Bosses of a leading ticket agency have apologized to Bruce Springsteen and his fans in a dispute over sales for the rocker's upcoming tour.

Fans of the Born to Run hitmaker were angry when they were unable to buy certain seats from the Ticketmaster.com website, and were redirected to another agency charging a higher price.

Springsteen insisted he was "furious" and described the move as an "abuse of our fans and our trust".

And Ticketmaster chiefs have now apologized for the blunder - promising it won't happen again and offering a refund to any fans who paid over the odds as a result.

The agency's CEO Irving Azoff says, "While we were genuinely trying to do the right thing for fans in providing more choices when the tickets they requested from the primary on-sale were not available, we clearly missed the mark. Fans are confused and angry, which is the opposite of what we hoped to accomplish. We sincerely apologize to Bruce, his organization and, above all, his fans.

"We recognize that we need to change our course. We have committed to Bruce and state publicly here that we have taken down all links for Bruce's shows directing fans from Ticketmaster to TicketsNow. This redirection only occurred as a choice when we could not satisfy fans' specific search request for primary ticket inventory, but to make sure there is no misunderstanding in the future, we also publicly state that we will never again link to TicketsNow in a manner that can possibly create any confusion during a high-demand on-sale."

Azoff also promises to refund the difference between the face value and resale value for any fan affected, adding: "Please don't abuse this good faith gesture - we did not give brokers any preferential access to tickets."

(This news article provided by World Entertainment News Network)