Fast Lane Plus coming to Cedar Point

I'll work off of the assumption that the time is exaggerated. I honestly don't know if they are or not. They probably are. It makes sense for them to be.

My first thought is "better safe than sorry" - if you're going to estimate wait times for the guest, you'd better overestimate. That just seems like common sense. But...

The exaggerated wait times also serve to makes guests in line happy. Underpromise and overdeliver. We're all pretty happy when an expected wait is actually less.

On top of that, if there's a segment of people who don't understand the imprecise nature of estimating a line's length and purchase Flashpass based on nothing more than a suggestion from a sign (and it's just simple advertising, really - present a problem and offer a solution) then it works on a third level too.

Travis, if you mean to say the line wouldn't be 60 minutes if it weren't for flash pass, you're probably right - it would probably only be 55 minutes or so. Then again, maybe not. Those same people who aren't physically in line thanks to the flash pass, would be there if there was no such thing.

I think what that means is, nothing has changed but your perception of waiting.

The comments about feeling alientated. I do feel it, more and more. All this expensive prefered parking, and paying to cut in line for rides, and now someone has to pay even more to cut for rides that the parks assume will be popular. What's next? Getting bumped from your park accomadations by someone who purcahses a cut in line pass to bump you from you hotel room? Even if you reserved it months and in advance, and they showed up in one day, and just happened to have more money than you?It's bad enough that they charge a huge amount of money to park the car. The only positive thing I can see that they have done, is allowing people to buy their season passes on a payment plan. And, include parking in that plan. But, you know they are only going to do that until it is no longer in their best interest, as went the Cedar Point/Michigan's Adventure combo pass. Which a lot of people close to the parks were using, at only $89.00. Now what is a platimum pass? Near $200.00. How many people are actually going to take advantage over every park in the chain?It's always something. Ca-ching Ca-ching Ca-ching!

Your strawman arguments don't help your case. But hey, if you're feeling alienated, I guess it gives you something to shoot for, so you too can be successful and part of the 1%.

I shouldn't even bother here, but I'm gonna try.
I will renew my platinum pass for 174 bucks which will give me access to CP, KI, Soak City, and Geauga, all in day trip range. In past years I've visited KD, Carowinds, Valleyfair, Dorney, Michigan's Adventure, Knott's, and this year I'm going to try to get to Worlds of Fun. I park free wherever I go.
And what do I say? Ca-ching. I can't think of a better value. How do you not see that?

RCMAC is 102.8% correct.

Timber-Rider said:

What's next? Getting bumped from your park accomadations by someone who purcahses a cut in line pass to bump you from you hotel room? Even if you reserved it months and in advance, and they showed up in one day, and just happened to have more money than you?

What's super great about this comment is that this absolutely happens. Just not as directly as you're painting it. But yes, there are nights that you can't get a room while someone who is a better customer can.

And if you don't want to believe it from CoasterBuzz's resident hotel husband, then check just 30 seconds of this clip from Marriott's revenue manager.

Which goes back to something I used to say - this is nothing new. This happens all the time in all kinds of situations. It's just usually not as obvious that it's happening. The parks really have no way of doing it more discreetly like other kinds of businesses can.

As an aside, if you want to know where I get most of my business sense from (Gonch's Business Model™ - heh, who remembers that?) watch that whole clip from the beginning. It flat out spells out how the hospitality industry does business...and I think parks qualify as the hospitality industry in a lot of ways. Surprised more parks haven't just straight-out adopted similar approaches...then again, maybe they are.

I have stayed in Courtyards on several nights now, last night included, that showed booked solid online, but I got a room without question thanks to Silver Elite Marriott Rewards.

It's freaking amazing, and I don't feel bad doing it, like, at all.

Lord Gonchar said:

rollergator said:

Accesso certainly wanted to hear from me directly in regards to my posting...LOL!

Dare I inquire further?

Sure. This thread: http://coasterbuzz.com/Forums/Topic/lo-q-acquires-accesso started it. Apparently someone with a title at Accesso thought I could serve some useful purpose by sharing my experience, and contacted Jeff to see if I'd be interested in offering my opinion. Jeff contacted me to ask if I was OK with talking to the guy (thanks, Jeff - very courteous). To the best of my recollection, my problem was with a transaction failing mid-process and being unable to get a successful resolution. More specifically, I think it was a season pass purchase, and trying to find out whether I had (a) been charged and (b) completed my order - were my passes actually ordered and on their way to being shipped. None of that information was accessible by phone.

I've been contacted a few other times for comments I've made. Usually positive (fluff) stuff about nostalgia and wooden coasters.

