It's tout-rageous!

The problem was highlighted after seats went on sale for a live version of the cult TV show The Mighty Boosh in November at the George Street venue.

Although tickets from the official agency Ticketmaster, costing £25, sold out in days, secondary firms are brokering tickets for up to £129, excluding processing and postage and packing fees.

While the New Theatre and Ticketmaster claimed they were powerless to stop the practice, which is not illegal, critics claimed it was unfair to people on low incomes.

Joel Barnett, of the New Theatre, said: "There is very little theatres can do to prevent the non-official sellers acquiring tickets and, as long as customers continue to purchase tickets from non-official sellers, this practice is likely to continue."

Ticketmaster's Carolyn Sims added that although they had a rigorous policy preventing more than six tickets being sold to any one address or credit card, many people bought the maximum amount and sold those they did not need.

Oxford University Student Union president Martin McClusky said: "This is obviously not good, especially for people with limited income. I do not support people buying extra tickets to sell on, but Oxford is an expensive place to live and people do a lot of things to supplement their income.

"I can understand why people do it, but it's not fair."

The Oxford Mail found tickets for The Mighty Boosh available on two internet sites.

The London Ticket Shop, based in Hungary, was selling them for £35-£75, excluding a £7-£15 transaction fee and £5.45 postage.

But Seatwave, which calls itself a fan-to-fan exchange website, was advertising seats for £95-£129, with processing fees starting at £17, plus £6.50 postage.

On eBay, two people were auctioning two tickets for the New Theatre performances. One had reached £77 after 13 bids.

Seatwave chief marketing officer James Burgess said: "We act as a middleman and guarantee a safe transaction for the buying and selling of tickets.

"People can sell their tickets at whatever price they want. We let them know roughly what people are prepared to pay, but some people put the price too high, and they usually don't sell.

"About 30 per cent of the tickets on our site actually sell for lower than their face value, and we insist sellers always let buyers know the face value.

"We charge a 15 per cent plus VAT processing fee. We've spent nearly £3m on call centres and technology for this site, so we have to make that charge."

It is not illegal to sell or tout tickets, except for football matches where resale is prohibited in order to segregate fans.

Richard Wightman of Oxfordshire Trading Standards said under the Price Indication (Resale of Tickets) Regulations 1994, people reselling tickets had to abide by certain rules.

They must disclose the face value of the tickets, and divulge information about where the seats are in the venue - so buyers are aware of any blind spots or poor views.

Mr Wightman added: "If there are a lot of complaints about this type of thing then we would investigate, but at the moment it's up to the consumer to make the choice about whether they're willing to pay the higher prices."

News of the inflated ticket sales comes ahead of the publication of a report by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee on Wednesday which is expected to condemn secondary agencies following an extensive investigation.