There's a nice wee festival happening down the coast for the next week or so and they have published a lovely programme with all the prices for their events there.

The problem is that you just can't buy the tickets at the published prices. You either have to book online through an outside ticket agency or you can purchase them at the official ticket booth which is also run on behalf of the festival by the same agency. Either way, a 5% booking fee is applied.
There are no other outlets and it is not possible to buy tickets "on the door"

There are no physical tickets now either. You need to print out a sheet of paper with a bar code or, if can show the ticket on your smart phone or tablet for scanning.... I've refused to get into this sort of nonsense on principle. It means bringing a phone, having it switched on, and praying that there is enough charge in the batteries. :-(
Usually, the stewards haven't a clue how to work the scanners either and the queue takes twice as long!

Anyway, neither this festival or ticket agency are any better or worse than most others these days. Unfortunately, it's the way of the world for event organisers to offload the responsibilty of ticket sales to outside agencies these days. Some are more efficient than others and the costs will vary too.

Even my local folk club is starting to head down this road but this is maybe due to the fact that our current Chair has spent too many years organising events within The Fringe and this has obviously shaped his views in this respect.

Anyway, I'm not totally against booking tickets via outside agencies. It can sometimes be convenient and I would naturally expect to pay a little more for this convenience(If there is any).
However, what I really dislike is when organisers provide absolutely no opportunity or outlet for customers to purchase tickets for events at face value. It had been my intention to wait and buy tickets at the actual festival for the less busy show and only book the essential ones in advance but I might as well have done everything at once in the first instance.
Grrrr.