Stupid Ticketing Tricks
Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 6:32 pm
I just came back from a lovely weekend at Disneyland and the new European fashion exhibit at LACMA (beautifully preserved clothes from 1760 - 1910; they have some seriously amazing pieces). We had a great time, but this post is about the not so fun bit: the problems we encountered at ticketing.
We bought our tickets online through disneyland.com in advance. Unfortunately, my friend L. bought a 3-day pass because she didn't realize that you had to use all three days within two weeks. Fortunately, she figured this out before she went into the park the first day, and I told her that she should be able to get it fixed at the park. We decided to be efficient and take care of it the night before so that we didn't have to deal with standing in line in the morning, so we headed over to the Guest Relations booth just outside DCA.
I'm sorry to say that the GR CM was unhelpful and clueless. L. found that she couldn't exchange her ticket even though she'd bought it directly through Disney, and the GR CM told L. to go to City Hall the next morning to get it fixed. I was dubious about that since I suspected that once she used the pass it would be a lot harder to get it fixed. We spent a bit of time at Downtown Disney, and on the way out we tried asking the front desk at the Grand Californian for help. That also didn't work, though it took a good twenty minutes of trying before the CM there gave up. He told L. that he'd only be able to help her if she were a guest at one of the Disney hotels. I understand that the front desk of the hotel can't and shouldn't act as a secondary ticket booth, but he also didn't provide any useful suggestions, beyond telling her that she should call the phone number for ticketing at disneyland.com.
Of course, since it was late, nobody answered the phone, and no one answered the next morning either, since apparently the ticketing dept. at disneyland.com is only open M - F. Since tons of people visit the Disney parks on the weekends, this strikes me as poor.
The next morning, we went over to one of the ticketing booths outside Disneyland. I thought that surely L. would be able to resolve things here - these are the people who deal with admissions media all day! It shouldn't be a problem, since she bought her ticket through Disney, she hadn't yet used it, and Disney should be able to exchange it.
I was wrong. Apparently, the ticketing system at disneyland.com and the ticketing system at the park itself are not linked at all, so Disneyland could not issue her an exchange. The only solution they offered was that she could buy an entirely new ticket, and then ask for a refund from disneyland.com later. The problem here is that it would take a week to process her refund, and meanwhile L. is standing at the ticket booth very upset and frustrated because what should be a simple process is turning out to be very difficult, and she's getting blocked at every time. To make matters worse, the ticket booth CM mentioned that we could have gone to a ticket booth last night because they're open as long as the parks are open! I had thought that that might be the case, but I didn't see any open ticket booths when we were there. My guess is that there was one open booth, but since they are little round structures and there are a lot of them in the plaza, I just didn't happen to see the one that was open that late at night. The worst part, though, is that the Guest Relations CM that L. talked to the first time didn't try to point her to a ticket booth - she gave her the bad advice to go to City Hall the next morning! If I hadn't been there as a guide, L. probably would have taken her advice, gone into the park, and then been told by City Hall that since she'd used the ticket, it was now nonrefundable. I'm really glad that didn't happen.
L. did eventually get her ticket refund and a new one-day ticket, but it was much, much harder than it should have been. She can't possibly be the only one who encountered this problem - it's something that needs to be fixed. I understand that disneyland.com and Disneyland are essentially different companies operating under the same umbrella, but that shouldn't matter to a guest, and it especially shouldn't impact their experience. L. was ready to leave that morning, and I don't think she would have returned to Disneyland any time soon, since that experience left a bad taste.
The two main problems are a) the nonlinked systems and b) the bad advice she got from Guest Relations. I was really surprised at just how bad the suggestions were; I've never encountered quite that much difficulty in all the years I've been visiting the parks.
We bought our tickets online through disneyland.com in advance. Unfortunately, my friend L. bought a 3-day pass because she didn't realize that you had to use all three days within two weeks. Fortunately, she figured this out before she went into the park the first day, and I told her that she should be able to get it fixed at the park. We decided to be efficient and take care of it the night before so that we didn't have to deal with standing in line in the morning, so we headed over to the Guest Relations booth just outside DCA.
I'm sorry to say that the GR CM was unhelpful and clueless. L. found that she couldn't exchange her ticket even though she'd bought it directly through Disney, and the GR CM told L. to go to City Hall the next morning to get it fixed. I was dubious about that since I suspected that once she used the pass it would be a lot harder to get it fixed. We spent a bit of time at Downtown Disney, and on the way out we tried asking the front desk at the Grand Californian for help. That also didn't work, though it took a good twenty minutes of trying before the CM there gave up. He told L. that he'd only be able to help her if she were a guest at one of the Disney hotels. I understand that the front desk of the hotel can't and shouldn't act as a secondary ticket booth, but he also didn't provide any useful suggestions, beyond telling her that she should call the phone number for ticketing at disneyland.com.
Of course, since it was late, nobody answered the phone, and no one answered the next morning either, since apparently the ticketing dept. at disneyland.com is only open M - F. Since tons of people visit the Disney parks on the weekends, this strikes me as poor.
The next morning, we went over to one of the ticketing booths outside Disneyland. I thought that surely L. would be able to resolve things here - these are the people who deal with admissions media all day! It shouldn't be a problem, since she bought her ticket through Disney, she hadn't yet used it, and Disney should be able to exchange it.
I was wrong. Apparently, the ticketing system at disneyland.com and the ticketing system at the park itself are not linked at all, so Disneyland could not issue her an exchange. The only solution they offered was that she could buy an entirely new ticket, and then ask for a refund from disneyland.com later. The problem here is that it would take a week to process her refund, and meanwhile L. is standing at the ticket booth very upset and frustrated because what should be a simple process is turning out to be very difficult, and she's getting blocked at every time. To make matters worse, the ticket booth CM mentioned that we could have gone to a ticket booth last night because they're open as long as the parks are open! I had thought that that might be the case, but I didn't see any open ticket booths when we were there. My guess is that there was one open booth, but since they are little round structures and there are a lot of them in the plaza, I just didn't happen to see the one that was open that late at night. The worst part, though, is that the Guest Relations CM that L. talked to the first time didn't try to point her to a ticket booth - she gave her the bad advice to go to City Hall the next morning! If I hadn't been there as a guide, L. probably would have taken her advice, gone into the park, and then been told by City Hall that since she'd used the ticket, it was now nonrefundable. I'm really glad that didn't happen.
L. did eventually get her ticket refund and a new one-day ticket, but it was much, much harder than it should have been. She can't possibly be the only one who encountered this problem - it's something that needs to be fixed. I understand that disneyland.com and Disneyland are essentially different companies operating under the same umbrella, but that shouldn't matter to a guest, and it especially shouldn't impact their experience. L. was ready to leave that morning, and I don't think she would have returned to Disneyland any time soon, since that experience left a bad taste.
The two main problems are a) the nonlinked systems and b) the bad advice she got from Guest Relations. I was really surprised at just how bad the suggestions were; I've never encountered quite that much difficulty in all the years I've been visiting the parks.
