Sarah*H
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 3,983
Jun 25, 2014 20:07:06 GMT
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Post by Sarah*H on Mar 22, 2022 1:26:56 GMT
It helps to forecast staffing needs. It’s not a bad system at all. I have sympathy for the pea who didn’t get in, but she was coming during Spring Break, literally one of the busiest weeks of the year. It’s no different than trying to change the date of any other sold out event. Sometimes you just can’t get in 🤷🏻♀️ It’s better than the old system of turning people away at the gate if the park is at max capacity. Now, a reservation guarantees entry. A ticket has never, in the history of Disney, guaranteed entry. A ticket is valid for all 4 parks. In the past, if you showed up and the park was at capacity, you were simply turned away and you could go to another park. Now you make reservations in advance so you know you can get in. I don’t understand how or why anyone could object to that. The thing I don't like about it is that park hopping has to be done after a certain time. When I go to WDW I like to go to the AK early and leave by lunch, now I think you can't hop until 2 or so? That part sucks. This is my biggest complaint with the new system. I have reservations for when we move DS in. We want to do Rise and Smugglers and then hop to EPCOT. We'll be done with those two rides by 8 am and then have to wait 6 hours. It's an enormous waste of time for the people who DO play their game and purchase the add ons.
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Post by myshelly on Mar 22, 2022 1:31:07 GMT
That’s not how Disney sells tickets. You buy a theme park admission ticket, which is good for all 4 parks, then you reserve a park. They don’t sell park specific tickets. I don't know what to tell you other than the app in my phone clearly stated one of the park names for X day. It did not say "Any Park". It said "Park Name". Maybe this another "gotcha" where you have to know the system and what it really means. Again, not how I want to spend my time. Correct. Because you had a park ticket and a park reservation. The app shows your reservation. The ticket and the reservation are two separate things and yes, this is one of the things you need to understand about the system and what it really means.
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Post by myshelly on Mar 22, 2022 1:33:03 GMT
It helps to forecast staffing needs. It’s not a bad system at all. I have sympathy for the pea who didn’t get in, but she was coming during Spring Break, literally one of the busiest weeks of the year. It’s no different than trying to change the date of any other sold out event. Sometimes you just can’t get in 🤷🏻♀️ It’s better than the old system of turning people away at the gate if the park is at max capacity. Now, a reservation guarantees entry. A ticket has never, in the history of Disney, guaranteed entry. A ticket is valid for all 4 parks. In the past, if you showed up and the park was at capacity, you were simply turned away and you could go to another park. Now you make reservations in advance so you know you can get in. I don’t understand how or why anyone could object to that. The thing I don't like about it is that park hopping has to be done after a certain time. When I go to WDW I like to go to the AK early and leave by lunch, now I think you can't hop until 2 or so? That part sucks. 2:00. They strictly enforce the 2:00 and you must have checked in at your first park before you go to the second park (in other words, you can’t use it as a work around for not getting a reservation for the park you wanted). I agree with you that this change makes park hopper less worth it. I was a fan of park hoppers when DH and I went before kids, but I’m not a fan of it with kids, so I don’t have strong feelings about it now.
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tincin
Drama Llama
Posts: 5,368
Jul 25, 2014 4:55:32 GMT
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Post by tincin on Mar 22, 2022 1:36:41 GMT
We took three trips to Disney when our kids were young. We used the Fastpass system and I thought it worked great. The new system just seems like a backhanded way of raising ticket prices. It seems like just about every guest will be forced to purchase the Genie + or spend all of their day standing in line to ride one or two rides. If I had young kids now, I probably wouldn’t go to Disney. It’s just gotten too expensive. Every guest won’t have to stand in line, only the ones who aren’t loaded.
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Post by Laurie on Mar 22, 2022 1:46:06 GMT
We took three trips to Disney when our kids were young. We used the Fastpass system and I thought it worked great. The new system just seems like a backhanded way of raising ticket prices. It seems like just about every guest will be forced to purchase the Genie + or spend all of their day standing in line to ride one or two rides. If I had young kids now, I probably wouldn’t go to Disney. It’s just gotten too expensive. Every guest won’t have to stand in line, only the ones who aren’t loaded. Which is how Universal Studios works as well. I am honestly surprised it took Disney this long to make the change given the success of this method at Universal.
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Post by myshelly on Mar 22, 2022 1:49:17 GMT
Every guest won’t have to stand in line, only the ones who aren’t loaded. Which is how Universal Studios works as well. I am honestly surprised it took Disney this long to make the change given the success of this method at Universal. I just wish Disney’s system worked like Universal’s!
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Post by rahnee on Mar 22, 2022 1:53:16 GMT
Our family are huge Disney Fans. Our last 5 family holidays have been to Disney World with a cruise and Universal thrown in. The three before that were to Disneyland. Our last trip was June/July 2019. We are currently have Fort Wilderness booked for September this year but will be cancelling. The plan currently is to rebook for December 2023 but I have to say, as much as I want to go, I'm considering changing plans. So far we have considered Hawaii and a driving trip around California, Nevada and Arizona.
It's hugely expensive to travel from Australia. Flights alone last time cost us $10,000AUD. And then the exchange rate really gets us. I just don't know if I want to spend that amount of money on the experience as it is at the moment. We loved Fastpass+. It was great knowing that we had three rides booked each day, especially on some days that we would choose to start late. The new system just doesn't appeal to us. If I was going to pay $15 per day, I'd rather pay for the old system. We would always park hop and on some occasions would choose to have breakfast and a couple of rides before hopping over to another park. We can't do this anymore as we would have to wait until 2pm. There were times that we would change our plans at the last minute if the parks appeared too busy. WE can't do that any more either due to the park reservations.
To be honest, it just seems like a huge amount of money for what would be a more restrictive and much more expensive experience.
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Post by papersilly on Mar 22, 2022 1:54:13 GMT
I can't think of anyone who is really happy with all of the changes that have been made in the last few years - except for the shareholders. This is where I am conflicted. As a passholder, I am not thrilled with many of the changes, rise in prices, and greater limitations on when we can go. HOWEVER, as a long time shareholder who is hoping for a decent retirement, I hope the company continues to keep growing and increasing its profits and revenue stream. Even if I'm one of the people contributing to the revenue stream by spending money at the parks, paying for their streaming service, or buying their merch.
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Post by ameslou on Mar 22, 2022 2:15:49 GMT
I don't know what to tell you other than the app in my phone clearly stated one of the park names for X day. It did not say "Any Park". It said "Park Name". Maybe this another "gotcha" where you have to know the system and what it really means. Again, not how I want to spend my time. Correct. Because you had a park ticket and a park reservation. The app shows your reservation. The ticket and the reservation are two separate things and yes, this is one of the things you need to understand about the system and what it really means. I think you are so caught up in correcting me / defending Disney that you're not hearing what I'm saying. In the app it said "Park A" .. this must have been the ticket because when I drilled further into the app it told me I did NOT have a reservation - for that park or any other park. When we called in to try to get a park reservation (this was a couple of hours of time wasted btw - waiting to talk to a person) the agent confirmed we didn't have a reservation and COULD NOT add one bc there were none available. There was no visual cue in the app that I was missing something - no "click here" to add your reservation, no images in the app that make it obvious that I had a ticket but didn't have a reservation. It was really a fluke that we didn't roll up to the park when it opened only to be turned away. Another pea mentioned upthread that the technology is difficult to navigate, and this app interface is another point for that thesis statement.
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