This could be interesting. (long)

[Disneyadore]

CENTRALIZED FAST PASS TESTING IN AK.

It’s no secret that Disney has been looking at different models for FastPass. This has been true since 1999, when the system was first installed. Disney wasn’t the earliest theme park operator to offer a ride-reservation system (Cedar Fair had them before Disney), but Disney hoped to iron out the kinks and really implement the system on a wide scale. The idea from the beginning was to get customers out of line and into the stores and restaurants… spending money. Why else would Disney spend extra money to staff those FP positions?

I’ve argued since 1999 that this was an unrealistic hope. Most people snag a FastPass, sure, but they use it be in line for Space Mountain "virtually" while they also stand in line for Big Thunder "physically." Then there are those visitors who don’t know to use it, or who think that using it is just an option (the reality is, you are getting ripped off big-time for total rides in a day if you think you can just skip FP and use Standby lines, but these casual visitors don’t know that). Worst of all, the gigantic volume of FP holders meant that Standby lines often don’t move very fast, and the overall wait time jumped compared to previous years.

Universal, which rolled out a similar system called Express Pass, decided that the return on investment wasn’t high enough, and dramatically altered their system. They ripped out the machines and declared that anyone staying at their Universal hotels would receive a daylong Express Pass (ride as often as you like), or you could pay a surcharge (usually $30) to get a one-day Express Pass that is good for one visit to each ride. In this fashion, Universal monetized the front of line passes, and otherwise gained by increasing occupancy rates at their hotels. They only have 2,400 hotel rooms, which is not a lot, so the impact on the Standby lines has been negligible. Wait times at Universal parks are now within the bounds of normalcy, which was not the case when Express Pass was available to everyone. I’ve long hoped that Disney would do something similar.

The time may be coming. First, Disney is testing variations on the FP enterprise at Disneyland Paris, where they are selling Magic Passes (like the Universal pass to non-hotel-guests) for 80 Euros (about $113) per day (it was originally 100 Euros). Over in Hong Kong Disneyland, Star Pass (a kind of FastPass book) costs only 120 Hong Kong Dollars (about $15 in U.S. currency), which is cheaper presumably because there are far fewer E-ticket rides (and there are seldom long lines in HKDL).

Normally, that alone would be cause for speculation. But some semi-public chatter from Disney park officials hinted that changes were coming here, too, and this past weekend they started testing a "centralized" location for FastPass at Animal Kingdom, in the machines formerly used for It’s Tough to be a Bug. If that holds, people can get all their tickets in one spot, without needing to run around. One assumes this will lead to tickets "running out" faster in the day.

But that’s not the bigger news. Some visitors to Disney parks started reporting recently about surveys that inquired into attitudes toward a "paid FastPass." This has led to other rumors (it’s sometimes hard to tell if the first rumor spawns the second one, or if the second one corroborates the first, so take all of this with a grain of salt) that Walt Disney World may soon be looking at a FastPass model similar to Universal Studios Florida.

If that’s true, the theory goes, they would rip out the FastPass machines in the parks. If you are staying at a Disney hotel, you would still get some FastPasses. A new twist is that you’d get them ahead of time, and could really plan out your trip (some people love this idea of pre-planning, while some hate it… I go back and forth).

Yet more twists: the amount of FP tickets you get per day is dependent on how long your vacation is. If you’re only staying a few days at a Disney resort, then you’d only earn a couple FP tickets per day. If your vacation is longer, you’d get more per day. This would function to reward those who take longer vacations with Disney (you can see why they’d want to encourage that!)

People staying at hotels off Disney property would not get any. Locals who live close enough to need no hotels would also get none. The rumor is silent about annual passholders, but one assumes they would also get none, unless they are in hotels. It would be a nice gesture if non-hotel passholders could get a single FP per day, though… otherwise, they risk annoying a very core audience. Ditto for the DVC crowd, which is populous, has big pockets, and has already spent a ton of money at Disney and doesn’t want to get shafted now.

