WDW renegged on my old never-expiring tickets. -watch out!!!

[jleslie48]

Alamo told you to go to city hall?

sorry I was answering two different thoughts in one message.

the city hall reference had to do with the ticket booth incident, it had nothing to do with the car reference.

 

[Chicago526]

I do understand your frustration. Even if the resort and ticket booth personel were wrong in telling you that the passes were still valid, obviousley they DID tell you that they were valid. This means either they are poorly trained in this area OR the computer system has some problems. I'd imagine the reason you had trouble confirming the tickets before you left was because they were infact expired.

As for your letter, you need to take a more organized and calm approach if you want it to be taken seriously. Here's an example:

"I'm writing to complain about the customer service I received while visiting the Walt Disney World Resort between (insert dates here). On a previous visit about 4 years ago, I still had two un-used Park Hopper days left on my room key. I was unable to confirm that they were still valid prior to leaving home. Upon arrival at the Caribbean Beach Resort, the front desk did confirm that the two un-used days were still valid. I arrived at your ticket booth at Magic Kingdom to get the days passes, the person collecting the money ran the cards, confirmed for a second time that I had 2 days left on 4-day park-hopper cards and that there was no need to issue day passes. However, when I tried to use the pass to enter the park, the gate attendant said the passes were not valid and to go back to the information booth. After waiting in line, I spoke with someone there that again informed me that the passes were expired, and proceed to turn the computer screen around to show me. That person would not listen to the fact that two other Disney employees had told me that they were valid nor would he/she try and contact either of these employees to verify the information they gave me.

I feel this shows a lack of training and professionalism among your employees and I am very disappointed with the whole experience..." etc. etc. etc.

Now, doesn't the way I put the same information sound more professional? Wouldn't you be more likely to respond to a letter like this, than what you wrote:

Well Now I know why you refuse to acknowledge old
cards online. It is reprehensible the way your park
didn't honor my 4 year old, never expiring passes.
Your personell were rude, non-compromising and
completely wrong. Your computer systems are
completely in error at the parks, and your ridiculous
insistence of showing me monitor screens are bullying.
I have been a life long devotee of your parks and I
have never had such an experience of incompetency (I
can only hope) or outright thievery (I fear.)

1) You wouldn't confirm the balances on my cards by
email or phone, prior to my visit, why? So I couldn't
dig out my receipts???

2) I arrived at Carribean beach and check with their
computer, they confirmed what I had already known, 2
days left on a 4, 4-day park-hopper cards (built into
my old room keys) never expiring. From what I
remember, that was always the case, now I see it is a
pay in option (very poor taste,) however I was now
confident that my cards were fine.

3) I arrived at your ticket booth at magic kingdom to
get the days passes, the person collecting the money
ran the cards, confirmed for a second time that I had
2 days left on 4-day park-hopper cards, no need to do
anything proceed to the monorail, and enter the park.


4) arrive at gate, access denied. I was told to go
back to the ticket booth (1/2 hour round trip???) you
have a bit of nerve. after making me 10 minutes while
the gate officer sold kids pins, returns to send me to
the information booth, (this is a wear down tactic,
I'm familiar with it.) where I wait on a line, only
to get the "see my screen shows that the cards are
expired" line. Your salesman has the audacity to
actuall turn the monitor around to show me, COMPLETELY
IGNORING THE FACT THAT TWO OTHER PERSONELL HAVE
ALREADY CONFIRMED THAT THE CARDS ARE GOOD. Refuses to
even check with the others.

 

[Toby'sFriend]

Well I think again - what is your goal of the letter?

Do you just want to scream at people? Well you did that, send it off.

Do you want to make suggestion on how they can improve? Well, then you need to get them to listen to what you are saying. I think it needs to be said again, the letter as it is written is unclear. The people here cannot tell what happened. Your letter needs to say the dates and time and nicely describe what you went through.

"Our family checked into the ____ hotel on ______. We were originally given a room that was very far from the food court and central areas. Since the hotel seemed fairly uncrowded, we asked to be moved the next day. At that time, the front desk assigned us to a new room and told me twice that our bags would be waiting for us in our new room that evening. We came back to our hotel room that evening to get ready for our dinner, and found our bags to be missing. I called the front desk and was told that my original information was false and that I needed to call first to have the bags sent. However, I was then assured that our bags would be brought shortly. 30 minutes later our bags still hadn't arrived and I called back again. At that time I was told that our bags were just being put on the truck, and that it would be about 10 to 20 more minutes. All of this delay (over an hour) caused us to miss our Dinner Reservation at ______. I found that very disappointing and it very much put a damper on our evening."

