StubHub spent more than a half a million dollars on refunds issued to customers who planned to attend events canceled by this weekend’s blackout in New York City, the online ticket exchange said Monday.
The sudden power outages Saturday in midtown Manhattan impacted more than 1,500 orders placed on StubHub, according to the eBay-owned ticket reseller.
Dozens of happenings were either canceled or postponed as a result of the blackout, including 27 different music and theater events StubHub sold tickets for, the company said.
StubHub ultimately refunded more than $500,000 worth of tickets after 25 of the 27 events were outright canceled, the company said.
“StubHub has our customers’ backs, and in the rare instances where something goes wrong, every ticket is 100% guaranteed,” said Daron Fowlks, StubHub vice president of global customer experience. “Saturday’s blackout in New York City was no exception.”
“As soon as we learned of the events affected, our team kicked into action and alerted customers and provided an update on the situation and processed a full refund for the events that weren’t rescheduled,” he said in a statement.
Thirty city blocks lost power Saturday for several hours due to outages that New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio blamed on a “mechanical issue.” More than 72,000 customers of Con Edison were affected, according to the utility company, including some of midtown’s most storied performance venues.
Pop singer Jennifer Lopez had already started performing at Madison Square Garden when her concert was cut short by the power outages Saturday. A rescheduled performance was subsequently held Monday evening.
A separate performance featuring Utah’s Millennial Choirs & Orchestras was moved to the street outside of Carnegie Hall after the historic concert venue lost power.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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