CP #16 Criticism Unwarranted
Adding on to that -
"Due to certain circumstances, some rides and attractions (including new rides) will not be open to the public."
Since people seem unable to read the things I have posted, let me state what should have happened that night (but obviously did not).
1) If the weather was really "the worst in the past three or four years" then why did CP even bother opening? Why bother collecting money from people entering the gates? It seems CP must have had some clue about what the weather was going to be like, what rides they would be able to open, etc. So why open if you're not going to open any rides, and why open if nobody is going to show up? It seems extremely unfair to collect money from people at the gate when the park has no intentions of opening rides. I live in Wisconsin, and grew up even further north so I'm hardly unacquainted with the weather typical at CP. If that's the "worst ever" then all you Ohioans are a bunch of wimps. ;)
2) Rides that could have been open should have been. No, I am not qualified to judge whether the weather was bad enough to limit ride operations to just *one* coaster, but it seems a little odd. Why can Power Tower operate and not Raptor? What about Magnum? What about the wooden coasters? This was 2001 (so I don't know what was different then) but it seems as though it was the park's intention to open as little as possible. Again, why open if you're going to do this?
3) Once a park decides to close earlier than posted times (especially after being open just three hours) free passes seem like the fair thing to do. You're being kicked out of the park early, contrary to schedules posted. Even SFWoA knows this (and practices it).
4) When a refund is promised, then it should be sent. CP promised a refund over the phone, then never sent it. That's lying, and that's poor business.
5) CP should not have continued collecting money from people entering in the gate when it had already been announced the park would be closing early. Come on - that's just cruel! The park is collecting money from people who assume (because the park is open) that the park is open for business. That just wasn't the case.
6) Rides that were closed should have been posted outside, and they were not. If they were posted, then hey - that's my fault for entering. I wouldn't be complaining. But when you enter a park and the list of closed rides is empty, you expect the rides to be open (with exceptions for breakdowns and changes in weather). The weather did not change at *all* from the time the park opened until it closed.
I don't understand how people can claim it's "fair" to charge people to enter a park where nothing IS open and nothing WILL be open. Your average park visitor does *not* know that certain weather conditions (wind, for instance, in the case of MF) will limit operations. Thus, if closed rides aren't posted then it's logical to assume they're open.
Do I think that was the norm for CP? No, not at all. But perhaps CP could learn some things from that Six Flags park down the road.
If people want to question further about what happened that night, then that's fine. But I'm not going to keep repeating myself for people who can't look back and read what has already been posted.
-Nate
*** This post was edited by coasterdude318 on 12/21/2002. ***
1.) Cedar Point opened on the chance that the weather will change. They're giving the customer the most chance to experience the park, and themselves the most chance to make a profit. I've been there before when its been raining cats and dogs inland, and the skies are clear over the Point. I think you'd see a lot more people complain if they weren't open on a day that ended up being gorgeous.
2.) Ok, so if it was 2001, then I would bet good money that out of that list given, Power Tower simply replaced Wicked Twister. So, that actually reduces the number of rides that "could have and should have been open" to 2 - Maggie and Raptor, both of which, you have no basis to judge how safe they are in cold, rainy conditions. The wooden coasters, it is clearly stated in the Halloweekends promotional materials are not open. Yes, it is their intention to open very few rides on Halloweekends Fridays, that has been the way its been for the last few years at least. That's why Fridays aren't as expensive as Saturday and Sunday!!
3.) How many times do we have to reiterate: "No refunds or rainchecks". Clearly stated park policy.
4.) See point #3 and then think if you're some low-paid temp worker at the customer service booth and some guy is complaining to you over a policy that clearly states otherwise. What do you do? Tell him something to get him off your back, take your paycheck and go home and as far as you're concerned, no harm no foul. He technically followed the rules.
5.) I highly doubt they were taking admissions at 8:30pm anyway. Jeff, help me out on this one, cause I'm not sure of the policy, but I thought they stopped admissions at some point, for just the reason that they don't want people to feel jipped that they paid full price for a two-hour admission ticket.
6.) The ride closures are not marked outside for Halloweekends Fridays because they assume that you already know what you're getting yourself into with the promotion. Fridays are limited service days. That's just the way of it, and no matter how much you say that it counts as "ride closures" for that day, those ride closures are scheduled and advertised months in advance.
Maybe it isn't fair, but its how they chose to run their business that night. Cedar Point is not responsible to hold your hand and make sure that you're not doing something dumb. If its cold and rainy and its a limited operations night anyway, don't waste your money!
-----------------
1. Kumba 2. Millie 3. Mantis 4. Lightning Racer 5. Wicked Twister (Front Seat)
-- Brett
2) You're right that I'm not qualified to determine why Raptor and Magnum weren't open. But don't they normally run in the rain? Don't they normally run it the cold? So why not that night? What about the flats that weren't open?
