Annual Pass Rumors??

[Ms Bibbidi]

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[Ms Bibbidi]

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[Ms Bibbidi]

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[randumb0]

Just for comparison, the Sea World annual pass lawsuit over automatic renewals took almost 3 years for a decision

 

[Blondie58]

No AP. No bounce back. No Magic Bus. No luggage delevery. No transfer of refrigerated items on split stays. Increased prices across the board. No all day park hopping. Parking charges. No bag tags. No magic bands with stay. No stationary. Not enough employees working the phones. Less than clean bathrooms. Concierge service not the same. Good = Love the new scanners and no bag searches.

 

[Ms Bibbidi]

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[john7994]

It is not conjecture. Disney admits manipulating the mix in public statements. The differences in the buckets can be seen on the websites of park availability. We have to check before making a reservation. Disney tells their stockholders ticketed guests have a 40% higher per guest per day spend rate than the passholder guest. It is not conjecture. I am not making it up. I have seen all of this first hand from original sources. The buckets are well known.

I am aware of those public statements and the lucrative nature of on-site resort staying / non AP holders - also stated that in one of my original responses.

So to understand further:
- Everyone has to check park availability - AP holders, off-site stay ticket buyers and on-site guest ticket buyers - correct?
- There are rules enforced by the system related to those staying on property (or not) in the number of park reservations they can make in direct proportion to their stay and full day tickets purchased versus the 5 reservations at any one time an AP holder can make without buying full tickets
- Are you further saying that Disney is manipulating at the time of reservation request based on the examples provided - the response provided to those inquiries - prioritizing and reserving more park reservations for on-site guest (or not) full ticket buyers?

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

I am aware of those public statements and the lucrative nature of on-site resort staying / non AP holders - also stated that in one of my original responses.

So to understand further:
- Everyone has to check park availability - AP holders, off-site stay ticket buyers and on-site guest ticket buyers - correct?
- There are rules enforced by the system related to those staying on property (or not) in the number of park reservations they can make in direct proportion to their stay and full day tickets purchased versus the 5 reservations at any one time an AP holder can make without buying full tickets
- Are you further saying that Disney is manipulating at the time of reservation request based on the examples provided - the response provided to those inquiries - prioritizing and reserving more park reservations for on-site guest (or not) full ticket buyers?

Are you genuinely asking these questions? As in you were legit unaware before of the differing buckets?

 

[AnnaKristoff2013]

To me what it sounds like is pass holders are upset cause they can't pop in every night like they used to. Disney could have fixed this by limiting sales in the first place

No, the issue is that they kept selling day passes while blocking out AP holders. If it was sold out for everybody it woudn’t be an issue.

 

[john7994]

Are you genuinely asking these questions? As in you were legit unaware before of the differing buckets?

Yes, why else would I waste my time or anyone else's? Its not like we get prizes on here for posting on every thread.
I am trying to understand the "buckets", so if these exist to whatever degree or not, than I am unaware of their nature and how they work.

 

[Ms Bibbidi]

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[Prissyms]

Disney needs to ditch the stupid reservation system in it's entirety. There is NO NEED for reservations for 340 days of the year!

I totally agree! We hate the reservation system but WDW has made it crystal clear that they have no intentions on letting it go. IMO, it serves no purpose at all!

 

[Ms Bibbidi]

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[Ms Bibbidi]

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[john7994]

Is Disney manipulating reservation availability between Bucket 1 and Bucket 2? Yes. Is Disney reserving park availability for Bucket 1 and blocking Bucket 2. Yes, I have seen them do that. Bucket 1 contains more profitable guests for them. Disney admits to using the park reservation system to maximize Bucket 1 guest availability to the detriment of Bucket 2 guests regardless of the express terms of the passholder contract in the blockout calendars. Yes.

Thank you for being civil through this ... As I might want to be an AP holder (as stated before), all of this is important to me.

While our categories are a little different - I follow your flow - so essentially the Ticket/Resort Bucket has an advantage in park reservation planning as they can consume up to 10 days of reservations at one time (14 for Foreign) - corresponding with their stay or plan to use the tickets. - whereas - at the top level of AP - they can only hold up to 5 reservations at any one time.

