Taylor Swift fans upset by tickets no-show

Taylor Swift fans found out they'd bought fake tickets just days before the concert

Police have acted against an online ticket firm's website after hundreds of Taylor Swift fans were left without tickets they had paid for.

People found out just days before the concerts that tickets would not arrive.

Circle Tickets, the company that took the money, has disappeared and calls and emails are not being returned.

As the festival season gets into full swing, police have renewed warnings for people to be on their guard when ordering tickets online.

Circle Tickets billed itself as "one of Europe's largest and most established secondary ticket agencies", but BBC Radio 4's You and Yours has spoken to a number of people whose tickets have not arrived.

Other customers have reported the same problem with tickets they bought for other acts including Ed Sheeran, Paloma Faith, AC/DC and Neil Diamond.

The police have now taken action against the website.

Positive reviews

Sixteen-year-old Liora Resnick paid hundreds of pounds to see Taylor Swift in Manchester.

She said: "I'm really disappointed because we'd just finished our AS levels. I was going to go with two of my best friends. We were really excited and we'd been counting down for months. Taylor Swift is one of our favourite singers and it was going to be my first concert. We'd been building up to it for ages."

So far this month Action Fraud, the UK's national fraud and internet crime reporting centre, has received 533 reports of ticket fraud and 248 of them were related to Circle Tickets.

Australian rockers AC/DC are also on a major world tour at the moment

Robert Fox, from Bath, paid just over £200 to take his wife to see Taylor Swift as part of their first wedding anniversary celebrations.

Before paying with his debit card he investigated the company and found many positive reviews about Circle Tickets.

"Circle Tickets had a pretty good rating through the standard review sites, and they had a reputable payment gateway. I was paying on a card, and it all seemed to be fairly normal really. I'm fairly accustomed to paying online so this didn't seem out of the ordinary," he said.

Sellers disappearing

Reg Walker, who runs the Iridium Consultancy which tackles ticket fraud, said it was not the first time tickets had been sold well in advance only for the sellers to disappear without trace just days before the event.

"This needs to be taken more seriously. It's the responsibility of the police forces to investigate and frankly over a period of many years they've failed to do so," he said.

He said it was a matter of priorities for the police, so music and sports fans were missing out as a result.

City of London Police said it had referred the complaints about Circle Tickets to the Metropolitan Police and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau disrupted the ticket company's website following the reports.

The BBC attempted to contact Circle Tickets, but had no success.