Has Disney changed its focus on the Guest?

Well...as much as I love the downtown Disney area at Disneyland FAR more than the current "springs" or the out of the way old downtown in Orlando...

...I do see the some notable ways where Disneyland comes up short of its Eastern sister:

1. The food - specifically sit downs - in Anaheim is far worse and priced probably more for what you get. And wdw's food has fallen dramatically. Maybe California isn't a "food" place? Like Pittsburgh

2. The Halloween party was an overcrowded mess...as in horrible crowd control and made worse by significant ride closures...

One nice nametag told me "well, this is the slow time of year"

Too which the obvious "well, you sold about 45,000 tickets to this "exclusive" event on a Monday...so obviously it's time to re-evaluate that calendar..."


So I may not forward my mail out here afterall

Customer service

Years ago we had DJ who had a bad customer service experience somewhere. He was mad enough to address it on the air.

He said if customer service is great people would shop there in great numbers and pay the price for it (within reason)

I think all this comes down to one thing....the place most companies care about now...

WALL STREET

xipotec said:

I think all this comes down to one thing....the place most companies care about now...

WALL STREET

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But that is where the message gets lost. I have no problem with a company trying to make Wall street happy. It is the duty of any board of directors to make their shareholders happy. You keep share holders happy by increasing profits. The problem is WDW currently is trying to do this by squeezing the customer(short term vision). Their method prior was to get customers to want to return and be ambassadors of why they cost what they do (long term vision). I used to say WDW is expensive but ....(long term vision with value perceived in a wdw vacation) Now I just say yup it is expensive (Short term vision also why attendance is dropping because of no perceived value).

OldsDr said:

But that is where the message gets lost. I have no problem with a company trying to make Wall street happy. It is the duty of any board of directors to make their shareholders happy. You keep share holders happy by increasing profits. The problem is WDW currently is trying to do this by squeezing the customer(short term vision). Their method prior was to get customers to want to return and be ambassadors of why they cost what they do (long term vision). I used to say WDW is expensive but ....(long term vision with value perceived in a wdw vacation) Now I just say yup it is expensive (Short term vision also why attendance is dropping because of no perceived value).

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Yes, the board has a direct responsibility to the shareholders. However, shareholders...and let's be clear, we're only talking about one kind of shareholder - the pension and hedge finds - should (but don't) keep their expectations and therefore, demands reasonable. They are never reasonable anymore. It's never about the long-term, only the next quarter. A couple of bad quarters in a row and they demand that heads roll - even if it is a matter of short-term pain for long-term gain. That's a strategy that is not allowed to exist anymore.

mcd2745 said:

Yes, the board has a direct responsibility to the shareholders. However, shareholders...and let's be clear, we're only talking about one kind of shareholder - the pension and hedge finds - should (but don't) keep their expectations and therefore, demands reasonable. They are never reasonable anymore. It's never about the long-term, only the next quarter. A couple of bad quarters in a row and they demand that heads roll - even if it is a matter of short-term pain for long-term gain. That's a strategy that is not allowed to exist anymore.

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That is a copout for the board. I work for a very large corporation. My division of that corporation is a long term type of business. It is offset by divisions that can grow short term. Disney is very similar. Movies (especially with marvel and Lucas) can give short term profits while investing in WDW for long term(all of the other theme parks seem to get the love that's why I said WDW) . I will not let the board say they are doing it for California teachers pension. No, if they truly cared they would treat each division they way they should and it would yield short and long term profits for everyone.