My reaction is guarded. On the one hand, I’m overjoyed if they really do rip out the FP machines. I liked the world of spontaneity before, and this would return "on the spot" decision-making to the parks. Well, not for those with "planned" FP tickets, I guess. But on the other hand, I’m worried that the actual rollout might miss a chance to alter the way FP ruins lines.

Let me put it another way: much depends on the execution. If they simply take the number of FP tickets issued in a day (for the sake of argument, let’s say 200,000 issued in the Magic Kingdom on a busy day, a number I get from guessing that 50,000 people each get four FP on average) and then distribute those to the people staying the hotels, then I will feel like I’ve been taken advantage of greatly. Why? Because keeping the number of FP tickets steady would mean that the Standby lines would stay just as long as they are today: 80 minutes for Peter Pan or Soarin’, 60 minutes for Splash Mountain or Rock ‘n Roller coaster.

This is a golden opportunity for them to change the entire equation. What if they dole out the FP tickets as perks to their hotel guests, but reduced the net number of tickets in the system? What if you only had 100,000 FP tickets sloshing around on a given day at the MK? I’m certain that would mean Standby lines would move faster. By definition, there are half as many people returning with tickets, so the people in the Standby lines could be allowed to proceed twice as often. Wouldn’t that make it a forty minute wait for Soarin and a 30 minute wait for Splash Mountain? Those are reasonable numbers and within the bounds of sanity. Best of all, it would happen in a system where those who paid Disney’s higher hotel prices got a benefit out of it (a few FPs, at least) but it didn’t happen in a way that made everyone else’s vacation utterly miserable.

Much depends on the execution: Can Disney really limit it to 100,000 FP tickets at the MK on a single day? Is the Universal Studios model even applicable at Disney, when Uni has 2,400 rooms and Disney 30,000?

Let’s try some back-of-the-envelope math, with the usual caveat that I’m freely inventing some numbers here that could be off (in fact, numbers are rounded for convenience):
# Rooms at Disney hotels: 30,000
# Average people per room: 3.3
# Total people at Disney hotels: 100,000
# Disney parks: 4
# Disney-hotel-guests at each Disney park: 100,000 divided by four parks = 25,000

If you gave three FP tickets to 25,000 people in the Magic Kingdom, you have given out only 75,000. That’s well under the 100,000 I was hoping for.

Assuming these numbers are even in the ballpark of accuracy, much depends on how generous they are with tickets. If the person on a short stay only gets 1-2 tickets, while the person on the weeklong stay gets 3 tickets per day, and the person on a 8+ day vacation gets 4-5 tickets per day, we’d easily still make the numbers I’m hoping for. But if they get overly generous and issue 5-6 tickets to everyone, with 8-9 tickets given out to the long-vacation folks, then there will be too many tickets sloshing around the system, and Standby lines will stay long and intolerable.

I hope they keep the ticket count down. Everyone would win! Well, the off-site hotels lose, as do Universal and SeaWorld, since a new trick like only giving FP tickets to Disney hotel visitors will do even more to keep people staying at Disney.

It’s a natural outgrowth of the "Destination Disney" program, which is an umbrella concept for "getting people to come to, stay at, and spend all their money at Disney." The Magical Express shuttle service from the airport encourages people to not rent a car, the Magic Your Way ticket pricing encourages people to spend every last day at Disney since it’s so darn cheap to add just one more day, Extra Magic Hours encourages visitors only to stay at Disney hotels, and the Dining Plan options encourage people to spend the equivalent of one counter-service and one table-service meal *every* day rather than just once in a while. Disney’s added variations of late, such as Free Dining or Free Days on the hotel rooms, which have contributed to the parks doing extremely well during this recession. There has been no lack of lines at Walt Disney World, because they’ve played their cards right.