One sneaky trick that resort hotels will often do, is tell you they are sold out, and refer you to a more expensive hotel. But, surprise, that hotel is also owned by the same company, and they are not sold out, what they are doing is selling you up to get more cash. I know several people who work for hotels, and also know a few people who also own them.A resort hotel, in a popular spot for singles, will tell you that they are swamped, and try to sell you the most expensive room they have, and when you tell them it's about your budget, they go..oh wait, I think I found a less expensive one that just opened up. You get there, paid a lot of money for your room, to find out that it's dead as hell. Or, the place is loaded with senior citizens on their way to the casino on a bus tour to play bingo!Another thing hotels will do is put a hold on cleaning their cheap rooms, so they can sell the more expensive ones, saying they don't have any left at that price, and sell up. I think that's wrong too. I have seen them doing it at hotels around cedar point.

Huh. I was in a hotel in Australia and got there early. They said they didn't have a room in my booking class, so they upgraded me for free to a room with a bay view overlooking Sydney airport and downtown for no reason other than to be nice. Those Communists.

Seriously, if you keep running into these evil hotels, you must be doing something wrong, because they're always nice to me. Maybe it's just because I'm so devilishly handsome.

I must be handsome too. Got upgraded to a 3 room suite in December I'm Vegas cause they over books due to the rodeo. And, like, I know people that work at hotels and stuff and they tell me stuff.

Yes, yes, you're both very handsome. But not as handsome as me.
My partner makes convention and travel arrangements for a club we belong to (non coaster related) and when we checked into the lovely Lowes hotel in Philly we got upgraded to the presidential suite, simply because we said "Gosh, we like to host in our room. You don't have anything nicer, do you?"
When I walked into our living room sized carrara marble bathroom and looked at the toilet I said "Hot Dayum! Barack AND Oprah been here!"

That wasn't a Lowe's hotel. You were camped out in the bathroom aisle of a hardware store.

Impossible. They tape the seats down at THAT Lowes.

Let me refer you all to a thread I just posted entitled "I am a hypocrite, I bought Fastlane." I think it ties in nicely here, but also deserved it's own thread.

LostKause said:

The point isn't that the lines are 60 minutes long. The point is that they advertise Flash Pass on the same sign that they show an exaggerated line length. They lie about the length of the line to sell more Flash Passes.

I had thought for the coasters, those wait time signs are accurate if 1 train is running. That seems to usually be the case at Great Adventure. Today Nitro was running 2 trains and from the 60 minute sign it was just under 30 minutes. With 3 trains running it's usually a 20 minute wait from that sign.

A lot of times I see people read those signs and consider getting out of line thinking that the sign is accurate when there are 2 or 3 trains running on a coaster. I usually speak up and let them know that the signs are wrong and that 60 minute wait is really only 20 minutes and then they stay in line.

Great Adventure still runs one train when the line is an hour long, and they have signs at their coasters advertising Flash Pass? And if they are running more than one train, they are essentially lying about the wait time while on the same sign advertising a way to pay to cut in front of everyone else?

You know, I am not the only person in this entire world who despises pay-to-cut. I recall last year when Kings Island announced on their Facebook that they were going to add Fast Lane to their park, and all heck broke loose in the comments section. Many people hated it. Yes, it is here to stay, but that doesn't mean everyone is really happy about it.

I'm used to it. I even use it on occasion, because I feel it is necessary, but I still hate it. I watch the solution for the problem make the problem worse for the people who don't pay for the solution. It makes no sense to me, as a customer. It makes perfect $en$e to the park operator though.

I didn't word that right. They rarely run 1 train on the coasters anymore unless it is very low crowds, weather related or it's early in the season and the 2nd train isn't ready yet (like Batman right now).

I'm honestly kind of indifferent about Flash Pass. I harbor no strong feelings either way. But since we're talking about Great Adventure...again...I am compelled to offer my experience there a couple of summers ago.

My husband and I visited in the middle of July so we were expecting heavy crowds. We wandered into a gift shop in the entrance to discuss the matter of Flash Pass. A very lovely gentlemen who works at the gift shop asked us about our day. We told him what we were thinking. He told us that honestly the need for Flash Pass was hit or miss due to the heat. But he said, "You know what? You don't even need it either way and I'm gonna tell ya why." Then he pulled out a park map and lined out in marker the way we should navigate the park to avoid the crowds.

That's the kind of customer service we had all day. Not trying to sell the upcharge at any expense. And he was right. We ended up not needing it.

We encountered a girl and her mom later in the day on El Toro who was taking advantage of the Platinum Flash Pass re-ride and they were gushing to us about how they didn't have to wait in line all day. We thought to ourselves, neither did we. But they were happy with their purchase. And we were happy with ours. Win win.