Do you want some type of compensation?

This is the tricky part. If you make people angry and give the impression that you are done with Disney forever, you will get no response. However, if you ask nicely and assure them that you hope your suggestions will help them improve their system so your NEXT trip might be better - you will get a much more positive response.

 

[ckret01]

i'm confused why you had a rental car AND used magical express.

but that's just me.

I think because magical express just takes you to and from the airport to the hotel. If you want to travel off site during your stay like to Universal she probably rented a car for the week to do so.

 

[DisneyDmbNut]

The bus story I really don't believe...they are clocked from one stop to the next..the driver " standing outside for 30 minutes" doesn't make sense because another bus would have come along by then.

Do yourself a favor...tear WDW off your vacation planner and go back to US...have a great time and don't get so stressed about a silly vacation! In the big scheme of life, the fact that you were able to fly to another state and have a vacation with your healthy family is pretty precious and getting all worked up over mis-steps is silly

 

[jleslie48]

i'm confused why you had a rental car AND used magical express.

but that's just me.

I was renting a car to go to NASA, the beach, and to Universal. I also know from experience that the 15 minute drive/park to the parks is worth it vs the 45-minute bus scenario. I originally wanted teh magical express just for the bags, I thought that would of been nice not to have to carry the bags, but that was also beyond WDW's comprehension. So I agreed to pick up the car in the park vs at the airport (which would of saved me 1 1/2 hours as well) Since I arrived at 11:30pm, that was the difference between getting to my hotel room at 12:00am vs 1:30am. That probably didn't help my mood in the morning when I then had to deal with the car...

why couldn't I just use disney express to handle the baggage and let me get the car at the airport? More stupidity.

 

[RickinNYC]

Truth be told, as I read your letter to WDW, I was pretty surprised at the overall nasty tone. Sure, you are entitled to be angry. Given the incidents you descsribed, I would be too to be quite honest. But I'd strongly advise you to tone it down and up the professionalism. I would be surprised if you ever received a response. Just something to think about.

Now another word of advice. You posted your letter on the DIS. So far, when you've responded to everyone's advice and thoughts, you've done so with that same nasty attitude. I strongly advise you to tone that down quite a few notches as well. Folks here are pretty cool for the most part, but when you start focusing your rage on everyone, you aren't going to get far.

The tone of your letter combined with your attitude with folks on this board, is rather telling. I'm not surprised you didn't get far with your complaints when you voiced them in person. I can only imagine what you were like at the time these things happened!!!

Like you, I've had problems on a couple of trips to WDW. On one occasion, the situation I found myself was downright distressing and I was over the top ticked off. The others, just a couple of irritating situations. Whatever the case, I picked my battles and those that I chose to deal with, I did so with a smile, a calm demeanor, and an understanding that the individual I was dealing with wasn't the culprit. And you know something? Every time, the situation at hand was handled pleasantly in return, and to a level of satisfaction that I was happy with.

 

[stinkerbelle]

Here's some free advice - get to know the Emerald Aisle through National rent-a-car.
no waiting at the airport at all...get in a car and go.

DH usually has the car before I have the luggage.

 

[DisneyDmbNut]

why couldn't I just use disney express to handle the baggage and let me get the car at the airport? More stupidity.

You live in NY and you are seriously asking this question? Why would I, as a Disney employee want to handle a bag that the owner doesn't want to handle...

yeah...plain stupidity!

 

[jleslie48]

I'd imagine the reason you had trouble confirming the tickets before you left was because they were infact expired.

Thanks for your reply, you are correct, I should be nice if I want something back. Your letter is worded much better. In reference to the above however, I called disney prior to going on the trip and they said they wouldn't look them up it was not there policy. They refused to even to look it up. If they would of told me at when I was at home my tickets were expired I would of investigated it prior to going down there. That would of made sense. I probably still have the price listing sheet in my papers from 2001. I find it very suspicious that they wouldn't even tell me the cards were expired over the phone.

 

[RickinNYC]

You live in NY and you are seriously asking this question? Why would I, as a Disney employee want to handle a bag that the owner doesn't want to handle...

yeah...plain stupidity!

Watch y'self missy! This New Yorker carries his own stuff!

 

[DisneyDmbNut]

Watch y'self missy! This New Yorker carries his own stuff!

That's not what I mean you nit! Come here so I can slap you!

An unattended bag?? In this post 9/11 day?? no way...

