FastPass+ Most Certainly Not Coming Back As It Was

[Sirwalterraleigh]

One of my favorite Disney stories is when we went to Pleasure Island...the bus ride back...I was BOMBED.

…I resemble those remarks…

…and I feel bad for your housekeeper

 

[kong1802]

Because that’s sycophantic response…

“they didn’t shorten hours!!!”

because the attendance used to be lower and the parks weren’t crowded!!! That’s how hours were set. Moses didn’t bring them down on the 3rd tablet off the mountain

open till 7 in September because no one was in the park…open till 1 am in the summer cause it was crowded. In 1995…not in 2015.

I have so little faith in humans…the fact that this is the “mental rubix cube” that can’t be solved.

Trivia time, was MK more crowded in July 2015 than July 2019? Below are MK hours for the same week July 2015 and July 2019.

Well I wonder why we need more crowd management tools. Couldn't be the loss of 14ish hours of park time could it?


I know I know, they kept AK open later...

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Trivia time, was MK more crowded in July 2015 than July 2019? Below are MK hours for the same week July 2015 and July 2019.

View attachment 572192

View attachment 572193

Well I wonder why we need more crowd management tools. Couldn't be the loss of 14ish hours of park time could it?


I know I know, they kept AK open later...

the Royal guard is gonna come after you if you keep posting “numbers”

 

[ImperfectPixie]

…I resemble those remarks…

…and I feel bad for your housekeeper

Nah. It was all good...we got back to our room at Dixie and I just passed out. The people on the bus sure had a good laugh at me though!

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Nah. It was all good...we got back to our room at Dixie and I just passed out. The people on the bus sure had a good laugh at me though!

Well that’s Disappointing

I’ve decided to believe that you’re lying (slow work day)

yep…I’m good

 

[kong1802]

the Royal guard is gonna come after you if you keep posting “numbers”

Tried to head them off at the pass with the usual "AK is open past 5 NOw" retort.

But its coming anyway........

 

[ImperfectPixie]

Well that’s Disappointing

I’ve decided to believe that you’re lying (slow work day)

yep…I’m good

I would never.

 

[Always A Fan]

What form it shall take is unknown. But signs point to: Not being revived to pre-pandemic form

The one thing we hate is first you need a park pass, now you need a reservation at one of the four parks, so now you need to ask disney for perrmission to use your park pass, then god for bid your headed to "Hollywood Studio's" for rise of the resistance now you need a "Q"
We've decided we're through with all this, we payed over 5 hundred dollar for the wifes and my annual pass and I'm sure it will be more this year so we won't be visiting the parks anymore, end of story

 

[pdude81]

They can give guests more then one and still see an improvement on the lines. The problem with only 1 or none is the lines will still be a problem and guests will now be ****ed at less front line access and long lines...as opposed to just long lines. IF Deluxe got 3. Mods got 2 and Values got 1 (which I STILL DO NOT AGREE WITH as they should all get 3) that cuts it down to 6 free instead of 9 for resorts guests. This cuts them by 1/3. Then use queues for the other lines. Maybe remove FP as an option for rides like Pirates, Small World, Nemo, LWTL, etc.

Well they've already announced the extras for on site guests, just haven't implemented them yet. I can't imagine where they incentivize further. And to give on site guests multiple passes on top of these just eats up too much of what they would try to monetize. And if you remove fastpass from other rides, again that further limits what people could use them on.

Fastpass is needed to manage the crowds without increased capacity, and crowds are returning faster than rides are being built. If they give 3 free passes to on-site guests and then charge everybody else, they have one of two problems.

A. off-site guests feel ripped off and don't go.
B. Off site guests still come, but feel the need to buy the limited remaining fastpasses not given away for free.

In case A, yes, lines would be reduced but also you lost $110 a day per imaginary guest over $30 worth of fastpasses they didn' get.
In case B, you have constrained available supply and increased demand for a percentage of guests, forcing sellouts. This would mean standby waits are still brutal. This could work financially but has the potential for angry diatribes trending on social media.

