The big G+ rides at HS gone by 1:07!

[georgina]

I had a chance to see DHS Genie+ availability first hand on Friday. Our park reservation was at Epcot but we didn’t plan to use Genie+ there. So my goal was to get a LL for SDD with a return time around 4:30- 6:30 because we planned to spend a few hours there after a midday break and before returning to Epcot for Harmonious. SDD was the only major ride at DHS we didn’t do on our day there earlier in the week.

At 7 AM from the hotel balcony and using data, I refreshed SDD a couple of times until the return time showed as 4 PM. I clicked on that and was offered and booked 5:15-6:15. Perfect.

After that, I checked for LL availability at roughly 10:30, 12:30, and 2:30 and ended up with the following:

View attachment 658115

This type of information is so helpful. We may rope drop a couple of rides, hang at the pool for the afternoon, and try to stack some G+ rides for later in the day.

 

[xipotec]

so, I just learned today that LL can be totally booked on a busy day?

So you can actually pay for G+ and not be able to use it for every ride it offers????

That is totally unacceptable.
If you paid for priority access, it should be guaranteed for each ride.

 

[HydroGuy]

so, I just learned today that LL can be totally booked on a busy day?

So you can actually pay for G+ and not be able to use it for every ride it offers????

That is totally unacceptable.
If you paid for priority access, it should be guaranteed for each ride.

In the old FP days the same was true, although the system was free.

G+ does not guarantee every ride. A front of line pass like at Universal is much more expensive and Disney could offer that but has chosen not to.

No one is forcing folks to buy G+. If someone thinks it is a bad deal they should not do it.

Not that the system is a good one or is perfect. Right now it has a lot of problems. But that is how it works.

 

[Meglen]

so, I just learned today that LL can be totally booked on a busy day?

So you can actually pay for G+ and not be able to use it for every ride it offers????

That is totally unacceptable.
If you paid for priority access, it should be guaranteed for each ride.

Unless you are on top of your app game and know the times you will usually get 2-3 rides a day before they sell out. And this will be with times showing up later in the day.

But like fp+ the folks I'm the know will get more and have a much better time and benefit for money spent.

 

[Jennasis]

so, I just learned today that LL can be totally booked on a busy day?

So you can actually pay for G+ and not be able to use it for every ride it offers????

That is totally unacceptable.
If you paid for priority access, it should be guaranteed for each ride.

Correct. technically you could buy it and not get anything.

 

[HydroGuy]

Correct. technically you could buy it and not get anything.

I am not sure I understand. How would you buy it and not get anything? If you get online at 7AM you can get something. Thrill-data shows G+ availability for many rides most of the day. The only way I could see this happen is if someone bought it and never tried to use it.

 

[Jennasis]

I am not sure I understand. How would you buy it and not get anything? If you get online at 7AM you can get something. Thrill-data shows G+ availability for many rides most of the day. The only way I could see this happen is if someone bought it and never tried to use it.

They continue to sell it throughout the day. SO theoretically someone who doesn't know any better could buy it at any point in the day, even in the afternoon/evening and find everything sold out (or find that the only things left are the nonsense things like Playhouse Disney and the Frozen sing-a-long LOL, which is what happened to us at MK one evening).

 

[HydroGuy]

They continue to sell it throughout the day. SO theoretically someone who doesn't know any better could buy it at any point in the day, even in the afternoon/evening and find everything sold out (or find that the only things left are the nonsense things like Playhouse Disney and the Frozen sing-a-long LOL, which is what happened to us at MK one evening).

Well in that case you are correct. That should not happen.

 

[godfather927]

In the old FP days the same was true, although the system was free.

G+ does not guarantee every ride. A front of line pass like at Universal is much more expensive and Disney could offer that but has chosen not to.

No one is forcing folks to buy G+. If someone thinks it is a bad deal they should not do it.

Not that the system is a good one or is perfect. Right now it has a lot of problems. But that is how it works.

The problem is the difficulty in assessing if it's a bad deal in the first place since the system means the results on crowded days can be highly unpredictable. In other words, it's far more of a gamble than buying $ILL because unlike with $ILL, you won't know which rides or times you'll be able to book when you decide to purchase the G+ add-on.

