It would indeed! But then, so is spending $250 for 4 hours of park time and a not-very-good parade, so clearly I don't understand Disney's target market these days.
Its "Mo Money Mo Money" if your old enough to get that joke
It would indeed! But then, so is spending $250 for 4 hours of park time and a not-very-good parade, so clearly I don't understand Disney's target market these days.
I did not read the full 10 pages, but i guess pre-pandemic the gaming of the FP system made it so unusable to many folks. I hated that. As a person who would wait and do the right thing and log in at the correct timeframes (legit based on my actual reservation I was going to use) and did not get any of the popular rides and if I did get one it was certainly not any good times.
Can we all agree that the pre-pandemic FP system was broken? (even if it was free, but I won't get into something free that is broken really has very little value to many, but it may still be of value to some)
IMHO, the FP system was horribly broken and while I may come to regret that position given the pay per ride option DLP is deploying which sounds awful for WDW. I don't really expect that since in DLP they have most guests on short stays based on my understanding. WDW they want you there for longer and the pay-per-ride scenario is not helpful. I suspect that we get a blanket upgrade like pay-per-day-per-person, which I will be fine with (I think).
In full disclosure I am also one of those people who have paid for a VIP tour in order to 'solve' a part of the old FP system problem. It was expensive and I had to make other decisions (like downgrade my hotel choice) to fund (a portion of) that option.
I think WDW unintentionally created a situation that in order to have a great experience you had to become educated and plan way in advance. Certainly everyone would agree WDW did not intentionally want those who did not get educated and plan over 60 days in advance to have a meh time. Yet that’s what they ended up with.
I think the FP+ at WDW was awesome for one group of guests at the expense of another, equally valued group of guests. This Genie app is their opportunity to fix that.
I heard a rumor that due to the anticipated high cost of the "new fast pass" system, Disney will accept Bitcoin and kidney donations as payment.That would be insane!
Not sure what the poster was referring to, but there were a couple ways to cheat the system via hotel reservations. ETA: I’m not sure what an overall effect it had on the system, and I’m not presuming that’s why Disney is making this change (I get that it’s all about $$$)Please define "gaming the system".
The only "gaming" that I was aware of was when people would acquire a FP for Grandma, who never entered the park, and then used the "change person" function in order to give it to someone else in their party. That loophole was closed by Disney a long time ago. So there would have been no reason to abandon the FP+ system to fix that.
Not sure what the poster was referring to, but there were a couple ways to cheat the system via hotel reservations.
I do think there were a few “broken” elements of FP+, though I did love the system overall. I’m very much interested in seeing if this new system makes it easier to acquire quicker line access to top tier rides. I was not a fan of hitting refresh 1000 times to get on FoP!
Can we all agree that the pre-pandemic FP system was broken?
As a person who would wait and do the right thing and log in at the correct timeframes
To me the problem with FP+ is that even though it was "available" to everyone, the most benefit derived from it went to a small fraction of the overall number of guests and at the same time made things worse for those who did not fully benefit from it.
A second option is what we have now: the people who plan out and are more informed get a "better" experience, at the expense of those who don't. Every "extra" ride that a "planner" gets is one less that a non-planner doesn't get. This isn't really new, and things like the Unofficial Guide/Touring Plans help planners exploit inefficiencies (like knowing low wait times, less crowded parks, etc.) and kind of maximize what they can do in their park time. This has been going on for >20 years, and Disney has always encouraged planning to some level, so I kind of doubt that they are going to completely get away from this. But, it's been encouraged even more in recent years with the moves to requiring advance FP reservations, booking park days and other reservations way ahead, etc. And, I can easily see Disney getting feedback or other info saying that the planning aspect has taken on too great of a role, and they need to back off, for the sake of people who don't know to plan, don't want to plan, etc. As a person really into planning, I like this model, and it's something I've liked about Disney trips, but I can see how it could create issues for the company as a whole.
If the new system is as bad as some people predict, it's may be available to everyone, but it will be out of reach for a great many of them. And it will certainly be worse for those who don't buy into it.
There was still a resort reservation loophole you could utilize in order to secure FP+. I won’t get into here because I think it’s against board rules, but Disney never corrected it.Other than that, there were no cheats you could use and no gaming of the system.
And however it worked, it's a better answer than paying $10-$50 per ride and having to be paying every time you want to ride a headliner without standing in hours long lines.
This is really my takeaway, too. I just don’t see any scenario where we didn’t end up here. I’m glad we got it for free for 20+ years, but I don’t think that was ever going to go on in perpetuity.It's hard to believe Disney hasn't gone this way already.
This option though (i.e. what it's been like with FP+) is both a planner and payer option combined.
To get the best possible advantage of ease to score that FP+ for FoP or Frozen or eventually ROTS (when it would have eventually been put on FP+) you are both planning (at that 60 day window) AND paying extra for it by staying on-site at a resort that costs double the equivalent resort that is off-site, pluse those that get further advantage by say staying longer than one week as opposed to staying less than a week. And couple this with FP+ making standby longer for eveyone else that doesn't have FP+ for the best headliners (which is 70% of guests or more).
I don't see it being worse for the 70+ % of guest who aren't able to get a FP+ for the biggest headliners and had their standby waits longer than if there was no FP+ to begin with.
I think a good comparison is the park hopper feature. It’s a pretty costly add on to a ticket and you certainly don’t HAVE to park hop to see and do everything. But a lot of people enjoy the flexibility it provides and are willing to pay for that ability.
I totally get that. I’m sure there are plenty of families that will struggle to find value here. A lot of the posts I’ve shared on this thread have been in reaction to someone saying something along the lines of “this is a bad plan, full stop.” I’ve been sharing my (what I feel to be in the minority) opinion as a matter of balance.I'm glad the paid version could work in your situation. I think what some of the rest of us are saying is to replace something that came with admission, and adding a significant up charge, is diminishing the value and the experience. For my family of 5 during a busy time for 10 rides we are looking at adding $1250 in addition to the cost of park admission. Disney management monitors social media and they should hear all sides.
I don't pay for parties any longer due to the increased capacity, I don't pay for hoppers any longer due to the increased cost, but these things are my choice. With the speculation that is going around the only way to ride some of the popular rides is to wait 1-2 hours, or pay $25 per person per ride, I have no choice there.
That's what I'm hoping WDW avoids.
Are you privy to these numbers or is 70% a guess you are making?
I am not disagreeing with the fact that guest satisfaction might be low for first time or infrequent visitors and WDW has to do something, I just don't see how charging $15, $25, $50 per person, per ride, on top of gate is going to alleviate this.
Once FP is monetized, there is no guarantee of availability to everyone who wants it. One group that will be disappointed is the guest that was able to get a FP with advanced planning and now has to pay, one group will be those who would love to pay for the FP but can't afford it, and one group will be those guests who want it, can afford it, but it isn't available.
I totally get that. I’m sure there are plenty of families that will struggle to find value here. A lot of the posts I’ve shared on this thread have been in reaction to someone saying something along the lines of “this is a bad plan, full stop.” I’ve been sharing my (what I feel to be in the minority) opinion as a matter of balance.
I think there are families that this will work for, mine included, and Disney must be counting on that being true for a wide number. I can absolutely understand the aggravation, though.