Just to keep things interesting, there is additional chatter that the FastPass changes, whatever they turn out to be, might make heavy use of RFID, a kind of low-cost GPS system, possibly embedded right into the admission media. The parks would know where you are, and could issue coupons, special offers, and FastPasses based on your location. This is heady stuff, and the possibilities (as well as the privacy concerns) could be enormous.

Once again, this is based on a rumor or two and may turn out to be so much smoke, so we all need to be cautious about jumping the gun here. It might even be a trial balloon floated by Disney to gauge the probable customer reaction. The rumor says nothing about Disneyland, but one assumes the different clientele base there would argue for a different approach.

Fingers crossed. If this is done right, it will surely mean sanity and joy (and fairness!) returned to the WDW rides. That would be great news for everyone.

 

[lauraf]

Thank you for the info. I would not mind having a few passes a day, but I would not pay for it. We do stay on property and an average of 10 days. But I hope they do make it fair for everyone that goes. Some people can't afford to stay on property and that would not be fair to them. I hope disney considers all financial groups of people.

 

[KYMickey]

Thank you for the info. I would not mind having a few passes a day, but I would not pay for it. We do stay on property and an average of 10 days. But I hope they do make it fair for everyone that goes. Some people can't afford to stay on property and that would not be fair to them. I hope disney considers all financial groups of people.

If they limit them to only people staying at Disney property I would think they would be open for a discrimination lawsuit. They wouldn't be giving everybody can opportunity to participate in the program, thus discriminating against those not staying in their hotels! I'm kind of surprised that already hasn't at Universal. Every other perk is available but you might have to pay more but it still is available to everyone.

I personally would prefer no Fast Passes at all, I like to do things on impulse and don't like planning that far ahead. Probably why I liked the old reservation system where you had to make reservations that day for meals! Of course they also had a lot of people not showing up for reservations with that system which made it better.

 

[enchantingodin]

I think it should be more based on the hotel level you stay at rather than the amount of days. For example:

Non-resort guests = 1FP per day
Value Guests = 3FP per day
Moderate Guests = 4 per day
Deluxe Guests = 5 per day

It could be done like the meal credits for the DP. So if you're staying at Music for 5 days you'd get 15FPs per person in your party. To use however you want. In fact I think (like the DP) it should be attached to your ticket or room key anyway. Take out the machines all together. Have a CM at the entrance with a handheld CC type reader to scan the card. Than can give you a receipt (if you ask) as to how many FPs you have left.

The only draw back is that certain FP lines would be longer than others. Newer rides, like TSM, might have a stand by time of 90 minutes and a FP wait time of 20 minutes. Whereas an older ride, like Splash, might have a stand by wait of 40 minutes with a FP wait time of 5.

Doing it this way makes both types of park goers happy. The casual fly-by-the-seat people don't feel tied down to having to be back at whatever attraction at whatever time. And the planners still get to plan around which ride will be busy at what time.

 

[epcot.girl]

I would prefer the FP system to stay the way it is. If they did change it though, I would like the 'more days = more FPs' concept. But that's because I'm in the UK, and it's only worth it for me if I'm staying in Disney for *at least* 10 days, and staying in a Deluxe, on top of the cost of flights as well, for that long would be very expensive indeed. Of course, there are probably North American visitors who visit for less than 10 days and find the Deluxe's more affordable (due to less days and cheaper flights) who would prefer the 'more expensive resort = more FPs' idea!

Wouldn't be surprised though if they offered a different deal to UK visitors - we already get different ticket options.

 

[Dznefreek]

# Rooms at Disney hotels: 30,000
# Average people per room: 3.3
# Total people at Disney hotels: 100,000
# Disney parks: 4
# Disney-hotel-guests at each Disney park: 100,000 divided by four parks = 25,000

These numbers would not be accurate due to the fact people are at water parks, DTD , other area parks and attraction, visiting relatives, shopping, etc. Not every Disney guest is at the park at the same time.