3) "No Refunds" makes sense and is acceptable if you enter the park, spend a few hours there riding rides, the weather turns crappy, and your day is shot. On the contrary, this was entering a park where nothing was open and nothing would open. That's essentially paying for nothing.
4) Read what I said again. After writing a letter to CP, a phone call was received from *someone* in operations who took his address and said a check was on the way. It never showed up.
5) I don't care if you doubt it, because I saw it happen. Not only did they take admissions at 8pm, but they didn't even stop to inform them the park was closing early!
6) The standard closed rides (rides that are never open Friday nights during Halloweekends) do not need to be listed outside, you're right. But the rides that are *supposed* to be open, and were not (nor were there any intentions to open...MF, Magnum, Raptor, Cedar Creek Mine Ride, etc) should have been listed on there. That's fair business, and that's why the sign is there.
Cedar Point normally operates when it's cold and rainy (specifically stated by the so-called fanboys and regulars). So what reason was there to expect otherwise, especially when CP didn't even bother to inform their valued customers that rides were closed and the park would close early? That's crap.
-Nate
It doesn't matter how cold your body is, it matters how well the coasters track in the cold. If it wasn't safe to run them (rollback chances, etc), it wasn't safe to run them.
That's that.
It (CMMR) looked fully staffed that night, and it was running test cycles soon after the park opened. The employees there informed us that, currently, it was running too slowly to open but would hopefully be open later. So I don't know what's up with it (or why that would be different from other Fri nights).
I completely understand closing coasters for cold. It was CP regulars who claimed that CP does not do that, which is obviously not true.
-Nate
*** This post was edited by coasterdude318 on 12/21/2002. ***
1.) You said they closed at 9pm right? Apparently they gave it 3 hours to change, it didn't so they closed. And waiting for the weather to change at 10am when you have a full day of operations in front of you, versus waiting for the weather to change at 9pm, when you have few guests and only a couple more hours which most employees probably lothe having to stay up that late anyway, you're going to close early on the nighttime one.
2.) for the millionth time it seems, the flats were not open because there were only 3 or 4 scheduled to be open! And I don't know why Raptor and Maggie weren't open, but I'm sure it was weather-related.
3.) No refunds means just that. No refunds. There is no conditions on it, there are no exceptions. No refunds. Period.
4.) Well I don't know what to say then - maybe it was lost in the mail?
5.) Since I can't argue my own point further without someone else's input as to when they normally stop admissions, I'm not gonna go on with this one ...
6.) First off, CCMR was not supposed to be open, please follow your own advice and read the previous posts. Read the list of rides that were scheduled to be open in 2002 and substitute Power Tower for Wicked Twister. And no, those rides should not be marked out front because that board is for ride closures due to mechanical failures and/or safety issues, not for weather closures. Heck, if it was for weather closures, they'd need a full-time employee just to update the sign every time its a windy, cold and/or rainy day!
I still only can count 3 or 4 rides (2 coasters) that were closed that you shouldn't have known about before you even got in your car to get to the park. So, I don't think its Cedar Point's responsibility to tell you that its raining and under rainy conditions, sometimes park rides have to close (by the way, that's right beside the "No Refunds" section of the park brochure and policies)
-----------------
1. Kumba 2. Millie 3. Mantis 4. Lightning Racer 5. Wicked Twister (Front Seat)
-- Brett
2) 3-4 scheduled and two open. What about the rest? Later in your post, you say there were only two coasters closed that I wouldn't have known about. I count four (MF, Raptor, Magnum, Wildcat).
3) I understand the concept of "no refunds", and I also understand the concept of using it for legal reasons. As I said, SFWoA knows when to use refunds/passes. CP does not.
4) Not likely when further letters and phone calls go unanswered/not returned.
6) I'll give you the benefit of the doubt here and say you started replying before you saw my post on CCMR (above). The ride board is for rides that are closed - simple as that. When everything goes down to weather, that's different. But when rides *never even open*, and with *no intentions* of opening, then they should be on the board. It's as simple as that.
When you choose to throw people out of your park (giving them only *half* of the normal hours) then refunds should be given. Wouldn't you be upset if you paid to enter the park and were thrown out after three hours? Like I said, maybe CP should turn to the east for some education in that.
-Nate
A funny thing about Cedar Creek Mine Ride...As an ex-employee of the park, I got to ride the thing 4 and a half times one day. The half comes from all of us employees climbing the second lift hill to board the empty train. We had to "test ride" it so the train had some weight in it. I thought it was funny to tell people that day that "I rode CCMR 4 and a half times today."
