A naive question about FP+ angst

[mom2rtk]

So simply because YOU don't see the need for 10 FPs, nobody else would? We routinely pulled, on average, 8-10 FPs a day, used the system properly (Returned within the time alloted) and FAIRLY. What was unfair about legacy FP? Will someone please explain this to me?

The unfair part was where you blocked the entrance to the kiosks and kept others from getting any fastpasses.

 

[MinniesYooHoo]

The unfair part was where you blocked the entrance to the kiosks and kept others from getting any fastpasses.

Touche. You defeated me.

 

[ilovemk76]

I can only speak for us:

Before they started making people "officially" return during the time stated on the physical FP we would arrive at rope drop...grab a FP for the ride we wanted to ride most (if you got them early you could pull another one within 45 minutes after that...not 2 hours)...hop on said ride, maybe a couple of times. Put said FP in the wallet.

Then we would ride the next biggest FP attraction according to us and pull another one for that one (45 minutes after we pulled the first one). Put said FP in wallet...and off we go. After that we would grab another one that was disconnected from the system. Put said FP in the wallet. Now it's like 10:45 and I have 3 FPs in my wallet and I have already ridden those rides multiple times.

Now we head off to short waits at HM or POTC. By the time we get off those we can grab another one. So we go grab one for Splash. Put said FP in wallet. Go get some lunch, wish we were in a park that sold beer, and then maybe stroll through a Treehouse or make fun of people in line for a Dole Whip...it differed.

Oh, look..the window is up...grab another one for SpaceM. Put said FP in wallet.

Then we would jump on the Monorail to EPCOT and immediately grab a FP for TT. Put said FP in wallet. Go have a drink or 3 in the WS, and use our TT FP.

Jump on the Monorail back to MK and use all of our FP that I had to physically get out of my wallet whenever we wanted. That was a typical 2 day park. Our touring style averaged 3 parks per day so that was a slowed down day. We pulled as many as 10 FP in one day on a 3 park day.

It may seem like we didn't stop to smell the roses but we did. We just had it down to a science (and we are far from local and have never had APs) and figured out how to make it work for us. I'm pretty sure I did screw about 20 people out of a FP (not really...because they were never gone for the day) on any given day while we were in town. Considering the thousands of people who visits the parks on any given day, I don't think that is a bad ratio.

And since "no one really used FP anyway" I had no guilt whatsoever in our touring style. There are no kids involved, we don't waste a FP on Soarin or TSMM and we've ridden PP more times than should be allowed...so we weren't pulling from that pool.

So, with said, I am not a fan of the current system. If they tweak some things then it might work a little bit better. But nothing changes the fact that it will always be less (at a higher price) than what it offered us in the past.

And I really do apologize to the possible 20 people I screwed over on one of our good days.

FP+ is not that big of a change as the enforcement of FP- return times would be with FP+ you could have scheduled three late day MK FPs. Your old way of touring would leave you with a wallet of FP-s.

 

[DisneyBum303]

I would be shocked if this isn't something they changed so they can start charging for them. I think WDW sees all these other parks charging for something they gave for free and this is there way to transition people to that system. They still will get some free, but the rest will be an upcharge.

I totally agree. I think that is exactly what is happening. Universal makes money doing it, Six Flags makes money doing it, and I expect in the near future, Disney will be making money doing it.

 

[BuckeyeBama]

The number of FP- that we could use in a given day was dramatically reduced when WDW started enforcing return times, but we were still able to use 5-6/day. We travel during slow times, so FP- probably saved us about 90-120 minutes/day in line. The move to FP+ adds another 45-60 minutes/day in queues for us in order to ride the same number of rides as we are accustomed to riding. So, I don't like that the number has been essentially cut in half for us, but I can live with it. It is not going to ruin our vacation, or come even close.

For those traveling during more busy times of the year - this could be a huge deal. Eliminating 3 FP/day can add 3-4 hours to your queue times. You will not be able to ride the same number of rides/day. That is sad, and understandably making a lot of people very upset.

 

[ilovemk76]

A lot of people can't afford a trip to Disney. It's not fair. So Disney should lower their prices.

This isn't about fairness. Disney thinks they can make more money this way. It really is that simple.

Of course it is about money, but also the most happy customers. Happy customers will spend more money, plan a second "once in a lifetime" trip and tell others, who have never been, that they should go.

You will never be happy unless you feel you are getting one over on those 20 people you have stepped on.

 

[Mad Hattered]

Of course it is about money, but also the most happy customers. Happy customers will spend more money, plan a second "once in a lifetime" trip and tell others, who have never been, that they should go.

