The Dark Side of Disney - Leonard Kinsey [15]
The crowds are light as I approach the turnstile at The Magic Kingdom, put my used ticket through the slot, and place my finger on the scanner. It doesn’t work. The CM tells me to do it again, with the other hand. Still doesn’t work.
Me: “Huh, that’s weird.”
CM: “Are you sure this is your ticket?”
Me: “Uhhh…..”
CM: “Sir, you’ll need to go to Guest Services to get this resolved. Have a magical day!”
Me: “Okay. Thanks”
So I go to Guest Services and hand over my ticket.
Me: “It doesn’t work when I put my finger on the thingy.”
CM: “Did you use the same finger you used the first time you went through the gate with this ticket?”
Me: “Not exactly.”
CM: “Sir, where did you purchase this ticket?”
Me: “From a gas station.”
CM: “We’re sorry, but we’re not able to accept tickets purchased from unauthorized resellers. Unfortunately you’ll need to buy a new ticket. I can help you with that now, if you’d like.”
Me: “So I just lost a bunch of money, right? And there’s nothing you can do about it?”
CM: “That is our policy, sir.”
Me: “Bummer. Can I get my ticket back, so I can at least sell it back to the gas station?”
CM: “Unfortunately since it was resold illegally I will need to confiscate it. However, here is a collectible “What Will You Celebrate” pin. Have a magical day!”
The CM gives me a little pin and I smile weakly and walk away. I lost money so you don’t have to!
However, I’ve been in line during busy times of the day, and a lot of times if the finger scanner doesn’t work the CM will punch in some code at the turnstile and just let the guest through. I gather the scanners aren’t wholly reliable, and most CMs don’t care enough about resold tickets to hold up the line and incur the wrath of impatient guests. But this is the exception rather than the rule.
If you’re a real sleazeball, there is one surefire way to get around the biometric scanner: act like you’re disabled. Borrow a wheelchair and have a friend push you to the gate and say that you can’t lift your arms up to the scanner. The CM will run the used ticket for you and let you through the handicapped gate, no questions asked. But that’s some super-bad karma to pull down just for discounted theme park tickets!
Another way to save money on tickets, if you don’t mind possibly going to jail at the end of your vacation (real jail, not Disney Jail – big difference), is by taking advantage of the other side of the resale scam: sell your unused days. The easiest (and cheapest) way to do this is to buy more days than you know you’ll use from Undercover Tourist. That way you’re not only getting a discount for the days you will use, but your unused days are also discounted, which means you have a larger profit margin when you go to sell those unused days. And the more days you buy, the cheaper they are, to the point where after the 4th day each additional day averages out to about $5.
So say you intend to stay 7 days at WDW (a regular 7-day MYW costs $263 at the gate). You’d buy a 10-day MYW base ticket from Undercover Tourist for $266, only $3 more than Disney’s gate price for a 7-day. At the end of your vacation you drive over to one of the reseller places on your way home and sell your remaining 3 days for $50. Now your 7-day MYW ticket has ended up costing you only $216, which is a $47 discount from the gate prices! There are also ways you can work out even bigger discounts by purchasing and reselling the various water park, park hopper, and non-expiration options, although the combinations of Undercover Tourist prices vs. reseller buyback prices are so numerous that finding the sweet spot of maximum profit might take a fair amount of calculator action.
As an addendum, I did talk to a detective completely off the record about these reseller scams. The detective told me that yes, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office is