However, thanks to sites like ThrillData, we can get a rough idea of what to expect, but for the novice going in blind without data from sites like that, it's basically a crapshoot. Personally, I feel as if the G+ upcharge is worth it if I can save at least 120 min of wait times per day. For my family of four, that means I'm basically paying $30 (at most) per hour of time saved in the parks, which is a good deal in my view. I know that for some parks/days, this might not be the case, but it should be pretty close.

Back to your point, obviously others may feel differently on the how much they'd be willing to pay for saving a couple hours, since what's a good or bad deal is highly subjective as you said. But the primary complaint with the system is still the fact that you're paying for something without a clear idea of what benefits to expect for the money you're spending. Such is life, I guess, but there are far better ways to develop such systems than the current one.

 

[Jross34]

They need to open up more spots per ride for G+

Dan

and then the regular queue times will double. What they need to do is cut off sales of G+ at a certain number or increase the price so less people get it. Or just bring back the old system.

 

[Jross34]

In the old FP days the same was true, although the system was free.

G+ does not guarantee every ride. A front of line pass like at Universal is much more expensive and Disney could offer that but has chosen not to.

No one is forcing folks to buy G+. If someone thinks it is a bad deal they should not do it.

Not that the system is a good one or is perfect. Right now it has a lot of problems. But that is how it works.

the problem is people don't know it's a bad deal until after they purchase it and realize it's not a gooddeal and can only get 1 or 2 good rides out of it. You don't know what your times will be until you get into the park for the day. Some days G+ can be good if there aren't a lot of people. Some days everything good is gone.

It has way more problems than benefits, and it's causing a lot of bad experiences for people paying money and getting very little value out of it. Sure they won't purchase it in the future, but that doesn't help their current trip.

 

[Westerner]

You don't know what your times will be until you get into the park for the day. Some days G+ can be good if there aren't a lot of people. Some days everything good is gone.

Actually you can get a sense of what times you can expect from G+ before you get to the park by doing research beforehand. You can look at thrilldata, Tip Board the week before, there are articles published about it, or just read up on it on DIS.

 

[snikki]

Someone posted this on the everything genie thread. New G+ info for Disney. Is especially true for most people at DHS.

 

[Jennasis]

Actually you can get a sense of what times you can expect from G+ before you get to the park by doing research beforehand. You can look at thrilldata, Tip Board the week before, there are articles published about it, or just read up on it on DIS.

Yes, that is likely what the average vacationer wants to do before their vacation. RESEARCH like they are planning their senior thesis.

 

[itf]

Yes, that is likely what the average vacationer wants to do before their vacation. RESEARCH like they are planning their senior thesis.

I must say I read someone's post earlier (and no slight on them) where they said "oh I just refreshed for an hour and eventually got" (the LL they wanted) - and I thought "this does not sound like a holiday to me..."

 

[pixiedust2u]

Someone posted this on the everything genie thread. New G+ info for Disney. Is especially true for most people at DHS.

View attachment 658603

Interesting. I bet their legal team had to recommend this change in language.

 

[itf]

Interesting. I bet their legal team had to recommend this change in language.

It's also sensible expectation setting so people can't complain if they only got 2 or 3. And if you're really cynical you might think most people will get 4 so "do better than expected" especially at MK.

 

[ckelly14]

To me, using it to skip 3 lines for it to be worth it, similar to what I received with FP+.

 

[wisblue]

Yes, that is likely what the average vacationer wants to do before their vacation. RESEARCH like they are planning their senior thesis.

Especially these days anyone who goes to a popular vacation destination without doing some research or planning in advance is likely to be disappointed.

It has been a fact of life for decades that people who go to WDW with some knowledge about how things work can have a much different (and in many cases better) experience than people who just show up with no idea what to expect.

 

[snikki]

To me, using it to skip 3 lines for it to be worth it, similar to what I received with FP+.

Personally I’ve always looked at G+ as a paid FP+ service and will be perfectly fine with getting 3 LL a day. Especially previously tiered parks. I remember the days of Epcot only having one decent FP+. You can do way more than 3 at MK. I think since people are paying they feel that they should get more than the usual 3. We also didn’t refresh and get extra FP+ since we did our FP+ in the evenings.