I should have been a little more clear that I was speaking more in general terms and not solely about Disney. Either way, it was not meant to absolve Disney of some of their bad decisions. Just more of a commentary about all large corporations and their relationships with the big funds and how, they probably have too much influence. You want boardrooms to have some pressure on them from investors. That's a healthy thing. But too much influence/pressure like we often see today leads to short-sighted decisions.

edlav said:

I also have seen Disney go from being customer friendly to take it or leave it. I think it is more a smaller hiring pool than a company policy. I have been going since the 70's when the CMs where always sincerely happy to see you and very accommodating. You never talked to anyone that did not try their best to make your visit memorable. Lately it seems that there are more CMs that take it as an inconvenience to assist you. That is not to say that there aren't CMs that can brighten your day with their exuberance and pride in being a Disney CM. This is a management problem for not pushing a customer first policy. Disney is not the only place that this is happening but they held themselves to a higher standard so they had a larger fall.

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This.

I'm going to post an email I sent to Guest Services last week. Although we have a trip booked for next Spring that we won't cancel because it's tied to an obligation for my DD10, I was getting ready to throw up my hands. There is a happy ending, though...

I must tell you that, after being a loyal Disney customer for many years, I am becoming less and less of a fan.

I first asked this question when I called into customer service, a week and a half ago. The cast member I spoke to was not able to answer my question, and suggested that I send an email to guest services, joking that it would probably be a while before I heard back. And then he laughed. Really, he laughed. I thought he was being very rude, definitely not acting in a way I would expect from Disney. But based upon the fact that it has been nine days since I sent my question to you, eight days until I heard anything other than an automated response, and the fact that I've been bounced twice since then (three times since that phone call), I guess the original cast member's assumption that it would be a while was right.

But so wrong, and so disappointing.

What has happened to Disney's customer service? In my line of work, it is my job to ensure that our customers receive the very best in service. We listen to understand, then we go to work. In the end, we may not come up with exactly what the customer had hoped for, but they never feel like we've dropped them. And that's what you've done here. I feel like a number.

As a sales manager for a large biopharmaceutical company, I've actually used "The Disney Way" during one of my training sessions for my team. Disney used to be the model for not only how you treat your customers, but how to run your business as a whole so that the quality just can't help but shine through. During this call, and during our last trip, the cracks have definitely begun to show.

We have a vacation coming up next Spring, already booked, already paid for. We're staying in a DVC room at the Poly, partially because we were considering becoming DVC members. I have to tell you, this hasn't done well to make us lean any further in that direction.

I'll call the ticket number later today.

So I went about my day, during which I happened to be on the road for a significant portion. As our days often do, mine got away from me and I didn't get a chance to call. But just after 5:00pm, on my drive to the next town, I got a call. From Disney.

The CM I spoke with was very kind, explaining that he had read my letter, and was calling for two reasons. First, to express his sincere apologies and to remedy the AP situation. The second was to thank me for using the Disney model to train my own employees, admitting that the CMs who had handled my situation previously had not been following their own practices. He assured me that they would follow up as appropriate, but then told me he was extending my AP by an extra month effective immediately. This way, our APs, which would have expired mid-Spring Break, will now be good through our entire vacation. We could renew, or not renew, but it was totally up to us.

This did a few things for me:

1. Most obviously, it pays for our tickets for our trip. This would have cost at least $840 (for 2 4-day park hoppers to DD and me, or way more with the cost of renewal for both of our APs). Unbelievable!!!!
2. It restores my faith that the core of the "Disney Way" is still there. Maybe fractured somehow, but still there.
3. Disney, or at least this CM, is betting that we'll have enough of a quality experience to make the decision to renew when the time comes.

I was hoping for an answer, but this definitely went above and beyond. And I'm now really excited about going to Disney again.

laura428 said:

This.

I'm going to post an email I sent to Guest Services last week. Although we have a trip booked for next Spring that we won't cancel because it's tied to an obligation for my DD10, I was getting ready to throw up my hands. There is a happy ending, though...

I must tell you that, after being a loyal Disney customer for many years, I am becoming less and less of a fan.