 

[tjkraz]

This is a golden opportunity for them to change the entire equation. What if they dole out the FP tickets as perks to their hotel guests, but reduced the net number of tickets in the system? What if you only had 100,000 FP tickets sloshing around on a given day at the MK? I’m certain that would mean Standby lines would move faster. By definition, there are half as many people returning with tickets, so the people in the Standby lines could be allowed to proceed twice as often. Wouldn’t that make it a forty minute wait for Soarin and a 30 minute wait for Splash Mountain? Those are reasonable numbers and within the bounds of sanity. Best of all, it would happen in a system where those who paid Disney’s higher hotel prices got a benefit out of it (a few FPs, at least) but it didn’t happen in a way that made everyone else’s vacation utterly miserable.

That's the rub, isn't it? I can tell you that we have never, ever, ever spent even 40 minutes in line for a WDW attraction. Meanwhile some people are apparently willing to spend 120 minutes in standby for TSM or Soarin.

We DID wait that long in line for TSM at California Adventure which does not have FastPass. In fact we had to structure our trip around that attraction just to have a wait time that short. Most times the lines were well over an hour so we arranged to hit DCA at opening and still had a 40+ min wait. And I can tell you it was the low point of that vacation. Never did the Nemo subs at all due to lack of FP.

So I guess the question is whether Disney places a higher value on the people who regularly use FP and appreciate the 10 minute waits or the people who are tired of having to wait 90-120 minutes due to all of the FP returnees.

Honestly I'd have no problem with FP being scaled-back. We always stay on-site so I have no real objections to a system that would favor us (although I can certainly appreciate why others would dislike that.) I could live with being limited to just 2 FPs per day, particularly if it meant quicker return times (immediate?) and shorter standby lines.

If they limit them to only people staying at Disney property I would think they would be open for a discrimination lawsuit. They wouldn't be giving everybody can opportunity to participate in the program, thus discriminating against those not staying in their hotels!

It's not discriminatory if the same opportunities are available to everyone. You can CHOOSE to stay at a Disney resort and reap the benefits or CHOOSE to stay elsewhere (which includes one's home if a local.) Disney isn't turning people away from its resorts due to some arbitrary criteria. That would be discriminatory.

 

[MountNittany]

I like the fastpass system just the way it is. I don't think that they need any changes.

 

[kmk1180]

I haven't read all of that. just too long but I think i get the gist.

The day the amount you can afford to spend on your room determines the way you are treated in the parks is the day Disney will loose it's magic to me..and the day I stop spending my money there.

And after my next two trips I will have stayed at every deluxe resort Disney has except Beach Club.

 

[Josh Hendy]

I can see how wanting to reward WDW resort guests with FP's is a good thing - they pay a premium for their rooms compared to offsite hotels and they probably spend a lot more than offsite guests on food, souvenirs, etc. during their stay.

OTOH if you deny FP to offsite guests then at busy times of the year, when it gets to be around 11:30 am, they're going to look at the lineups for Test track, Soarin, Mission Space or whatever and they're going to say this: "Honey, we're not going to get on a single fun ride for the rest of the day without a 90 minute wait, until at least 7 pm. Let's leave the park, get a cheaper lunch at the McDs near our hotel, have a swim, do a bit of shopping at Florida mall and pick up some beach towels and stuff, have supper at Pizza Hut, and come back at 7 to get a couple more rides and then watch the fireworks."

Whereas with FP you're always holding one of the darn things and it keeps you in the park. Around 11:30 am you're saying, "Well Darling, we've been on M:S and TT and we have FPs to ride Soarin at 1:45. Let's go over to Sunshine Seasons to have lunch, then after the kids finish their lunch you can ride The Land with them while I whip over to pick up more FPs for M:S. It'll be for sometime after 3pm, so after Soarin we can have some ice cream and watch O Canada before we go ride M:S again. Then we can watch the Chinese jugglers and shop at Mexico while we think about where to eat supper."