You will never be happy unless you feel you are getting one over on those 20 people you have stepped on.

Those 20 people just make me feel way smarter than them.

 

[Planogirl]

Of course it is about money, but also the most happy customers. Happy customers will spend more money, plan a second "once in a lifetime" trip and tell others, who have never been, that they should go.

You will never be happy unless you feel you are getting one over on those 20 people you have stepped on.

Were people not already doing that before FP+? It would seem so based on the crowds.

 

[morethananyonex]

Of course it is about money, but also the most happy customers. Happy customers will spend more money, plan a second "once in a lifetime" trip and tell others, who have never been, that they should go.

You will never be happy unless you feel you are getting one over on those 20 people you have stepped on.

What does that last line even mean? Are you implying that the playing field is now level for everyone so no one guest has an advantage over another (or 20 others)? That is just completely false.

Those in the know will know when to book FP+ if they end up selling out before the day of. They will know which attractions need FP+ and what time of the day is best to use them. They will know how to utilize touring strategies in order to see more than other guests. They will know the layout of the parks in order to better plan their FP+. They will know which FP+ seem like a good idea but are a waste (looking at you, Fantasmic).

FP+ has not made anything more fair, it has just changed who is holding the FP. There are still losers, although now it looks like it's offsite guests who don't arrive at opening, as opposed to all guests who don't arrive at opening. Those people are still being "stepped over" because of an advantage other guests have. The capacity numbers have not changed. There is still a max of X number of people who can hold a TSMM FP+ for example, they're just theoretically going to a different group of people than before.

 

[robinb]

We were at WDW in December 2013, and I understand the issues with tiering and FP+ at just one park per day.

But when I read posts from people who used to get 6 or more vintage FP each day, I wonder how they could juggle their times and brains to keep track of it all. Were most people pulling tons of fast passes in the morning but using them later than the printed time window throughout the day?

Please don't flame me. Last month we had to hustle to make the times on our three FP+ each day.

Yes, we were FP- hoarders. We would pull a next FP as soon as we could and then come back later to use them. Once we were unable to hoard FPs we were still able to pull and use at least 4-5 FPs (plus stand-by some attractions) during a morning in a park. We are only able to go when it is quite busy so pulling evening FPs was never an option for us unless we pulled one on the way out and came back for that ride. FP+ allows us plan for an evening park more effectively but makes our morning park problematic once the big crowds him and waittimes jump to an hour or more.

 

[shalom]

The capacity numbers have not changed. There is still a max of X number of people who can hold a TSMM FP+ for example, they're just theoretically going to a different group of people than before.

But if there are more individuals using those FPs under FP+ than there were using FP-, then that means more people, in total, will have a positive FP experience. Depending on who you asked, legacy FP was used by a minority of park goers; if 10% of park goers used FP-, and 90% use FP+, then more people are getting that benefit. Assuming it works well enough to be a benefit, of course.

I am definitely in the "Disney really isn't worried about being fair" camp. Disney wants the most happy customers possible spending the most money possible. If that means favoring new customers or customers who pay more per trip over people who've been going for years but aren't big spenders, Disney's going to play favorites. Disney's whole business plan is to appeal to the masses, and that means playing to the average.

I think with FP+ people who research will still be able to get more rides in and otherwise make better use of what Disney offers, but that's entirely independent of anything Disney's trying to do.

 

[skater]

As a non regular I think it's a good thing they're limiting the FPs to 3. I just don't see the need for people to near 10 FPs. With FP+ you can ride things in the AM and use your FPs for later in the day (like we did). If you want to ride the ride more than twice, well then you have to stand in the hour or two line.

I know FP+ gets a lot of flack, and I'm not singling anyone out in this post or anything (and I know people are going to hate my thoughts), I just think that Disney is finally trying to keep things fair. FP+ has a couple flaws (tiers and hopping) but I think it's a wonderful system.

I really don't think being fair is Disney's goal for this system.

 

[robinb]

I had no idea people were pulling so many GPS in the old system. I thought you had to wait 2 hours in between pulls so didn't even think that was possible. We only got 2-3 per day under the old system and that was fine for us, but we didn't have expectations to do anything more than once or to see everything.

You could pull a new FP as soon as your most recent FP window started or 2 hours from when you pulled ... whichever came first. Early in the day or when it wasn't busy you could pull another FP in as soon as 45 minutes to an hour. When it was busy or later in the day the FP return would likely be more than 2 hours away so you would only wait 2 hours to pull another. The time that you were "FP eligible" (as we called it) was printed on the bottom of the FP.