I first asked this question when I called into customer service, a week and a half ago. The cast member I spoke to was not able to answer my question, and suggested that I send an email to guest services, joking that it would probably be a while before I heard back. And then he laughed. Really, he laughed. I thought he was being very rude, definitely not acting in a way I would expect from Disney. But based upon the fact that it has been nine days since I sent my question to you, eight days until I heard anything other than an automated response, and the fact that I've been bounced twice since then (three times since that phone call), I guess the original cast member's assumption that it would be a while was right.

But so wrong, and so disappointing.

What has happened to Disney's customer service? In my line of work, it is my job to ensure that our customers receive the very best in service. We listen to understand, then we go to work. In the end, we may not come up with exactly what the customer had hoped for, but they never feel like we've dropped them. And that's what you've done here. I feel like a number.

As a sales manager for a large biopharmaceutical company, I've actually used "The Disney Way" during one of my training sessions for my team. Disney used to be the model for not only how you treat your customers, but how to run your business as a whole so that the quality just can't help but shine through. During this call, and during our last trip, the cracks have definitely begun to show.

We have a vacation coming up next Spring, already booked, already paid for. We're staying in a DVC room at the Poly, partially because we were considering becoming DVC members. I have to tell you, this hasn't done well to make us lean any further in that direction.

I'll call the ticket number later today.

So I went about my day, during which I happened to be on the road for a significant portion. As our days often do, mine got away from me and I didn't get a chance to call. But just after 5:00pm, on my drive to the next town, I got a call. From Disney.

The CM I spoke with was very kind, explaining that he had read my letter, and was calling for two reasons. First, to express his sincere apologies and to remedy the AP situation. The second was to thank me for using the Disney model to train my own employees, admitting that the CMs who had handled my situation previously had not been following their own practices. He assured me that they would follow up as appropriate, but then told me he was extending my AP by an extra month effective immediately. This way, our APs, which would have expired mid-Spring Break, will now be good through our entire vacation. We could renew, or not renew, but it was totally up to us.

This did a few things for me:

1. Most obviously, it pays for our tickets for our trip. This would have cost at least $840 (for 2 4-day park hoppers to DD and me, or way more with the cost of renewal for both of our APs). Unbelievable!!!!
2. It restores my faith that the core of the "Disney Way" is still there. Maybe fractured somehow, but still there.
3. Disney, or at least this CM, is betting that we'll have enough of a quality experience to make the decision to renew when the time comes.

I was hoping for an answer, but this definitely went above and beyond. And I'm now really excited about going to Disney again.

Click to expand...

Thank you for posting your experience. I too have written a couple of times to GS with issues, and they have always called back quickly, and resolved the issue in a way I found very satisfactory.

But, the bigger issue seems to be this: Why is it that they seem to be applying the "squeaky wheel" approach, and only addressing the issues for those of us who take the time to bring it up with a dissatisfaction letter?

I can remember taking a "business statistics" class about a million years ago, where the instructor talked about airlines weighing the costs of paying out death and injury lawsuits against the cost of fixing the issues in advance (at the time - hopefully they have changed).

When everything is reduced only to measurable "costs," like it seems it is in many companies now, that's when you get skewed in an unintended direction. Intangibles, like customer satisfaction, (and perhaps managing expectations rather than marketing such MAGICAL vacations), needs to stay a large part of the equation.

I agree about the customer service decline at WDW. We, too, have visited the parks multiple times per year since 2001. While no trip is perfect, it was only until the last couple of years that all trips have been filled with disappointment and bad customer service. We have found the silver lining- Universal! We started staying onsite at the Hard Rock Hotel- WOW! Their customer service- everyone from bell staff, front desk, servers, housekeeping- is stellar! We complimented a staff member about this and she answered that they all love their job and management empowers them to be able to make decisions and make the guests satisfied. When you call the front desk- you get the front desk! When there is a problem- they will go above and beyond to solve it. Room requests? I called and said we liked where we've stayed before and before I could describe the location he said, let me see the room numbers you've had before and handled the request. And a month later when we arrived- we had our request met. So while we do love WDW, we will choose to spend the bulk of our money and time with those that get customer service-Universal- and limit our time at the WDW parks until they wake up!

laura428 said:

This.

