Customer Services

[Tom]

I have an enquiry which requires attachments on an email to send to the park, which their website does not offer - Does anyone know the customer services email?

[TPJames]

 

The thing is James, not all coasters have 2 hour queues all the time.  Most days, you'll see one or two rides with near 2 hour queues (usually Saw and Colossus in my experiences), and the rest between 60-90mins.  And that would be at their worst.  So, your assumptions are a bit over the top really.  

 

We truly won't know the effect it will have on the rest of the rides until they try it for a few days (one day or half a day is just not good enough).  For it to be as successful as possible, they'll need more attractions, yes, but I think it can work.

My assumptions are in NO WAY over the top. If the system was put into place and everyone was notified of how to use it, on a day with 15,000 people at least 10,000 will be using the virtual system while queuing for another ride. So what, if some are shorter than others? That's what has been experienced. Saw at a RIDICULOUS 3hours 30mins and stealth at 2hours 30mins today with the others just over an hour. Bearing in mind this is excluding the people who aren't using the system in the main queues and flats rides aswell.

During peak summer with JUST reserve n ride in place, they will easily reach 2 hours each, baring in mind there are people currently not aware of the system and not using it. So 2000 virtually queueing per coaster. Once again I reiterate, there will be 500 people per 'other' ride if they spread out evenly. And they will not spread out evenly, people are more likely to go to things like samurai, rush or vortex which will easily get over 90mins with this system. I wouldn't be suprised if they tried this system and the queues for the flat rides are getting so ridiculously long that people miss their reservations.

[Coaster]

3 hours?!!! Something has got to be wrong with the way the park is being run if the main queue is reaching the 3 hour mark.

[Project LC]

TPJames maths does check out. That is the case and what will happen. bare in mind next season the coaster queues will be closed so you have 15,000 people divided among the flat rides whilst at the same time those 15,000 people are waiting virtually for the coasters. Both resulting in massive queues.

[TPJames]

3 hours?!!! Something has got to be wrong with the way the park is being run if the main queue is reaching the 3 hour mark.

Sorry I worded that wrongly, saw reached 120mins in the main queue today and was 3hours 30mins on reserve n ride. From what I've heard as well, the main queues are much longer than advertised as well with it saying 50mins for people to wait 2hours in the main etc. I wouldn't be surprised if the 120min saw queue was actually nearing 3hours with fastrack AND reserve n ride pushing their way through.

[Project LC]

The advertised times are wrong as no one has adjusted them for the RnR system. This forum alone should be a warning sign to Thorpe that some of their biggest fans and getting very annoyed by this system. I'm sure that "your concerns will be passed on to the relevant manager". Recently they have made me very angry and it sounds like that they are going to make the park a lot worse if they really think this is going to work.

[Marc]

It's very easy sitting behind a keyboard saying it won't work and doing some maths based on guessed ride throughputs but none of it is fact.

Let's look at things logically for a second - I know there are people who will never like this system because it will affect THEIR days , but Thorpe has to cater for the majority of it's guests not the minority. Thorpe are the only ones who truly know how well this is working / not working, looking at twitter for a few good / bad comments and looking at the queue times from home is no real indicator to how the systems working.

If the system works and the majority of the feedback is good then the park will continue to develop the system, if the feedback is bad then they won't, it really is that simple. We represent a tiny minority of the parks guests, and as I said only they will know the true success of this system.

[TPJames]

Every park has flaws, it doesn't matter what these flaws are as long as they try to rectify them.

I for one get very upset by Merlins customer service, they never actually take anything into action it is always the same response, "we will look into this further" or "have some free fastrack" or "we will pass your information on to the relevant department". Do they actually ever take action and listen to you comments? Probably not unless there is a big enough stir about something to make them lose money. Whenever I have complained to thorpe before, they never actually solve anything but give me fastrack. Yes this fastrack benefits me but my advice has not benefited thorpe or the public.

Thorpe isn't the only park with merlin who have the same level of customer service. I recently won tickets to the fusion festival through alton towers. I haven't received them for well over a week now and the festival is on Saturday. When I email to ask them where the tickets are, the response is simply "we will ask the relevant department" or "we will look into this further". I am not happy about the customer service here and if I do not infact receive my tickets I would be grateful if someone could provide me with a proper customer service link for alton so I can deal with the situation. At no point did they say they would send out my tickets after I asked for a third time and I don't want to be given fastracks for alton as I am not planning to visit until next year at the earliest.

Anyway my point is, complaining doesn't seem to get you anywhere. We can all moan as much as we want but thorpe aren't gonna change their mind, they have decided what they want to do and even their most important guests, US, the enthusiasts they won't take advice from. As much as we all moan about this system. Are thorpe's plans going to realistically change? No they aren't.

[paige]

I just don't think they're trialling it in a very good way

[Project LC]

Guest services do never listen. I have never seen any complaint get dealt with properly. It is always here is a free fastrack. I'm willing to put money on the fact that there is lots of complaints, I'm not saying that there probably isn't good feedback as well however I'm sure that Thorpe are now so heavily invested in this that bad feedback doesn't have anywhere near the weight of good feedback. If RnR does work magic for the park I will truly be astonished. However I'm sure that its another scheme where not every angle has been covered and will ultimately result in a way for Q-Bots to make an appearance and rake in the money. The trails have been poorly executed as they are not trailing it in conditions in which it will be used. Any bad bit of feedback they turn round and say no your wrong. It is a complete joke which I'm really not willing to put up with any more. 