 

[mmoores2]

Another issue with the new system that we encountered over Thanksgiving was for military members. Even though my father in law was staying on site and had magic bands, he couldn't book fp+ options in advance because he had to buy his military discount tickets at the gate. Therefore, because we went over a very busy time, he was unable to book TSMM fp+ at all!

I know this may be a more "rare" issue and we did go during a very busy time (but it was never a problem before) but kinks like that need to be worked out too.

 

[nugov2]

Of course it is about money, but also the most happy customers. Happy customers will spend more money, plan a second "once in a lifetime" trip and tell others, who have never been, that they should go.

You will never be happy unless you feel you are getting one over on those 20 people you have stepped on.

Yes, but right now it seems there is one unhappy person for every happy one(at least now that legacy has been eliminated from all parks) and negative people are always louder. Plus off site makes up a huge portion of WDW customers and they are going to be very unhappy if the kiosk lines are any indication especially during peak season. Many won't like feeling like they are forced into on site, because they stay off b/c WDW doesn't offer accommodations that meet their needs. Some people will book throw away rooms to get the perk, but some won't like that either. So trying to make people "happy" is a slippery slope...for everyone you make happy you will make one unhappy when it comes to a system like this.

 

[Dallas_Lady]

The most we ever pulled was 5 in one day in the MK and this was back when you could use them whenever. And even then I think we gave one away to another family (which we loved doing but can't with the new system). 10 FP seems like a lot of work, but I'm not knocking the people who did it. They were just working the system for maximum benefit.

Disney knows there were those Super Guests like all us on the DIS who knew how to get the most out of every aspect of the system. And they also knew changes like FP+ with it's limitations would upset us. So IMO, there are two conclusuons Disney had to come to when it comes to us Super Guests:
1) We'd get upset, whine online about it, but still spend our money and come back year after year
2) If we choose not to come back, there aren't enough of us vs. regular geusts that our absense will make a difference anyway.

 

[diskev]

We were at WDW in December 2013, and I understand the issues with tiering and FP+ at just one park per day.

But when I read posts from people who used to get 6 or more vintage FP each day, I wonder how they could juggle their times and brains to keep track of it all. Were most people pulling tons of fast passes in the morning but using them later than the printed time window throughout the day?

Please don't flame me. Last month we had to hustle to make the times on our three FP+ each day.

It's just common sense. Favor FP selections with earlier return times. Doing so means you can select another FP as soon as the return time for the last one. Chain them together and you can easily pull 6 or (in the case of MK) way more. My last pure paper FP trip was Thanksgiving week in 2012. I pulled two paper TSMM FP within the first two hours of park open (yay rope drop!). I pulled at least two sets of FP each for Star Tours and Rockin Roller Coaster as well. That's six FP in Hollywood Studios alone, four of which were for Tier 1 rides.

 

[crostorfer]

Of course it is about money, but also the most happy customers. Happy customers will spend more money, plan a second "once in a lifetime" trip and tell others, who have never been, that they should go. You will never be happy unless you feel you are getting one over on those 20 people you have stepped on.

Stepped on 20 people? Don't be obtuse.

If it is, as you say, about making customers happy, that certainly backfired, didn't it? At least with repeat clientele.

 

[Dizneefamily+4]

So simply because YOU don't see the need for 10 FPs, nobody else would? We routinely pulled, on average, 8-10 FPs a day, used the system properly (Returned within the time alloted) and FAIRLY. What was unfair about legacy FP? Will someone please explain this to me?

We did the same. And IMO, there was nothing at all unfair about legacy FP. As pp have stated, this change is all about money, not fair/unfairness. I believe this is just paving the way to charge for a 2nd tier or additional FP. At this point, with FP+ the way it currently is, we're holding off on our usual annual August Disney trip. We're skipping this year in the hopes that some major changes are made - even if it involves more FP for additional cost. My kiddos like to repeat ride their faves. The new system doesn't allow for that without waiting in interminably long lines, so we're heading to Universal this year and trying out Express Pass. Sorry Disney.

 

[diskev]

If it is, as you say, about making customers happy, that certainly backfired, didn't it? At least with repeat clientele.

This. I was a happy customer, happily spending my money as WDW year after year, sometimes multiple times per year. As it stands today, there will be no 2014 trip. This new trend will continue until serious changes are made to the FP system. I refuse to pay more and get less. My big challenge now is finding new vacations we want to do.