I'm going to post an email I sent to Guest Services last week. Although we have a trip booked for next Spring that we won't cancel because it's tied to an obligation for my DD10, I was getting ready to throw up my hands. There is a happy ending, though...

I must tell you that, after being a loyal Disney customer for many years, I am becoming less and less of a fan.

I first asked this question when I called into customer service, a week and a half ago. The cast member I spoke to was not able to answer my question, and suggested that I send an email to guest services, joking that it would probably be a while before I heard back. And then he laughed. Really, he laughed. I thought he was being very rude, definitely not acting in a way I would expect from Disney. But based upon the fact that it has been nine days since I sent my question to you, eight days until I heard anything other than an automated response, and the fact that I've been bounced twice since then (three times since that phone call), I guess the original cast member's assumption that it would be a while was right.

But so wrong, and so disappointing.

What has happened to Disney's customer service? In my line of work, it is my job to ensure that our customers receive the very best in service. We listen to understand, then we go to work. In the end, we may not come up with exactly what the customer had hoped for, but they never feel like we've dropped them. And that's what you've done here. I feel like a number.

As a sales manager for a large biopharmaceutical company, I've actually used "The Disney Way" during one of my training sessions for my team. Disney used to be the model for not only how you treat your customers, but how to run your business as a whole so that the quality just can't help but shine through. During this call, and during our last trip, the cracks have definitely begun to show.

We have a vacation coming up next Spring, already booked, already paid for. We're staying in a DVC room at the Poly, partially because we were considering becoming DVC members. I have to tell you, this hasn't done well to make us lean any further in that direction.

I'll call the ticket number later today.

So I went about my day, during which I happened to be on the road for a significant portion. As our days often do, mine got away from me and I didn't get a chance to call. But just after 5:00pm, on my drive to the next town, I got a call. From Disney.

The CM I spoke with was very kind, explaining that he had read my letter, and was calling for two reasons. First, to express his sincere apologies and to remedy the AP situation. The second was to thank me for using the Disney model to train my own employees, admitting that the CMs who had handled my situation previously had not been following their own practices. He assured me that they would follow up as appropriate, but then told me he was extending my AP by an extra month effective immediately. This way, our APs, which would have expired mid-Spring Break, will now be good through our entire vacation. We could renew, or not renew, but it was totally up to us.

This did a few things for me:

1. Most obviously, it pays for our tickets for our trip. This would have cost at least $840 (for 2 4-day park hoppers to DD and me, or way more with the cost of renewal for both of our APs). Unbelievable!!!!
2. It restores my faith that the core of the "Disney Way" is still there. Maybe fractured somehow, but still there.
3. Disney, or at least this CM, is betting that we'll have enough of a quality experience to make the decision to renew when the time comes.

I was hoping for an answer, but this definitely went above and beyond. And I'm now really excited about going to Disney again.

Click to expand...

Great post.

Good on you to send the email, and well written at that.

Disney's final response to your email is great, totally appropriate, and what ought to be expected of disney (which is to say I wouldn't expect that, and Disney should go beyond just what you expect, that IS the Disney difference, that's what makes the premium price you pay for Disney worth it).

I think this exemplifies my experience as well. On the front lines: mixed experiences, some GREAT CMs, some who just seem to be doing their job and each person they deal with is just more work. UPPER lines: If your issue gets pushed up the chain, have only had fantastic CMs and really good responses from Disney that have either fixed the situation, or have tried to smooth things over (or a combination).

I think the core of what Disney CMs were / are is still there, as is seen when you get pushed up the chain, but I think the front lines the daily interactions, have fallen off.

