Park Operations

[BigBobJones]

I was at the the Towers, no security on show, the old boards and and www.ridetimes.co.uk giving accurate times and the ability to get a drinks refill at ANY food or drinks place... how can two parks owned by the same company be so different...

[Ricky]

Just because two places are owned by the same company doesn't mean they are run the same. Take J D Weatherspoons and Lloyd's No. 1, owned by the same company and couldn't be anymore different. One is a pub which has no music the other is more 'club' like and has music.

[pluk]

But they are trying to be different brands offering a different service to different people. Thorpe and Alton are broadly trying to do the same thing as each other, especially regarding these ponts. Clearly one could learn by looking at what the other is doing.

I still find this exaggerated queue time vs excessive fastrack sales thing disgusting and hard to defend, even if it really is accidental/coincidental as some people are so adamant is the case. It'll end up being the next watchdog report if they keep it up!

[coastercameron98]

I forgot to put this post up on Sunday but operations for Sunday were generally really good all the ride crews tried their best to keep the queues down and yet Colossus still stayed over 90 mins. But the main queue time boards were complete lies. They advertised Colossus as 5 mins at 2oclock so I ran over to it to find the single Colossus board said 90 mins, I said no that doesn't look like 90 mins and went in and yet it still took 65 mins. Also most of the queue times from 4 oclock onwards were advertised at around 20 to 30 mins each, however most were walk on got 2 rides on Inferno within 5 minutes even though the queue was advertised as 25 mins. Why are the times so inaccurate, surely at a park like Thorpe they should be spot on.

[Marc]

It's swings and roundabouts, Alton do things such as sell fastrack on the smiler when it's not reedy / have sellers going into the queue lines which is somthing I wouldn't like to see at Thorpe.

Equally with the drinks I agree it's handy how at Alton you can just do it your self, but in the summer I rarther Thorpes system avoiding me fights with wasps!

[Benin]

It's swings and roundabouts, Alton do things such as sell fastrack on the smiler when it's not reedy / have sellers going into the queue lines which is somthing I wouldn't like to see at Thorpe.

Equally with the drinks I agree it's handy how at Alton you can just do it your self, but in the summer I rarther Thorpes system avoiding me fights with wasps!

Apparently said person has since been sacked, so clearly Towers agreed that it was way beyond what any sales person should be doing... Seems it might well have been the person's idea, rather than the park itself (though of course, that goes against the Merlin = bad thing)...

Thorpe are stupid for being selective in their drinks place choices though, causes more queues at specific places and if I recall Glass House doesn't do it, meaning that I wouldn't want to eat there because I'm not paying extra for a drink when I can get it for free elsewhere... See also Kebab place... It's a daft choice and bollocks is it against wasps...

[Marc]

Apparently said person has since been sacked, so clearly Towers agreed that it was way beyond what any sales person should be doing... Seems it might well have been the person's idea, rather than the park itself (though of course, that goes against the Merlin = bad thing)...

Good to hear, the point I was trying to make is both parks have there pros and cons in the way things are run IMO.

Thorpe are stupid for being selective in their drinks place choices though, causes more queues at specific places and if I recall Glass House doesn't do it, meaning that I wouldn't want to eat there because I'm not paying extra for a drink when I can get it for free elsewhere... See also Kebab place... It's a daft choice and bollocks is it against wasps...

From what I understand your able to fill your capsule up at the restaurants (Bar 360 / Bush BBQ etc) if your eating a meal there. I'm not sure the reasons behind it.

[Benin]

Probably to do with queues, but at the same time this causes a build-up of queues at the Doughnut places (where I waited 10 odd minutes just to refill my drink because those have the worst queues on park really)...

Might as well just let everyone refill at any place with the ability to do it, saves people having to search for that specific place...

[BigBobJones]

Last Saturday three of the refill stations either were closed or had faulty machines. I had to have stern words at Guest Services about this as the places which were open had 25 min queues and one member of staff and the places which refuse to serve you drinks had 2-3 staff doing not a lot.

Plenty of hot frustrated customers melting in a 30C heat. The girl on one of the refill stations who was on her own with a queue a mile long and a faulty refill machine looked like she was going to burst out in tears as people were waiting ages to be told there was no drinks! Also Thorpe were selling plenty of day capsules but not having the infrastructure to support it.

This policy is ridiculous. I made a point when I went to the Towers on Sunday/Monday to go to all the places which were not standard refill stations to get my drinks refills.

• Fish and Chips in FV
• Bar at the bottom of towers street
• Hot dog stands etc

Nobody questioned it, they took the capsule and filled it up no questions asked "Are you having a good day" normal kiosk conversation...