Again just my opinion. I think they'd much sooner have everybody pay for every pass over giving out multiple freebies to any group. My pitch is the 1 free per ticket as I think that takes the heat out of many greed arguments but still raises substantial money at $10 per pass. Then if demand is through the roof they can raise prices from there and pay for a new E-ticket every year, with some left over.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Well they've already announced the extras for on site guests, just haven't implemented them yet. I can't imagine where they incentivize further. And to give on site guests multiple passes on top of these just eats up too much of what they would try to monetize. And if you remove fastpass from other rides, again that further limits what people could use them on.

Fastpass is needed to manage the crowds without increased capacity, and crowds are returning faster than rides are being built. If they give 3 free passes to on-site guests and then charge everybody else, they have one of two problems.

A. off-site guests feel ripped off and don't go.
B. Off site guests still come, but feel the need to buy the limited remaining fastpasses not given away for free.

In case A, yes, lines would be reduced but also you lost $110 a day per imaginary guest over $30 worth of fastpasses they didn' get.
In case B, you have constrained available supply and increased demand for a percentage of guests, forcing sellouts. This would mean standby waits are still brutal. This could work financially but has the potential for angry diatribes trending on social media.

Again just my opinion. I think they'd much sooner have everybody pay for every pass over giving out multiple freebies to any group. My pitch is the 1 free per ticket as I think that takes the heat out of many greed arguments but still raises substantial money at $10 per pass. Then if demand is through the roof they can raise prices from there and pay for a new E-ticket every year, with some left over.

Exactly…we are having “tea leaves interpretation” issues here…

30 minutes for Disney hotels (that’s what you get…2% of the day…)

and a few hours here or there for the high rollers…but who knows what that’s like with the “filter” during the exit period?

that’s already been announced.
And no fastpass resumption/announcement
And no local or AP ticket sales.

That’s where we are at. Just the facts as they stand

 

[Waters Back Side]

Well they've already announced the extras for on site guests, just haven't implemented them yet. I can't imagine where they incentivize further. And to give on site guests multiple passes on top of these just eats up too much of what they would try to monetize. And if you remove fastpass from other rides, again that further limits what people could use them on.

Fastpass is needed to manage the crowds without increased capacity, and crowds are returning faster than rides are being built. If they give 3 free passes to on-site guests and then charge everybody else, they have one of two problems.

A. off-site guests feel ripped off and don't go.
B. Off site guests still come, but feel the need to buy the limited remaining fastpasses not given away for free.

In case A, yes, lines would be reduced but also you lost $110 a day per imaginary guest over $30 worth of fastpasses they didn' get.
In case B, you have constrained available supply and increased demand for a percentage of guests, forcing sellouts. This would mean standby waits are still brutal. This could work financially but has the potential for angry diatribes trending on social media.

Again just my opinion. I think they'd much sooner have everybody pay for every pass over giving out multiple freebies to any group. My pitch is the 1 free per ticket as I think that takes the heat out of many greed arguments but still raises substantial money at $10 per pass. Then if demand is through the roof they can raise prices from there and pay for a new E-ticket every year, with some left over.

Ill pay to walk onto rides. But they need to make it intriguing to me. Length of stay and family size are huge factors for Disney. Whereas How I can use the line skips is a factor for me. When can I use them? Can I walk on the ride anytime of the day is a factor also.

IF the price of park tickets goes down per guest each added day, then guess what? The price of line skips can also. I told you my terms. Disney does not get to decide the terms as to whether ill pay or not. I do... $1000...EVERY RIDE IN EVER PARK ANY TIME. If they say that's not feasible then its not feasible for me to stay on longer or even keep showing up at all.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Ill pay to walk onto rides. But they need to make it intriguing to me. Length of stay and family size are huge factors for Disney. Whereas How I can use the line skips is a factor. When can I use them? Can I walk on the ride anytime of the day is a factor also.

That’s is directly contrary to what the bobs have been saying for about 7 years…

now that doesn’t mean you should always believe them

 

[aaronml]

I have 6.20. I search FP and I still see an option to make selections. Clicking on it does nothing, but the point is the reference to FP is still there

What you are seeing is a reference to the FastPass service in the list of services (and other facilities, etc.) at the resort. If you decompile the app, the actual code for managing / booking FPs is gone.

 

[pdude81]

Ill pay to walk onto rides. But they need to make it intriguing to me. Length of stay and family size are huge factors for Disney. Whereas How I can use the line skips is a factor for me. When can I use them? Can I walk on the ride anytime of the day is a factor also.