I'm glad I found this thread. I'm completely dissatisfied right now. I've been waiting for our refund for MNSSHP from Oct. 6 cancellation due to Hurricane Matthew. Since October 14 I've talked to 3 different Guest Experience Services people. I paid for our tickets through our Disney Vacation Account. The first CM said that it takes 10 business days to process the refund and that I should expect a gift card in the mail. Okay, cool. After 12 business days (Nov 1) I called again to check the status. The CM said that a gift card had been processed but not mailed. Kept me on hold for 40 minutes. FORTY MINUTES to tell me this. I don't think he expected me to hang on that long. So today I decided to call AGAIN!!! The CM told me that a check was written on Oct. 18 (what? then why didn't they tell me that on Nov. 1?) and it takes 4-6 weeks for a check to be mailed.

I'm so confused and frustrated. Has anyone experienced this kind of miscommunication before? Has anyone who paid with the Disney Vacation Account received their refund? Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

I came across CM last year who had a brain the size of a pea. I was crossing the bridge to main street. I use a cart. The CM tells me to move faster. I didn't and he gets into my face. I told him I would be happy to if he got out in front of me and tell the people to move FASTER.

Follow up. I had emailed my original post to Guest Relations. I did this completely without the assumption that they would follow up with me, and in fact I prefaced the email by saying that I wanted to bring the experience to their attention not to seek a solution for me but to illustrate how thhe company has been changing.

Fast forward a couple of weeks, and I did get a call. The CM I spoke with (some kind of customer service manager, don't recall the exact title) was very conciliatory, and in general very helpful. The answer I got were the right answers, even though one was no help to me; at least I understoof why they couldn't help me. I think they finally fixed my concerns.

I am still concerned, though, that the initial contact was so bad, and that I had to threaten to cancel a visit to get any kind of help on the second contact.

Here now, for two days and already having to fight and be pushy to get what we paid for and/or have them live up to the things they told us.
Most CMs are lovely and extraordinarily helpful, especially the ones who are working with kids. This is why I feel like too many of the problems come from above with poor management decisions.

I know this is an old-ish thread, but I had a similar experience on our last trip. By cashing in bank rewards points, I had $1200 of disney GC that I was planning to use for tickets for the family - 4 4-day hoppers to DL/DCA. We planned a trip around a convention we were invited to attend. In total, the convention price tickets were $200 less than if I were to pay retail, which is a significant savings. I checked out the convention ticket website to make sure everything was kosher, no mention of special payment methods, etc. All I knew was that my GC could purchase park tickets so that's what I set aside to pay for the tickets. 5 days before our trip, I finally go to buy the tickets and it turns out you cannot buy park tickets at the convention rate with gift cards (no place to enter the number/pin.) No mention of this on the initial site where all the terms/conditions of the convention tickets are listed. Nothing on the back of the GC that says special rate tickets are excluded. I assumed I just needed to call and they could process manually.

The first CM answers and I explain I have $1200 of GC to purchase the tickets, and she just says "I'm sorry, we don't take GC." And that's it. So I'm supposed to just fork out this money and disregard the fact that I have 100% valid Disney gift cards, which specifically say they can be used to purchase park tickets...and that's it? I was kind of stunned. Not everyone just has extra $1000s of dollars sitting around. After frantically trying to figure out my options, which included selling locally, I call again and get someone more helpful...she still doesn't have a good answer, but is at least trying. She tells me I can buy them at the Anaheim convention center with GC when I get there...incorrect, they only sell twilight tickets. I call back, and I've basically given up at this point, but I wanted to let them know that that option wouldn't work, in case someone else had this problem (how is it possible no one else has had this problem, ever?) Anyway, eventually they had a high-up guy call me back, and he found a sketchy workaround wherein I input incorrect cc info so that it submitted my ticket request but bounced back for wrong info, and then they input the GC.

So, I was very grateful they were able to do it. They were all very kind (except for the first lady who was mostly apathetic.) But - really? Someone has all these GC to buy tickets and your best answer is "we don't take GC, and there's nothing we can do, so go buy them at the window?" Okay. Not in line with any experiences I have typically had with Disney.