didn't like my browser — I use Brave. I was able to fix this easily by disabling Brave's shield. If you have a VPN, you'll likely have to disable that as well. Apparently, Ticketmaster doesn't like anything that blocks trackers and cookies.
However, this did not resolve my issues. Ticketmaster didn't just suspend my Brave browser. Google Chrome was suspended, too. I then moved to my phone's browser. Guess what? Also suspended. I moved to a laptop. Also suspended. What the heck is going on?
Ticketmaster suspended every device connected to my Wi-Fi. The only device I could access Ticketmaster with was my phone via mobile data. I cannot express how much anxiety this pumped through my veins for that short amount of time.
I think I know why my Wi-Fi was suspended. I was looking for Hollywood Undead concert tickets a week ago, and every day I would check what the seating was like. Well, as it turned out, because I had that window open every day, Ticketmaster assumed I was a bot and banned my Wi-Fi from accessing Ticketmaster or Live Nation.
I contacted Ticketmaster support a week ago to get this issue resolved quickly and it never was. A representative said, "I've reviewed your account and see that you should be able to sign in, manage your account and access your orders." Despite me saying that I couldn't even access the website, they proceeded to tell me to log into my account and talk to a virtual assistant if I have questions.
So I had to resort to mobile data. Like a madman, I spent so much time zooming and scrolling into Madison Square Garden seats that kept disappearing and rising in price until I found a pair of seats for $500 a pop. I fell victim to the sunk-cost fallacy and purchased these tickets. PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS.
I find Ticketmaster's business practice of jacking up the prices is worse than what scalpers do, and I mean that sincerely. My wonderful wife found us tickets on Stubhub with better seats for half the price I paid to Ticketmaster.