Maybe it's not really that funny, now that I've said it:p
Okay, time for me to get serious. I can tell you from expierance that Cedar Point cares greatly if a ride isn't working. I have personally seen 8 maintenance guys working diligently on the stupid little Camp Bus for nearly 4 hours. That's just one tiny example of how important it is to CP to have the rides opperating as much as possible.
On the other hand...Durring the first year it was called Six flags Ohio, I was on only my second visit to the park in my life. Many of the rides were closed for no reason, and the park decided to close 3 hours early. I was than told off by the guest service lady after makeing my dissatifaction known. It didn't ruin my day, but that was when I realized the differance between SFO and CP. And I DIDN'T get a free pass.
For the record, I am not a "fanboy". I am an ex-employee who really enjoyed his job.
Has this become a CP vs. SFWOA topic?
-----------------
Think for yourself-Don't reley on someone else.
Hummm... Regarding the great maintenance Disney has...
No other parks have a maintenance nightmare like Test Track. No others. That thing has 7-8 maintenance guys at all time working around the clock on it and sometimes, its just doesn't want to work. Each car has 3 computers onboard (more than enough computer power to run the magic kingdom). Its has 26 cars, going at 65 mph in a segment, 7-8 seconds apart!
See? Its not WDW fault if that ride is a downtime nightmare. But, they learned from their mistake and now, Journey to the Center of the Earth (Tokyo Disney-Seas)works perfectly. Imagineering well... took a bite took big, now its works, but with some troubles... (Give Matterhorn Bobsleds at DL a chance! Its the first steel coaster after all!)
Also, being a WDW Guest Relations cast member, I can say that if the park really trusts their GR employees, GR can do anything (I show that everyday).
1.) They opened at 6 because it is stated right in the Halloweekends spiel that on Friday nights they open at 6. That's the way they've done it for at least the last two years and probably all years before that too that they've held Halloweekends. Opening at 6 was not an odd occurance, that was normal operating procedure for that day.
2.) Well going back to your original arguement that seemed to show you were angry over the majority of 68 rides being closed, even if you do count Millie and Wildcat, that's still only 4. And you yourself said you can understand that when the weather was like that, Millie can't run. I would assume Wildcat has the same problems, but I don't know that for sure. Just my guess based on how it makes it over those hills. Butr again, these are weather related closures (see point 4)
3.) CP does not give refunds, so no they would not know when to use them. It's just not something they do. Wether you agree with that or not is irrelevant, you should have been aware of that policy before entering the park. When a place clearly states no refunds or rainchecks, you should not expect them to break that rule. It should simply be a pleasant surprise if they choose to.
6.) No, the rideboard is not for rides that are closed due to weather reasons. I have never seen one of those boards used for that purpose. At any park, not just CP. And again, you don't know what their intentions were. The rides were probably closed after testing because of the weather, and they held the same policy as the rest of the park. We'll open up, try to get some money off the folks that are addicted to DDR and don't mind being in the arcade on a cold rainy night, and maybe in a few hours, the rain will quit and we can open things up and people can enjoy themselves. But, oh well, it didn't happen, so at some point just give up, its just not going to change. You keep referring to these closures as if they saw you coming down the causeway and then made the decision to not open the rides that night that were already down due to the crappy weather. I am sure that was not the case. And if you want further proof that CP did have intentions of opening these rides had the weather let up? They weren't on the board! So using previous logic, that means there was no mechanical problem, which means it was definitely weather related, which means they had intentions of re-opening the rides if the weather let up! So your whole closed with no intentions of opening arguement just lost all water as far as I can see, and mainly because of your own arguments (I'm just amazed it took me this long to puzzle that one together ... )
No honestly I wouldn't be upset. Not with the operational schedule for that day and the weather being described. I'd be happy I got in the park at all, cause if I was running things that day, based on descriptions I've seen so far, I wouldn't have even opened the park that night.
No I'm not trying to make this CP vs. WoA, it just happens to be a convenient comparison. Sorry if you feel that is what it has become.
-----------------
1. Kumba 2. Millie 3. Mantis 4. Lightning Racer 5. Wicked Twister (Front Seat)
-- Brett
*** This post was edited by PittDesigner on 12/21/2002. ***
coasterdude318 said:What's "sad" is that people are attacked for even insinuating CP isn't the greatest place on the planet. What's the use of having a discussion if people aren't entitled to their own opinion?
coasterdude318, there is nothing wrong in stating your opinion. Where did I say you weren't entitled to it? My beef with you is, if their policies upset you that much, why didn't you take this up with Customer Relations, instead trying to cram down our throats that this is how the operate and they have bad customer service.
