JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A local man is looking for answers and claims he didn’t get what was advertised online when he bought tickets to a New Year’s Eve bar crawl event.
Steven Hubbard, and dozens of others, bought tickets for the “New Year’s Eve Bar Crawl – Jacksonville” event on Eventbrite, an online event management site where people can promote and sell tickets.
Looking for last-minute New Year’s Eve plans, Hubbard and his girlfriend found tickets to the event advertised online.
“We just bought some tickets and thought, you know, this would be fun. Cool. Check out some places, meet some new people,” Hubbard said.
The Eventbrite page promised free drinks, free entry into local bars and a souvenir champagne flute — all of which Hubbard said didn’t happen.
He said a group of about 30 people were part of the bar crawl. They all checked in at Underbelly, the first bar listed on the event page.
“Underbelly wasn’t offering any drink specials, like they said they were on the page. And then about 30 minutes later, a band gets on stage and says, ‘Hey, if you’re not part of our concert, you don’t have tickets, you got to get out just for concert people only.’ And we walked outside and everyone’s kind of like, ‘What do we do?’ So we didn’t know what was going on. And so, we just went to the next bar on the list was which was Bold City,” Hubbard said.
News4JAX reached out to the bars listed on the bar crawl’s event page. Underbelly said registration happened at their bar, but the event organizer left quickly.
Bold City Brewery confirmed they closed at 6 p.m. on New Year’s Eve. They’ve participated in bar crawls in the past, but were not fully aware of this one.
“So we left. Went to the next bar on the list. And it was just bar after bar, ‘What are you talking about? We have no idea. What drinks specials?’ Like, nobody honored anything. There was no contact from anybody,” Hubbard said.
Tickets cost about $40 per person. Money that Hubbard feels he was conned out of.
“I’m canceling my credit cards and everything because I don’t know what kind of information they have and what they plan to do with it,” Hubbard said.
The event organizer “Top Shelf Bar Crawls” wrote that the event was a success to News4JAX and also explained that the event is self-guided.
“We strive to put on the best events and understand that some things are not within our control,” the organizers wrote in an email.
“I mean, about what I’m doing? Laughing,” Hubbard responded after learning the response from the organizer.
Eventbrite said they take inauthentic content on their platform seriously and are investigating.
At this point, no refunds have been offered. None of the bars listed on the event said they were a part of planning or sponsoring the bar crawl.
It can be hard to know for sure if events are legitimate when buying tickets online. However, reading reviews and researching the event organizer is always a good idea if an event seems suspicious or too good to be true.
Also, consider paying for tickets online with a credit card, so if it turns out to be a scam, you can dispute the charge and get your money refunded.