The attractions are constantly breaking down and people are cutting the lines pretending to look for relatives. To charge $224/person/day when the rides are nonstop broken, and the wait times are super long (encouraging the line cutting), is low brow. In addition to the 4 rides that are currently closed for refurbishment, ~13 rides closed temporarily on March 17 (some multiple times). This makes planning out your day impossible as you end up running all over the park and barely get on any rides even with Genie+. Further, all the malfunctions make the Genie+ (Lightening Lane) upgrade not worth getting since everyone gets a “multi-ride pass” when a ride breaks down.
It also makes me worry how safe these rides are. Disney stock hasn’t performed well until recently, and I wonder if they are trying to extend their current parts for as long as possible vs replacing parts before issues arise. The rides didn’t breakdown this much pre-COVID (I was a passholder).
The employees are either super dismissive about the constant ride failures or just desensitized by how often this happens. If you complain/mention anything, they pawn you off on guest services. After the 6th ride failure of the day, I went up to guest services by Matterhorn, the guy looked super bored and stared past my shoulder, then said ok and dismissed me. The departments also alert one another if a guest has a complaint and likely badmouth the guest. When I entered City Hall guest services they were definitely combative. As an adult with fairly thick skin, I am embarrassed that I gave those people the satisfaction of seeing me cry. I was genuinely not expecting them to bully me, humiliate me, gaslight me, and call me a liar (they track when the rides get temporarily shutdown…so how/why would I lie about that).
It took a lot for me to say something to guest services about all the issues at the park (I also had my hair pulled, hoodie pulled, had my seat kicked and had a little girl scream directly into my ears on the Small World ride where a Disney employee saw everything but said nothing…further some teens kept screaming and shoving me while waiting in the RoR line). When the City Hall guest services noticed that my face was red from embarrassment at having to complain, they condescending smiled at me, started talking loudly about their terms and conditions, and refused to refund the useless Genie+. I don’t understand people who enjoy being mean to others. What did I do to deserve that?
Also, be careful if you buy anything at Disney. I bought one of the “sturdier” $60 backpacks and the clasp that adjusted the straps was broken; I only had the bag for a few hours. Guest services refused to let me return it. I had to jump through hoops and show them that the strap adjuster wouldn’t clasp. I felt like I was being taken advantage of; they were basically gaslighting me about all of their ride and product quality issues.
As a now former Disney Adult, I see why none of my SoCal friends wanted to go to Disney even after I offered to pay. This is not a magical place, it is a money place for Disney to charge you $224 while they conserve power with ride failures and/or spend time extending their life on your dime.
The most tone deaf aspect about all of this has to be Disney sending me a “very important” survey about how to get me to spend more money on food in the park. First, why don’t you fix the rides, long queues, line cutting, inappropriate cast members and say something about children/teens not touching people, so that folks want to be in the park in the first place.