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Ministers are set to investigate the use of “dynamic” pricing, which has driven up costs for thousands of music fans struggling to get tickets to see rock band Oasis.

The government will include the practices of sites such as Ticketmaster in an upcoming consultation on the UK ticket market, aimed at tackling unfair pricing and ticket sellers.

In a statement on Sunday evening, British Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said it was “depressing to see hugely inflated prices excluding ordinary fans from the chance to see their favourite band live”.

She said the government “will include issues around transparency and the use of dynamic pricing, including the technology around queuing systems that encourage this, in our forthcoming consultation on consumer protection in ticket resale”.

She added: “By working together with artists, the industry and fans, we can create a fairer system that ends the scourge of scams, rip-offs and reselling and ensures tickets are sold at fair prices.”

Ticketmaster, the world’s largest seller of music and sports tickets, has been criticized for using a “dynamic” pricing system that adjusts ticket prices based on demand, a practice often used in the U.S. Ticketmaster says the system helps stop ticket sellers and makes artists more money by allowing them to price their tickets closer to market value.

The Manchester band’s reunion created a huge demand for tickets among the band’s millions of fans, not only the original audience but also their children, given the revival of 1990s music among the younger generations.

Tickets for the first Oasis shows in the UK and Ireland in 16 years went on sale on Saturday morning, with the tour expected to gross hundreds of millions of pounds through ticket sales, hospitality and hotel packaging, merchandise and potential media rights sales. The band has already benefited from a rise in streaming services for its tracks.

However, fans were left angry after waiting hours for tickets only to find that the price of seats was much higher than originally stated. Hundreds of people took to social media to complain about the sky-high costs, with standing room prices at some venues going up by hundreds of pounds. Many also reported being thrown out of the queue after waiting for hours.

David Baines, Labour MP for St Helens North, said it was “shocking to hear that Ticketmaster UK is now using ‘dynamic pricing’ to rip off fans and rake in money”, adding that it was “particularly insulting to those who have been queuing all day”.

The Labour government has made tackling the high prices caused by ticket brokers – who often buy up large numbers of tickets and resell them at huge profit – a priority for its first year in power, and has said it will commit to fair and transparent ticket pricing.

Dublin MEP Regina Doherty said Ireland’s Competition and Consumer Protection Commission should investigate Ticketmaster following rising prices for Croke Park tickets in the city.

“The EU Digital Services Act contains sections specifically designed to ensure that large platforms that control aspects of the digital economy do not simply make up their own rules that are unfair to consumers,” she said. “I think TicketMaster’s ‘in-demand’ pricing structure certainly needs to be scrutinised in this context.”

Ticketmaster is owned by US media company Live Nation, which manages music venues and festivals. The outcry will heighten concerns among music executives and artists about Live Nation’s power after it acquired the ticketing platform in 2009, giving it control over both venue and artist management and ticket sales.

The U.S. Department of Justice, along with 30 state and district attorneys general, filed a civil antitrust lawsuit in May against Live Nation and Ticketmaster for “monopolization and other unlawful conduct that impedes competition in markets in the live entertainment industry.”

The lawsuit is aimed at restoring competition and giving fans better choices at lower prices. US Attorney General Merrick B Garland said it was “time to break up Live Nation-Ticketmaster”.

Cris Miller, global managing director of Viagogo, the world’s largest ticket resale marketplace for live events, said he was “pleased to see the Department of Justice finally take action” to charge Live Nation with monopolization. “Ticketmaster also has a monopoly (in the UK)… they have disproportionate control over the concerts.”

However, pricing strategies are also agreed with artists, which has drawn criticism of Oasis. Artists and promoters can reject dynamic pricing to create a level playing field for all fans.

Aidan Moffat of Scottish band Arab Strap said on X that, as “many people are discovering these days, dynamic pricing is an utterly despicable practice, and acts who do it are no better than the scammers they claim to oppose… The voice of the working class? Pfft.”

On its website, Ticketmaster said: “Prices are adjusted based on supply and demand. The goal is to give fans fair and safe access to the best tickets, while allowing artists and other people involved in organizing live events to price tickets closer to their true market value.”

Ticketmaster was not available for comment on Sunday, while organizer SJM Concerts did not immediately respond to a request for comment.