The only thing Towers let people down with was that all the slush stations were closed

[Mark9]

I don't really understand why they restrict the capsule in the first place. Surely you buy the thing with the idea that anywhere that does a machine should serve you the drink. We got refused at The Smiler for example, in a two hour queue in the boiling sun. Just seems like a very odd policy to sell you the thing but only let certain places refill it.

[TPJames]

Last Saturday three of the refill stations either were closed or had faulty machines. I had to have stern words at Guest Services about this as the places which were open had 25 min queues and one member of staff and the places which refuse to serve you drinks had 2-3 staff doing not a lot.

Plenty of hot frustrated customers melting in a 30C heat. The girl on one of the refill stations who was on her own with a queue a mile long and a faulty refill machine looked like she was going to burst out in tears as people were waiting ages to be told there was no drinks! Also Thorpe were selling plenty of day capsules but not having the infrastructure to support it.

This policy is ridiculous. I made a point when I went to the Towers on Sunday/Monday to go to all the places which were not standard refill stations to get my drinks refills.

• Fish and Chips in FV
• Bar at the bottom of towers street
• Hot dog stands etc

Nobody questioned it, they took the capsule and filled it up no questions asked "Are you having a good day" normal kiosk conversation...

The only thing Towers let people down with was that all the slush stations were closed

Hmmmm, I visited warwick castle a couple of days ago and we had the exact same problem.

All of the stations around the grounds were closed except for a couple of the outdoor food stalls. However half of them had faulty machines as the gas wasn't working and the others had massive lines as people were buying food etc. aswell!

[dragon2000]

Fastrack ticket sales were out of control today. Pretty much all the coasters had a salesperson stood at the entrance at some point and it was making a lot of the queues move at a snails pace.

What should have been a 45min Swarm queue ended up being 90mins because only about 6-8 normal forward-facing riders got let into the station each time a train was sent out.

Funnily enough when the fastrackers stopped coming to the ride around 4, the queue went right down.

Can I also say how miserable some of the staff were today. Even the usually great Inferno team were chanting the 'daylight come and me wanna go home' song across the station to each other

(For those of you unaware:

)

[Flipper]

Fastrack ticket sales were out of control today. Pretty much all the coasters had a salesperson stood at the entrance at some point and it was making a lot of the queues move at a snails pace.

What should have been a 45min Swarm queue ended up being 90mins because only about 6-8 normal forward-facing riders got let into the station each time a train was sent out.

Can I also say how miserable some of the staff were today. Even the usually great Inferno team were chanting the 'daylight come and me wanna go home' song across the station to each other

Two things I wanna pick out on:

Fastrack; come on, we've had it going long enough to accept we're gonna have to deal with it. On a hot day, Thorpe are going to sell it at entrances; and it very rarely seems to actually sell out for an entire day on any given ride. You wouldn't complain when you visit Disney, because it's free. And at the end of the day, a lot of people don't want to queue for hours and hours for rides in such heat. I know I wouldn't (hence why I don't go at the moment). Might I add, Fastrack limits mean that when the timings are adhered to (both by guests and staff) it does run the risk of extending the queue time by approximately 50% at any given point for any ride. But for that to occur, you have to have sold out fastrack, and have people steadily coming up Fastrack - which is rare. So, I'm sorry but you're 45 minute queue, which might I add, you're claiming without actually knowing; and if you're going off the advertising sign, then you should have complained because 90 minutes and 45 minutes is a bit of a jump and clearly not being updated on the time board, and like I said, you'd need the Swarm fastrack queue to be pretty much full, and Fastrack sold out for the entire day... I really doubt that occurred.

Also regarding staff; again it's tough luck. Yes, they're not as happy-go-lucky as you'd expect; but at the same time, people have to respect and give a little; these guys are running around loading rides in the excessive heat, and have been doing for a few weeks now with no sign of it slipping up. They don't get any respite in the heat. They get the same breaks as usual, except no air conditioning or water supplied to them like a standard workplace. And from experience, you'd be amazed how many people will actually steal drinks off staff if they seem they laying around; and throw them around, or over themselves to keep themselves cool. So yes, perhaps they're not in the best mood; but I don't think anybody would be in this heat! I mean for the love of god; I was slipping in my job yesterday; saying the wrong things, getting confused with myself, and it was all down to the heat. But I ain't gonna complain, because at least I had a fan and drink on an hourly basis; unlike Thorpe's staff.

[BigBobJones]

After 2.5 hours in a queue for the Smiler last week and Thorpe unable to manage their refills, I think I'll keep clear of the parks until September. I really would rather loose out than go there at the moment.

