Women from Johnstown duped into buying fake Penguins Stanley Cup Finals tickets

PITTSBURGH — Three women told Channel 11 News that they drove from Johnstown to Pittsburgh Monday night for the Penguins first Stanley Cup Finals game against the San Jose Sharks in Pittsburgh only to learn that the tickets they bought were fake.

"I'm in college, and I don't have a lot of money. That was pretty much all of the money I had in my bank account at the time,” Penguins fan Jillian Foster said.

Foster told Channel 11 News on Tuesday that she found a Craigslist ad for tickets for Monday’s Penguins game and negotiated with the seller for a better price.

"He was like I could do three for $300, so I was jumping off the walls. I was so excited,” Foster said.

However, when she and her two friends arrived at the gate with the Craigslist tickets, they were turned away.

“We went in, and when they tried to scan them, it didn't scan right,” Foster said.

She said the tickets looked real, so Channel 11 News sat down with a representative with the Better Business Bureau to prevent others from being duped.

"There are so many different appearances of legitimate tickets, and it's also easy nowadays for scammers to replicate the legitimate tickets so that they appear completely real,” Catlin Driscoll, with the BBB, said.

Driscoll offered the following advice:

• Only buy tickets from trusted sources, such as Ticketmaster or the NHL Ticket Exchange.
• Beware if a seller asks for payment via wire transfer, prepaid debit card or cash.
• Be wary of buying tickets outside of event's venue.

"If you get to the gate and find out that the tickets aren't legitimate and you aren't able to get in, you really have little recourse because that scalper will be long gone with your cash and you'll be unable to find them,” Driscoll said.

She added that if a ticket deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Reviews and ratings of ticket sellers and resellers are available through the

.

Cox Media Group