Some Taylor Swift fans are hoping to snag last-minute tickets

When Samantha Osaduke saw Taylor Swift in Toronto during her Reputation tour about six years ago, she bought her ticket a week before the show for around $60.

But the pop star's longtime fan says snagging tickets to Swift's Toronto shows during her record-breaking Eras Tour is a whole different story.

“This time it completely exploded. It was crazy,” she said.

“It was incredibly difficult. Nobody I know has concert tickets either.”

Osaduke is among the Swifties who say they do everything from searching for last-minute tickets on Ticketmaster to entering every competition imaginable that offers tickets as prizes in the hopes of getting a last-minute deal -Get your ticket to one of Swift's six sold-out Toronto shows at the Rogers Centre.

But one fan says she was scammed out of over $800 out of desperation.

Looking for a ticket leads to getting scammed

Swift's world tour has led to a surge in interest in tickets in cities across North America and Europe. When they went on sale for their Toronto dates last August, demand far exceeded supply, and many fans who had signed up for a code that would have allowed them to purchase tickets ended up on a waiting list.

Resold nosebleed tickets to Swift's opening show in Toronto sold for over $2,000 on Wednesday.

Maggie Chan says she believes feverish demand for tickets and her desperation to get one led to her being scammed out of $850 in October by someone pretending to have tickets.

She says she joined a Facebook group that positioned itself as a group of fans helping each other get tickets.

“I kind of thought there was no way other Swifties would lead me astray.”

She contacted another group member who told her they could sell her a ticket to one of Swift's shows at the Rogers Center for $850.

Although there were some warning signs, such as PayPal rejecting her first payment, Chan believed she was simply experiencing technical issues.

But then, after Chan's payment came through, she said the scammer told her to send her another $100 to cover a fee for arranging ticket sales.

After she declined, Chan said the scammer eventually sent her an email with the supposed ticket. When she opened it, it was clearly not an official Ticketmaster transfer, she says.

“I'm generally someone who's pretty smart and able to kind of figure things out,” she said.

“But what I noticed during the scam is that people really take advantage of your most vulnerable moments and the times when your higher cognitive thinking or critical thinking skills are pushed aside by your emotions and desperation.”

Despite this experience, Chan still tries to see one of her favorite artists live, including driving an hour to a local store where there is a competition for the coveted tickets.

VIEW | Fans, the city is getting ready to welcome Taylor Swift to Toronto:

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“Scrub everywhere”

Carolyn Craig says she has been trying to get tickets to one of Swift's tour dates, including in Toronto, since they were announced two years ago.

“I put myself on every waiting list. I looked everywhere and tried to enter some competitions but it never caught on,” she said.

She hoped she would succeed when Ticketmaster made a limited number of tickets to the Toronto shows available to fans a few days ago.

“I ran five machines, constantly refreshing, constantly refreshing, to see if I could get a single ticket for any of the evenings.”

Craig says she saw Swift in concert before about 10 years ago. But aside from seeing the star perform again, she says she wants to be part of the excitement that the Eras tour has created.

“Just being among all her fans and seeing how much everyone loves her and seeing her perform live, I would be over the moon,” she said.

“She already has so much of a fan base, but there's just something about this concert that turned so many heads that I think everyone just wants to be there because it's the Eras tour.”