[Benin]

I do remember once complaining at Towers (few years back when they were all, MAP holders must use a gate, but no sign stating which gate), and on my next visit they had a sign up...

Best methods to complain are either in person on the day, or by phone... Emails just be forgotten about way too easily... On the phone they have to sort you out (since you cant just get given Fastrack)...

[Mark9]

If this system bothers people so much, you really should think about just not going. If genuine concerns are being ignored because of the odd positive tweet then Thorpe's position is clear. I'd rather encourage people to go to Europa Park or Efteling then to continue to visit and be disappointed by Thorpe.

[TPJames]

This is the thing though, while I can't speak for Project LC or some others I genuinely enjoy thopre park and what it has to offer, hence me getting an annual pass.

The problem is, I don't want queues to become spiralling out of control. I would much rather wait 2hours in a standby queue for a coaster than wait the best of 2hours in a queue for a flat ride because everyone is queuing virtually for the coasters at the same time. Waiting that long for a flat ride would just make it seem worthless and I get by making this a new system you won't bet on any more rides than you usually would as the queues would just be moved if it was all completely RNR.

You feel much better queuing normally for a coaster than you do for a flat ride, if the queues are simply moved to the flat rides, then you are going to be forced into queueing for ages into queueing for a flat ride. The system will not work if it turns completely to RNR as thorpe don't have enough high throughput attractions to cater all the people.

Anyways, my point is that I like thorpe the way it is, and it's not a realistic idea which is going to work UNTIL they install more rides and shows and attractions with high throughputs. If thorpe wait a few years then this system could easily be a winner.

[Marc]

As I said all we can do is wait and see - like it or not Thorpe have a much better idea how these trails are going than we do - the positive / negative feedback on social will be just a tiny percentage of the real feedback they have from actually talking to the guests at the park who have used the system which we have no access too.

If the feedback was as bad as some of you claim for it to be the park would simply not carry on with this... But I think the biggest issue is people being adverse to change.. If you had said 5 years ago busses in London won't be accepting cash anymore you would have thought that's mad and come up with a list of reasons why that would never work and I'm sure during trails it would of had it's criticism, but now...

[darkadder312]

I would rather see RnR just being in place of Fastrack charge for it and up the cost of it.

[Project LC]

I honestly believe that this system will not, cannot not and wont work. Its not me being anti-change, when I first heard they were trailing this I was excited so at the first possibility I went to a trail. It wasn't the best day I've ever had and I pointed out some concerns. I then went to another with the full system active to see none of my concerns had been addressed and in fact all of the problems and more were now worse. Now this far into the trails it appears that they still haven't addressed the problems like where these people are going to go. Ive been asking the same question for about a year and no one has been able to say what happens to the 5000+ people. No one here has been able to answer, no one on other forums, no one from guest services (person and email) and no staff have been. The only place these people can go is into the flat queue lines which is just moving the queues and not eliminating them. Which results in the situation becoming worse as no one wants to wait 60-100 minutes for a flat ride.

[darkadder312]

I remember complaining at Towers on my birthday last year as Smiler was down and came back the following day by certain time and got given x5 free fastracks as I couldn't go up to Towers hardly at all that year so Kinda did make up for my Birthday.

[Project LC]

That is merlin's solution to everything. first its we well tell the relevant manager and then if you are not pleased with that its here is a free fastrack. That is not guest services that's just paying people to go away.

[TPJames]

Thorpe have activated their rainy day garuntee for today and tomorrow. If you visited on either of these days, you will apparently be given a free return ticket to selected dates.

"RAINY DAY OFFER TERMS & CONDITIONS - 25TH AND 26TH AUGUST

Don’t let the wet weather put you off from coming to THORPE PARK Resort. As well as the queue lines being shorter, we have activated our Wet Weather guarantee for guests visiting on 25th and 26th August 2014.

We will be offering all our guests already in the park a complimentary ticket to return later in the season on selected dates in 2014.*

Just hang on to your ticket from your visit and present your original ticket at our admissions kiosks or ticket collection desk.

*Free visit is like for like e.g. adult ticket for adult ticket and can be used on Monday 8th September – Friday 26th September 2014 & Monday 29th September to Friday 3rd October 2014."

Hope this helps anyone at the park today or tomorrow

[THORPE PARK]

Hi everyone,

 

Very interesting to read all your feedback and some of the very passionate viewpoints on this topic.

 

Over the weekend the feedback from guests at the Resort using the system has been incredibly positive. We do take on board all comments, both positive and negative, and that is the reason we are running the trials - as a test to fully road test the system and see what potential pitfalls there are for us to overcome before rolling this out as a permanent feature.

 

We are not ignoring the issue of additional guests on the Resort who will no longer be standing in coaster queues, and this is one of the reasons we have invested in live bands performing on Saturdays over the summer this year, as well as every day over the Bank Holiday weekend when RNR was running.

 

We have implemented RNR to improve the experience of our guests, and from the vast majority of feedback we've received, this has been successful, but we are continually reviewing and making improvements to our processes based on learnings from the trials.