Ticketmaster apologizes to Taylor Swift and her fans for ticketing debacle

CTV National News: Ticketmaster under fire U.S. lawmakers grill Ticketmaster’s parent company for its Taylor Swift ticket fiasco and stranglehold on the industry. Vanessa Lee reports.

Ticketmaster apologized to Taylor Swift and her fans late Friday night after a ticketing debacle this week that made it difficult for consumers to buy tickets to the pop star's new tour.

"We want to apologize to Taylor and all of her fans — especially those who had a terrible experience trying to purchase tickets," the ticketing site said in the blog post.

The company added that it strives to make ticket buying "as easy as possible," but that "hasn't been the case for many people trying to buy tickets" to Swift's tour, which kicks off in March and will hit 52 stadiums across the US over five months.

The company said that it is working to "shore up our tech for the new bar that has been set by demand" for her tour. "Once we get through that, if there are any next steps, updates will be shared accordingly," it wrote.

The mea culpa comes after Swift spoke out earlier on Friday about how the situation was "excruciating" for her to watch as it unfolded into chaos.

"I'm not going to make excuses for anyone because we asked them, multiple times, if they could handle this kind of demand and we were assured they could," the singer wrote in an Instagram post on Friday afternoon. "It's truly amazing that 2.4 million people got tickets, but it really pisses me off that a lot of them feel like they went through several bear attacks to get them."

Swift added that she would try to "figure out how this situation can be improved moving forward."

Sales for the singer's new Eras Tour began Tuesday, but overwhelming demand snarled the ticketing site, infuriating countless fans who couldn't buy tickets. Customers complained on social media about Ticketmaster not loading, saying the platform didn't allow them to access tickets, even if they had a pre-sale code for verified fans.

On Thursday, Ticketmaster announced that the sale to the general public, scheduled to begin Friday, was canceled due to "extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand."

"To those who didn't get tickets, all I can say is that my hope is to provide more opportunities for us to get together and sing these songs," Swift said.