They can't manage the lines effectively if they don't squeeze you into a window. Unless you mean availability of a paid pass at any time, but that I assume they couldn't guarantee as there might be 4000 guests who want to pay for a 7DMT fastpass at 1pm without the capacity to handle them quickly.

The makeup of whatever program they announce should be really interesting. I still can't understand why we are hearing nothing. Perhaps it's a test to see what we'll take before people flip out. Perhaps the app isn't ready. But I think even the pixie-dusters, who I sometimes identify with, will be getting the pitchforks ready soon.

 

[pdude81]

What you are seeing is a reference to the FastPass service in the list of services (and other facilities, etc.) at the resort. If you decompile the app, the actual code for managing / booking FPs is gone.

Maybe they finally figured out they could sideload a test version of the app instead of having people report the weird stuff they are doing in the background. Welcome to 2014 guys.

A question I have then is relative to return windows for guest recovery or DAS. Those are essentially fastpasses, so those would have to still be active in MDE, right? Was this just an extra copy of the system with the self scheduling/search components that was removed?

 

[Jeff4272]

Let's put it this way.

WDW is never going to be able to offer what Universal offers: unlimited Express Pass for all Deluxe Resort guests.

Universal has 2400 Deluxe Resort rooms. WDW has (depending on lockoffs) over 10,000 Deluxe rooms.

The previous poster had an entirely unrealistic expectation the Disney might offer a family of 4 unlimited FastPasses for a week for $1000.

Disney is not going to offer (as you call it) "the smartest way to do it". That's the point.

The point is, what Disney will offer could cost thousands (plural) of dollars for a week and be considerably less than unlimited FastPass.

The point is, what the previous poster thought might cost $1000 might actually cost many times that, and still fall far short of that poster's unlimited express access expectations.

I agree, the smart way to do it at Universal is to stay onsite. Disney is never going to allow you to do it the "smart" way at WDW.

Based on what we've heard so far, Disney is considering implementing something somewhat similar to the original FastPass (which was "free"), but then charge you for it.

I wont pay that and we will sell my DVC if thats the case.......

Im not saying we wont still go because i will because my kids love it.........

But what I will do is stay at Hard Rock and do Universal for 4 days and do a 1 or 2 day Park Hopper to go to WDW........

 

[jpinkc]

They can't manage the lines effectively if they don't squeeze you into a window. Unless you mean availability of a paid pass at any time, but that I assume they couldn't guarantee as there might be 4000 guests who want to pay for a 7DMT fastpass at 1pm without the capacity to handle them quickly.

The makeup of whatever program they announce should be really interesting. I still can't understand why we are hearing nothing. Perhaps it's a test to see what we'll take before people flip out. Perhaps the app isn't ready. But I think even the pixie-dusters, who I sometimes identify with, will be getting the pitchforks ready soon.

I already have mine sharpened and the Tar is heating up, the longer we go with no idea of what they plan to do is certainly ticking me off with Thanksgiving week already booked....

 

[aaronml]

Maybe they finally figured out they could sideload a test version of the app instead of having people report the weird stuff they are doing in the background. Welcome to 2014 guys.

A question I have then is relative to return windows for guest recovery or DAS. Those are essentially fastpasses, so those would have to still be active in MDE, right? Was this just an extra copy of the system with the self scheduling/search components that was removed?

They generally include code that isn’t always immediately used / they aren’t ready to enable yet, that is conditionally enable via a feature flag. Fairly standard thing to do honestly (in the industry), that way when they choose to enable a feature, it’s already supported on a number of different versions of the app.

The code to view an “FP” from “My Plans” is still there, but all of the other code seems to be gone.

 

[TiggerDad]

We usually travel as a party of 5 or 6, so I feel the pain of paying for more than one or two people. Disney could recognize this and reduce the cost of additional people’s cut the line passes due to economies of scale in a group, or really due to psychological limits in how much one is willing to pay for up charges. So $15 for the first person and $10 for the others, for example. But I don’t think it’s likely.

 

[Jedijax719]

Lines are getting whack according to live-queues. They can't hold up that pattern for too much longer. Sure, they will get shorter in August and September, but that's never anything to go by. ALL people have to wait in 1-2 hour lines for many headliner rides. That's not good at all. The steadily increasing wait times (currently 200 minutes for FoP) will be what springs Disney into action in announcing something.