I don't care if you had a season pass, you still could have voiced your opinion and got the answer as to why they closed the rides. Why didn't you stand up for your guests who paid money for tickets? Why are you waiting a year to tell us all of this. Apparently it wasn't that big of a deal, because you didn't voice your opinion then.....
coasterdude318 also said:Coasterr: You think I stayed up unusually late to post on a message board? Ha! FWIW, 1:30am is *early* for me. I was up until 4:30 studying for a final, thank you much.
Oh really, I see your last post was past *2am*,so what, are you studying on a Saturday morning, too.
*Still...Rollin Eyes*
-----------------
100th coaster....Dania Beach Hurricane!
And yes, I had my last final this morning at 10:05am. Even so, being up at 2am is not out of the ordinary for me - as I stated before.
PittDesigner, you misunderstood what I said with point 1 (I'm well aware the park opens at 6 on Friday nights). Still, my basic point lies in this : if the weather was *that* bad, the park should not have opened. Period. Sure, they took a gamble and opened, but it's simply *not* fair to collect admission from your guests when nothing in the park is open or will open. When they decided to close, refunds *should* have been given because that's the thing to do. I don't think anybody paid to enter the park just to sit around, which is what everyone had to do that night. I guess I'm glad people like you normally don't work in customer service, because businesses would be in trouble.
-Nate
PittDesigner, you misunderstood what I said with point 1 (I'm well aware the park opens at 6 on Friday nights). Still, my basic point lies in this : if the weather was *that* bad, the park should not have opened. Period.
And did they force you into the park, did they force you into buying the ticket, did they force you to get into your car and drive to the park? NO....
-----------------
Don't Fight It, Ride It, RAGING BULL!!!!!!- SFGAm
-----------------
1. Kumba 2. Millie 3. Mantis 4. Lightning Racer 5. Wicked Twister (Front Seat)
-- Brett
-----------------
Age and treachery will always overcome youth and skill.
No, there were a *few* random attractions open, but as I said - if you're not going to open rides, why open the park?
When you pay to enter a park, you pay for a service you're about to receive (as I've explained before). CP did not deliver that service, and therefore I feel a refund is justified. Apparently CP also feels that way, since they did agree to send a refund (just never did). If the park felt they were so right, why did they agree a refund was in order?
It seems ridiculous the park even opened, and that's my complaint. You don't open a park gate but not open any rides. No, it's not CP's responsibility to "hold my hand" but it is their responsibility to inform me which attractions are down. If something is down due to wind, then it should be on the board. Same thing if something is down to cold. Six Flags parks certainly do that. I don't even believe Raptor or Magnum were staffed (empty stations when we walked past). If CP had intentions of opening those when we came in the park, fine. But they weren't even on the board when we left! That's ridiculous because they obviously were not waiting for the weather to improve.
My complaint is that CP gave a false impression that they were open for business - and very obviously they were not. The same holds true when you close early and kick people out earlier than scheduled closing times (that's false advertising, no?). That's not faulting them for "trying to make money" but for basically stealing. My point is that CP *does* close rides to cold and wind and rain. And that the park does, at times, do wrong. It might do wrong *less often* that many other parks, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
I think you ALL would have felt differently if you had paid to get into the park that night.
-Nate
*** This post was edited by coasterdude318 on 12/21/2002. ***
Why can't people admit that CP simply did wrong on the occasion in question? No one is claiming CP doesn't have good customer service usually or that it is a great park (one of the best imo) but it's not perfect. People seem to be defending accusations against CP that haven't actually been made, and not reading Coasterdude's posts; I mean Coasterdude has had to repeat himself quite a few times!
I've said it before and I'll say it again, if the night in question had been at a SF, people would not be rushing to defend the undefendable, but would be jumping on the SF bashing bandwagon. 'It's just good business' would be replaced with 'SF is just out to rip people off' or something like that.
How can you defend the simple fact about not receiving the promised refund?
Also, how can one defend letting people into the park at full price shortly before closing 3 hours early. I wouldn't imagine that CP deliberately let people in knowing that they would be chucking them out shortly after because the staff that let them in would not be the same staff who made the decision to close. However, it still happened, and shows a lack of communication. The fact is some people entered the park at full price and got a very short time in there with very little rides open. That is a plain and simple unfair thing to do imo.
I do not buy the argument 'oh, no one forced them to go to the park', and 'they knew they were taking a risk by going', that just seems like a cop out. CP should not have created the scenario, which allowed people to take such a big risk (entering the park) whilst not knowing they were doing so. There should have been a sign or someone giving the information of the exact scenario before entering the park. Then, if people proceed to enter, they know that they are taking a risk and can have no complaints. It should not be up to guests to research the park's scenario beyondlooking to see if the park is open. Not everyone has the internet for example.
I really do challenge some people here to just admit CP messed up on this occasion.
You must be logged in to post