So the Mouse has to consider carefully who to reward and who to burn with any new FP system. I assume that resort guests spend more on WDW per day, but there are not as many of them as there are day guests. Difficult problem!

 

[KYMickey]

It's not discriminatory if the same opportunities are available to everyone. You can CHOOSE to stay at a Disney resort and reap the benefits or CHOOSE to stay elsewhere (which includes one's home if a local.) Disney isn't turning people away from its resorts due to some arbitrary criteria. That would be discriminatory.

It is discriminating against the poor people who can't afford to stay at Disney! You and I may not look at it that way but I'm sure there are some lawyers out there who would and they would love to sue Disney.

 

[carmiedog]

OP, could you please post a link to your source so people don't assume this is your information/words?
http://miceage.micechat.com/kevinyee/ky072109a.htm

Thanks! Interesting stuff, btw!

 

[Disneyadore]

OP, could you please post a link to your source so people don't assume this is your information/words?
http://miceage.micechat.com/kevinyee/ky072109a.htm

Thanks! Interesting stuff, btw!

Oooops I thought it was a big no no to link to other pages

Thanks.

 

[Disneyadore]

It is discriminating against the poor people who can't afford to stay at Disney! You and I may not look at it that way but I'm sure there are some lawyers out there who would and they would love to sue Disney.

So Disney must also provide free dining for poor people staying of side?
I'm sure that's discrimination also.

 

[barney-dodgecharger]

I like the concept that if you stay on property you should get the past pass perk!

 

[Metro West]

Speaking as someone who rarely uses FP's at any of the parks...if Disney decides to make changes to the FP system they should just offer a FP you can buy (like the Express Plus pass) that will give you a single time through the FP line at all attractions in the park. I think this whole thing about spending more money at the hotels is just adding mud to the water and will cost Disney customers who might be upset they couldn't spend the money to get five FP's a day. Disney could never give the type of perk Universal can at their hotels because of the number of rooms...it would never work.

I would say...keep FastPasses available to everyone but if Disney wanted to offer a FP you could buy, so be it.

 

[gymnastgirlflips]

Hmm, im not sure what I like. I know I want fast passes, and I know that our family is doing just fine with the FPs now. So if they ripped out the machines, would the people getting the FPs for staying actually get to pick how many FPs for each attraction? That wouldn't work out with so many rides being just more popular than others. Plus, they can only give out so many of each one a day and with all those people staying on Disney property that just wouldn't work out at all. And if they didn't do it that way, I know alot of people would complain. I think just deciding the fast passes the way it is right now is the best way, you yourself get to choose. The worst I think would be getting rid of them completley though.

 

[krissylizzy]

hmmm...i don't know that i like all this talk of change to the FP system...i kind of like the way it works now...

suppose they do change it to where guests staying at their resorts get a certain number of FPs. will they designate ride and time? i know that at least with my family, we don't always go on some of the "popular" rides, such as mission space and some others. we probably wouldn't use some of these fast passes and would instead love more to others such as space mountain and test track.

i'm just wondering how much freedom people would have with them

i'm also in agreement that this idea would be unfair to those who cannot afford to stay on disney property or afford FP should they start making them an extra expense. i don't know what the solution is here

 

[sellsje]

Whatever happens, I put my trust in Len Testa to update the touring plans... If you dont use them, you loose time!

 

[Padrepride]

The time may be coming. First, Disney is testing variations on the FP enterprise at Disneyland Paris, where they are selling Magic Passes (like the Universal pass to non-hotel-guests) for 80 Euros (about $113) per day (it was originally 100 Euros).

113 bucks a day!!?? That's more than a one day admission ticket!! That is truely extortion. Not a lot of people are going to shell out that kind of money a day for this so called "magic pass." This is just gonna make the stand-by lines even longer. This better not come to the American parks.