I'm sure we have all been there when you have queued for so long that you get to the stage that you don't care how good the ride is, the wait is not worth it.

[pluk]

Two things I wanna pick out on:

Fastrack; come on, we've had it going long enough to accept we're gonna have to deal with it. ...... I really doubt that occurred.

I think you are rather missing the point here. Fastrack as a thing, yes of course people can deal with it however against it they are, but the rampant and aggressive overselling of it in a totally unmanaged way is wrong. People should be complaining and people quite rightly get sick of it when it destroys any chance you have of a decent day out as your wait time rises and rises as a constant procession of people pay past you.

There is, allegedly, a system, but it does not work. Supposedly there are x number of tickets per hour based on a percentage of throughput, but:

-that figure does not move based on a drop in real throughput for any reason

-the allocation is based per park hour and should be sold as such, but no one needs/uses fastrack in the first and last couple of hours so the allocation for those is sold and used at peak times, throwing the supposed ratios right off.

-The thing is wildly oversold anyway by staff writing 'x2' or 'x4' on individual tickets, which are all surplus to the number that is supposed to be allocated.

Thorpe need to get a hold of this and sort it, for all the good that they are and have been doing to create a decent place to go they are ruining so many of their guests days with this that people will not return. These short term instant profits will soon look like bad value when they have to work harder and harder to get people to come back (see opening multi-million £ coaster which is well received but your visitor numbers fall dramatically). You simply can not compare the mess we have to the free, well run, well managed Disney system. That's why people complain about ours but not theirs.

[Fred]

Flipper, that's just complete niavety.

Complain about fastrack when it's being oversold and poorly run, and the more complaints then something will be done about it. It's awful having people selling at the ride entrances, regardless of what park, because of what it does to the main queue. It's a **** system, particularly if they do as pluk says (and I fully believe that having seen it myself there).

As for staff attitude, well then thorpe should treat their staff better. That's the way to affect KPI scores and make everyone happy. You can't just say that's how it's gonna be.

[Benin]

Also, few people complain about Disney because they have the capacity to run it reasonably well and limit the hell out of it... Apart from Midway Mania or so I hear...

[pluk]

...and the trial on crushes coaster was fun too!

They don't always get it right, but they learn and change things when they get it wrong. How long have we been putting up with this mess for now?

[Marc]

Maybe the fastrack system is being run properly just the park have a very different idea to how many is acceptable compared to us?

It's a common theme across the parks now with long queues to buy fastrack/ sellers at the evtrances and the fastrack queue making the main queue longer. If it was affecting guests days that badly they would complain in their masses and somthing would probably change.

[Deleted Users]

So for something to change we need guest riots ala when The Smiler's name was announced?

Comparing a free system (which also has big flaws) with a paid system is silly.

[Benin]

The Belgians recently took affront to Walibi looking into a paid system, and have since changed their plans...

Apathy is a lovely trait of the British...

[Flipper]

There is, allegedly, a system, but it does not work. Supposedly there are x number of tickets per hour based on a percentage of throughput, but:

-that figure does not move based on a drop in real throughput for any reason

-the allocation is based per park hour and should be sold as such, but no one needs/uses fastrack in the first and last couple of hours so the allocation for those is sold and used at peak times, throwing the supposed ratios right off.

-The thing is wildly oversold anyway by staff writing 'x2' or 'x4' on individual tickets, which are all surplus to the number that is supposed to be allocated.

1. I admit, it doesn't. So fair point.

2. You're correct again, however Fastrack slots start thirty minutes into the park day, so pending staff are doing their jobs correctly; people who buy a fastrack for say, 10.30, have until 11am to use it. The system won't allow staff to sell a 10.30 fastrack at 1.30pm for example.

3. I've never seen this occur, the only thing similar to what you suggest is priority passes where a number is written on for whatever given reason, for a group; but I've never witnessed nor did I ever take a fastrack with an number written on it. Although, it wouldn't surprise me if they do to be honest.

In the occurrence that Fastrack is falling out of control, the allocated member of staff (say on Inferno) who's at fastrack merge, has the power to call for an additional staff member, or even manager; to organise people. It's been done alot. And in the past I've told a entrance seller that we can't accept people before their time, as she was selling people 1.30pm fastracks at 12, and people were trying to come on. So it's solely down to staff managing it, more than anything.

As Marc said, the system works; it's just a few people who won't pay who don't like it to be blunt. It's an unfair, paid, advantage. So sue Thorpe. Most parks do it. Flamingo, Pleasure Beach, Six Flags... they all have their systems. And to be honest, Six Flags have an awful one which I used; where you can pay for unlimited fastrack; where you wait 10% of the queue, and can ride twice! Yes, it's harsh; but if you've paid the money, then you've paid the money.

