Taylor Swift concert tickets: warning over online scam

Maria Hurley had a plan to give her two daughters a surprise by gifting them Taylor Swift tickets for the summer concert next year at Wembley Stadium.

While browsing through the Newport Life and Newport Memories Facebook pages, she stumbled upon a seller offering four tickets. Maria believed the tickets to be authentic as a mutual friend was selling them.

“The woman who was selling the tickets looked legit as we had a mutual friend, so I messaged her to see what they knew about my friend and said that she was lovely and a carer. I was happy with that,” she said.

Taylor Swift is due to play at Wembley Stadium in June and August next year. (Image: PA)Taylor Swift is due to play at Wembley Stadium in June and August next year. 

“She messaged me back and said she had four tickets, but I only wanted three but understood it would leave her in a predicament to sell only one, but she told me it wasn’t a problem.

“She told me to go onto my Ticketmaster account and make sure that I can log on to receive the tickets once they were transferred, then I was told to use PayPal and she kept rushing me to send the money.”

Ms Hurley told the Argus the excitement on her daughter's faces on Christmas morning clouded her judgement when purchasing the tickets from a seller calling herself Angela Aziz, who she believed to be local.

“She told me that she would let them go to someone else, I was in Christmas morning face mode for my daughters, and I wanted them, and I was happy.

Ms Hurley believed the ticket sale was legit due to having a mutual friend in Newport. Picture: Maria Hurley (Image: Maria Hurley)Ms Hurley believed the ticket sale was legitimate due to having a mutual friend in Newport. Picture: Maria Hurley. 

“The woman spoke in perfect English prior to receiving payment for the tickets, then once the money was transferred messages were back in broken English.

“She asked me to send a screenshot of my account and asked for the names of my daughters so she could transfer the tickets and I honestly thought it was legit.”

After waiting an hour to receive the tickets, she realised it was a scam and contacted her bank right away. She now faces a stressful wait to see if she can get her money back.

Angela received £750 from Ms Hurley and subsequently deleted her Facebook account. Ms Hurley now wants to warn others about scams on social media.

The scammer from Newport, has deleted her facebook account following the scam (Image: Maria Hurley)The scammer apparently from Newport, has deleted her account following the incident 

She added: “I literally cried all day, I feel sick to my stomach because of how unguarded I was thinking that they were local people.

“The bank said they have had 100s of calls a minute about Taylor Swift. I am now inundated with scammers trying to scam me and I am absolutely gutted. It’s a lot of money to lose.

“Please tell everyone to learn from this, as I wish I had given it to someone needy and now I couldn’t buy them if I wanted to as I can’t afford to. People are so vile.”