 

[RickinNYC]

That's not what I mean you nit! Come here so I can slap you!

An unattended bag?? In this post 9/11 day?? no way...

Who you calling a "nit"? C-c-c-c-c-c-CAT fight!

 

[inaminute]

You were staying at Caribbean Beach? We were there just two weeks ago and were the very first stop on Magical Express. It seemed to me to work similarly to the regular Disney bus system--each bus was assigned a group of hotels. It worked the same on the way back to the airport except we were the last stop. Overall I was happy with Magical Express--there was a bit of a wait for the bus to the hotel, but I just took that time to relax and plan what we'd do when we arrived.

Also, at Caribbean Beach nearly every room is quite a distance from the "resort services" area. They have a really great internal shuttle that gets you there without too much wait. Just curious--where were you originally located and where did they move you?

About the check-in times: The airlines require 1.5-2 hours for check in. The busses are full of people who have used the check in service as well as those who have not. Some people check their bags, some do not. The airport may be only 30 minutes away with no traffic. Add heavy traffic or an accident, and you're adding precious minutes on your trip.

I'm sorry you had such a bad experience. Were I in your shoes I'd consider somewhere less stressful for my next vacation.

 

[DisneyDmbNut]

you make me laugh...but it is time to punch out ( the day, not Rick )

Great advice given here leslie....please use it!

 

[stinkerbelle]

I called disney prior to going on the trip and they said they wouldn't look them up it was not there policy. They refused to even to look it up.

This is 100% true....and this policy has been true for while.

They will not give this info out on the phone...when I've gone to WDW in the past, I've had friends hand me passes and ask "can you check the days left for me?" no problem with that.

so...they weren't out to 'get you' on that one...that's just their policy on it. (could you imagine the backlog on the phone with people checking 'days left'?)

 

[tbelfonti]

I find it very suspicious that they wouldn't even tell me the cards were expired over the phone.

The reason they won't check tickets over the phone is to discourage people from selling their tickets on ebay. Suspicious? Nah ...

And ditto to the PP who talked about National's Emerald Club aisle. Alamo offers a similar program called Quick Silver. If you are renting, thats the only way to go, imo.

 

[CPM]

Just for the record, Disney does respond to angry letters. My neighbor stayed at the CR. She had a similar experience. Wrote a similar letter. She actually received a phone call from a customer service rep.. They credited her one of her two nights plus gave her a character breakfast for day on her next visit.

I would be very agrry if this all happened to me too. Very frustrating.

 

[jleslie48]

Well I think again - what is your goal of the letter?

Do you just want to scream at people? Well you did that, send it off.

Do you want to make suggestion on how they can improve? Well, then you need to get them to listen to what you are saying. I think it needs to be said again, the letter as it is written is unclear. The people here cannot tell what happened. Your letter needs to say the dates and time and nicely describe what you went through.

"Our family checked into the ____ hotel on ______. We were originally given a room that was very far from the food court and central areas. Since the hotel seemed fairly uncrowded, we asked to be moved the next day. At that time, the front desk assigned us to a new room and told me twice that our bags would be waiting for us in our new room that evening. We came back to our hotel room that evening to get ready for our dinner, and found our bags to be missing. I called the front desk and was told that my original information was false and that I needed to call first to have the bags sent. However, I was then assured that our bags would be brought shortly. 30 minutes later our bags still hadn't arrived and I called back again. At that time I was told that our bags were just being put on the truck, and that it would be about 10 to 20 more minutes. All of this delay (over an hour) caused us to miss our Dinner Reservation at ______. I found that very disappointing and it very much put a damper on our evening."

Do you want some type of compensation?

This is the tricky part. If you make people angry and give the impression that you are done with Disney forever, you will get no response. However, if you ask nicely and assure them that you hope your suggestions will help them improve their system so your NEXT trip might be better - you will get a much more positive response.

Do you just want to scream at people? I think so. I thing I want someone to say I'm sorry and to acknowledge that they screwed it up and I'm not crazy. The screaming is very therapeautic though.


Do you want some type of compensation? I think they owe me 1/2 a day at the parks, plus a 1/2 a day hotel. all wasted. that's $250.

I think I'm actually trying to see if others have experienced a similar fiasco. The setup I had should not of been that unusual. I was very surprised at the levels/number of mis-communications I ran into.

 

[CPM]

Here's some free advice - get to know the Emerald Aisle through National rent-a-car.
no waiting at the airport at all...get in a car and go.

DH usually has the car before I have the luggage.

I love the Emerald Aisle!!!