I'd lie if I said I'd never used a paid fastrack, as I have a while ago at Thorpe, Towers, and Chessie; I've also, as I said, used the Lo-Q System at SFMM. Life's tough. But at the end of the day, when you pay for the advantage...

[Deleted Users]

The difference being that even during peak times at Six Flags/Universal etc I have never seen the sheer amount of people using the paid system. Universal even jacks up their prices at peak.

[dragon2000]

Hopefully they will complain as I have - seeing only fastrackers being let into the Swarm station for 3 dispatches and then only 8 normal forward guests is unacceptable.

You wouldn't complain when you visit Disney, because it's free.

Incorrect - I wouldn't complain about Disney because there it works. Take DLP: Big Thunder Mountain, Space Mountain, Indy all have 5 trains; Star Tours has 6 simulators and Buzz is continuous loading. Their capacities (with the one exception of Peter Pan) are gigantic compared to Thorpe's. They manage the queues fairly and the normal queue guests don't feel disadvantaged.

So, I'm sorry but you're 45 minute queue, which might I add, you're claiming without actually knowing; and if you're going off the advertising sign, then you should have complained because 90 minutes and 45 minutes is a bit of a jump and clearly not being updated on the time board, and like I said, you'd need the Swarm fastrack queue to be pretty much full, and Fastrack sold out for the entire day... I really doubt that occurred.

Believe me, I visit Thorpe often enough to know how long a queue should take. There is no way that just the rear side of the queue (over the bridge) should take 90mins.

Also regarding staff; again it's tough luck. Yes, they're not as happy-go-lucky as you'd expect; but at the same time, people have to respect and give a little; these guys are running around loading rides in the excessive heat, and have been doing for a few weeks now with no sign of it slipping up. They don't get any respite in the heat. They get the same breaks as usual, except no air conditioning or water supplied to them like a standard workplace. And from experience, you'd be amazed how many people will actually steal drinks off staff if they seem they laying around; and throw them around, or over themselves to keep themselves cool. So yes, perhaps they're not in the best mood; but I don't think anybody would be in this heat! I mean for the love of god; I was slipping in my job yesterday; saying the wrong things, getting confused with myself, and it was all down to the heat. But I ain't gonna complain, because at least I had a fan and drink on an hourly basis; unlike Thorpe's staff.

So you're telling me it would be perfectly fine if you went to your local Tesco, library, petrol station, coffee shop etc and the staff were singing across the store while the customers are around about how they want to go home?

I appreciate it's hot and it's physical work but they chose to do it. If they don't like it they need to find another job. As a science teacher myself, believe me I find it hard working for 8 hours a day in a classroom which is currently averaging 32 degrees C, has 30 teenagers in it who need to be working hard to pass exams - with me having to get them to do it. I don't get a fan and I get a quick drink every 2 hours. Can you imagine the senior members of staff letting me go around shouting down the hallways about how I want to go home? No, it's simply unprofessional.

[Mark9]

As Marc said, the system works; it's just a few people who won't pay who don't like it to be blunt. It's an unfair, paid, advantage. So sue Thorpe. Most parks do it. Flamingo, Pleasure Beach, Six Flags... they all have their systems. And to be honest, Six Flags have an awful one which I used; where you can pay for unlimited fastrack; where you wait 10% of the queue, and can ride twice! Yes, it's harsh; but if you've paid the money, then you've paid the money.

I'd lie if I said I'd never used a paid fastrack, as I have a while ago at Thorpe, Towers, and Chessie; I've also, as I said, used the Lo-Q System at SFMM. Life's tough. But at the end of the day, when you pay for the advantage...

Isn't the Six Flags system flash-pass where an extremely limited number of them are handed out so the park can control how many people go to a ride at any particular point. I admit I know very little about how the system actually runs but I've never heard that it effects the queue lines in an adverse way.

Fastrack is always a contentious issue and I know I've been outspoken about in the past. I believe it to be too cheap for what it is offering and is in too high quantity meaning that whenever something does go wrong (for instance, The Smiler today) then the park falls into chaos. Guest Services answer to everything is to give out free fastrack to anyone who makes a complaint. They then help bump up the queues even more. Then sellers are sent to all entrances to sell even more of the things. And then parks offer free fastrack for Oblivion if you prebook tickets for a group of four people. It just becomes a vicious circle where the only answer to anything is fastrack. Even if our parks built a ride like Euro-Mir or Silver-Star they would fastrack the hell out of it so that a ride capable of getting 1,800 an hour, still has a 90 minute queue because no one seems to give a damn about the actual operation of the attractions anymore.

It's a ridiculous situation.