To the above remaining element, this is where I am trying to hone in on:
- So when we say Disney is manipulating availability between these two buckets - what are they applying in the background outside of the rules that defined the two buckets (up to 10 days Ticket/Resorts vs. 5 Days for AP Holders)

The closest analogy I see as similar (and perhaps where I have difficulty) is in ADRs. People that have 10 ten day stays can start planning their reservations for dining at 60 + 10 - whereas for my typical 4 day stay - I only get 60 + 4. (if that makes sense).

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Yes, why else would I waste my time or anyone else's? Its not like we get prizes on here for posting on every thread.
I am trying to understand the "buckets", so if these exist to whatever degree or not, than I am unaware of their nature and how they work.

Ooohhh well that explains soo much about your responses, that's why it seemed like we were talking past each other. I was strictly talking about this thread anyhow. Because every time me and the other poster would try to explain you'd have a response that didn't quite match what we were saying the whole time. We said multiple times that there was a different bucket depending on the ticket media that part must have gotten lost in the conversation then.

Yeah there are totally different buckets and Disney adjusts as they see fit.

When you go to the website you have to select which you're looking for.

For WDW here's what you'll see


So let's say I want to look at the reservation availability but don't have a ticket, for example sake we'll select Park Ticket Availability. It will default to Theme Park Tickets (meaning normal park tickets):


But notice there are three buckets: Theme Park Tickets, Select Hotels, Annual Passes

If we select Annual Passes you can see their availability. In this case you can see APs are actually favored in June where only 1 day is unavailable to them for any park which isn't surprising if you look at my paragraph just after this photo




Now some of this you may say "well I don't see an issue" that's because it's also after APs have been paused and after the lawsuit. It was a different situation when you were comparing back in November when the lawsuit had been filed. It seemed too coincidental that after the lawsuit availability for APs was suddenly much wider.

The same is over at DL as well. Checking the different availability buckets.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Yes he is. Be nice. There are no dumb questions. I appreciate his effort to understand.

You misunderstand I was just confirming the honesty in the questions, between some of the snarky comments that came out on this thread and just the general conversation that sometimes happens you don't always know if someone is legit asking or if they are being sarcastic, that's why I was asking.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

what are they applying in the background outside of the rules that defined the two buckets (up to 10 days Ticket/Resorts vs. 5 Days for AP Holders)

They look at what reservations have been booked whenever they decide to check and they can take from one bucket and add to another bucket.

Park Capacity in the past was defined largely by fire marshal numbers for safety. Disney has advised no longer will they use that and the park reservation system is here to stay in its place. So with this they can decide to favor on site guests one day (Select Hotels bucket), another day multi-day ticket holders (Theme Park Tickets bucket) and another day AP (Annual Passes bucket) holders. It's completely in their hands how many in each of those buckets they choose. This is also why you may see a date be unavailable completely or a specific park be unavailable but then open up again. People shift their plans too but Disney also shifts. May 9th for instance was listed as unavailable for any park reservations for any parks for at least hotel and theme park ticket holders, that did not stay that way and availability did open up.

 

[Jrb1979]

They look at what reservations have been booked whenever they decide to check and they can take from one bucket and add to another bucket.

Park Capacity in the past was defined largely by fire marshal numbers for safety. Disney has advised no longer will they use that and the park reservation system is here to stay in its place. So with this they can decide to favor on site guests one day (Select Hotels bucket), another day multi-day ticket holders (Theme Park Tickets bucket) and another day AP (Annual Passes bucket) holders. It's completely in their hands how many in each of those buckets they choose. This is also why you may see a date be unavailable completely or a specific park be unavailable but then open up again. People shift their plans too but Disney also shifts. May 9th for instance was listed as unavailable for any park reservations for any parks for at least hotel and theme park ticket holders, that did not stay that way and availability did open up.

For what I understand is instead of fire marshal numbers they use labor costs. As for WDW, IMO the way they do the buckets is my how many rooms are sold for that day. What else is left after that goes to Pass Holders. It's most likely different at DL due to more pass holders then on-site guests historically.

IMO the best way to solve this is instead of reservations give each pass a different number of days a month a they can go to the parks. For example they highest tier gets 7 days a month. The lower tiers get less days the lower the pass you have.

My question would that work for many of you?

 

[DebbieB]

I totally agree! We hate the reservation system but WDW has made it crystal clear that they have no intentions on letting it go. IMO, it serves no purpose at all!

It serves Disney’s purpose. They can reduce attendance and reduce staffing on any particular day.