If you are a music fan, you will be familiar with the maddening process of trying to purchase tickets to watch your favourite artist perform live.

Gigs featuring the biggest music acts often sell out in minutes, leaving thousands of fans heading down alternative routes to secure tickets.

Unscrupulous resale websites have become the scourge of the music industry in recent years by charging hugely inflated prices to customers.

In many cases, fans have needed to scoop a Betway online slots jackpot before being able to buy tickets from sites of this nature.

The resale market controversy raised its head again this week when tickets for Sam Fender’s two shows at the home of Newcastle United went on sale.

Tickets for the gigs quickly sold out on traditional platforms, but subsequently became available for exorbitant amounts on resale sites.

The most expensive tickets for the gigs were initially priced at just £63.25, but fans reported seeing them online for £1,121 later the same day.

Fender then issued a statement via his official Instagram page confirming that anyone caught with resale tickets would not be allowed entry into his shows.

He encouraged fans to only purchase from official vendors or trusted resale sites that insist on tickets being sold at face value.

The issue of inflated prices for resale tickets is one which the music industry has yet to fully get to grips with.

Technology has allowed ticket touts to become far more sophisticated with their operations and fans are increasingly being taken to the cleaners financially.

Using bulk purchasing software programs, they are able to snap up hundreds of tickets before advertising them on resale sites.

While there have been attempts to clamp down on this type of practice, they have largely proved to be unsuccessful.

A United States government accountability report in 2018 highlighted the scale of the problem, claiming that the vast majority of gig tickets are bought by professional brokers.

They discovered that prices were marked up by an average of 49 percent, while a 7,000% mark-up was found on tickets for a One Direction concert.

Resale sites are not alone in taking advantage of music fans, with some of the industry’s leading online ticket outlets implementing questionable tactics.

These include the introduction of ‘dynamic pricing’, which inflates the asking price for gig tickets based on real-time demand.

This algorithm-based technology has been approved for use by many top music acts including Bruce Springsteen, Coldplay, Harry Styles and Taylor Swift.

With the average ticket price for elite level gigs more than tripling since the mid-1990s, it is tough to justify this mode of operation.

Fender’s decision to bar resale tickets from his gigs in Newcastle is unquestionably a step in the right direction, but more is needed to prevent music fans from continually being take for a ride.

Stronger regulation from governments would certainly be a welcome move to address a situation that is threatening to spiral out of control.