Whats with the secrets?

I also agree that it is not right of the ride ops to get sarcastic and rude with guests, even if they ask stupid questions or are the 1000th person that day to ask it. I work in a retail clothing store where I constantly deal with the public and stupid people. Just this morning while I was working this guy literally followed me around for 20 minutes asking every obvious and stupid question possible. Was I irritated, annoyed, and did I have 10 sarcastic comments ready for him? Of course! But I couldnt say that because I would lose my job! Point is, people who can't tolerate dealing with stupid people don't need to be working in job that deals with the public. All you can do is answer their questions and laugh about it later.

At least CP lets the employees tell you a ride is down and communicates. If we get robbed at the bank, there will be a note taped on the door directing customers to the next branch without an explanation. There won't be someone at the entrance greeting people.

I was at Knotts Berry Farm and it was a bit different. Silver Bullet went down and they cleared the platform right off. Then there was a person at the entrance (they had no chains on their entrances and initially no entrance person) explaining they were down due to mechanical reasons. When guests asked "when will it be up and running?" The ride host stated, "when you don't see me standing here." What a great reply!

My question is, why do people want to know what's wrong so bad. If you know what the problem is will that make it be solved faster? No. You will simply say "Oh, ok" and chances are not even understand what it means. If the ride is down, it's down. If you find out what the problem is, will you go and fix it? No, have patience.

On another note, I work at Speed Zone next to Dragster and have been asked why Millennium Force is down or why Mean Streak is down or why Magnum down. When I say "really, it's down?" they get angry. People have yelled at me and said well you work here. Um I don't work next to these rides. I don't know Dragster's down until about 15 minutes later when someone wants to know how long their kid will be in line. AND I don't even work on a ride so I feel for all of the ride hosts out there. I do however argee with all that have said that the 1000th response should be as cheerful as the 1001st but I do have to admit, while it is no excuse, it is very hard not to lose your composure when asked why a ride's down every 30 seconds for two hours. I've seen it.

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE this thread.

The highlight: HONEYBAKED HAM is currently down due to weather!!!

My question is this: Is HONEYBAKED HAM ever down due to technical problems?

Of course it is, and of course, the employees could never tell a customer: "I'm sorry, but we're having some difficulties mustering the adequate amount of energy to launch our HONEYBAKED HAMS at the requisite 120 mph.

That would be one fast ham, I must say.

Enough of that.

I've found the TTD ride ops to be very helpful and accommodating much of the time.

HOWEVER.....

I've also seen some of these people tell guests that the line is 3 hours when in fact it was more like 30 to 45 minutes.

And when that issue was broached last summer, many of our fellow PointBuzzers were quick to make excuses for why these poor workers just want to call it a day.

These folks are in a customer-oriented business, plain and simple. Should they get pissy about being asked the same questions over and over? Should they relate or post FRAUDULENT wait times?

I should think not.

But it happens.

It's not a perfect world, after all.

There are other summer jobs with more defined start and stop times.

I wouldn't be too hard on the employees that might get a little sarcastic with park patrons. I once was between 18 & 21 working a summer job with long hours and a hangover, which at CP is probably about 95% of the seasonals.

If the ride is down, it's down. Don't act like a two-year-old by saying "Why?" after the answer to every question.

Even the best employees at the park have their bad days. When you have thosands of underpaid jobs to fill, it's not always easy to keep employees working. It's even harder to get employees that do a good job most of the time and virtually impossible to have all great employees.

The park instead trys to "weed out" the worst apples, but there is a point were they can't cut any more jobs. It can actually have a negative effect because less employees results in more hours per employee. More hours is more stressful and can and does result is worse service.

Throw in a little incompetence on the management level, and you've got Cedar Point.

Cedar Point seasonal employees are generally overworked, underpaid and lead very stressful lives while working at the park. It's not much of a wonder why so many employees are alcoholics.

Answering the same questions, however annoying, is pretty much a part of all jobs involving some level of public relations. I still believe that the guests should accept the fact that the ops don't know what happened, for once.

raptorqueen said:
At least CP lets the employees tell you a ride is down and communicates. If we get robbed at the bank, there will be a note taped on the door directing customers to the next branch without an explanation. There won't be someone at the entrance greeting people.

Oh come on. When you're standing in a queue they don't tell you a ride broke down. Thats just a metaphor guests use to mean that the ride has stopped working. someone could ahve had a heart-attack, someone could have dropped something. There's a wide range of things that could stop a ride.

And honestly, that sign on the bank is just as useful and I'd rather have a sign than some smart ass employee sitting there chatting with some buddies. I'll tell you at Magnum this one time, an employee that was supposed to be guarding the exit was 100 ft. away chatting with some buddies. We walked in and the employee started yelling saying how obvious the ride was closed and how annoyed he is with guests like us.

The pojnt is employees do not tell us anything at all. I've never heard any employee specifacally say "mechanical breakdown" even. All I hear is it's closed.

What are you talking about? While standing in line and any coaster goes down it is always announced to guests waiting in line that "X ride is currently down due to mechanical difficulties, we do not know how long this wait will be but you are welcome to stay in line. If you choose to leave the line you must leave through the line entrance and your place will be lost in line. Once again X ride is currently down due to mechanical difficulties."

Maybe on Dragster but IVE never heard it on any other ride that I can remember.

I was once about to board a Gemini train when the trains something when wrong on the brakes right before the station. They had to unload all of the riders from that area and close down the ride.

I don't know what the problem was, but I remember them only saying that the ride was experiencing a mechanical difficulty.

Unless you've worked with a large number of the general public you really have no idea why they can sometimes be a little POed.The only reason i can think of why some of the employees stick with their jobs after being frustrated almost everyday is that they love what they do.

In October when I went to the park with my friends we were about to get onto Millennium Force, literally stepping into the train and then we had to get out. We stepped back behind the gate and a ride op came on and announced what was wrong, the problem was, as she made her announcement a CP & LE train went by and blew its horn. It made a lot of people mad, but shortly we got the thumbs up and got back into the train. Since no one knew what happened as the train left the station people were yelling "Ahaha the guinea pigs!!" then someone on the train yelled "We're all gonna die!!!"

Our ride was fine, infact, one of the best I've had. I guess the answer is patience.

Fastball84, I have a feeling you're quite confused. You said that an employee was 100 feet away from the exit that he was supposed to be guarding. There is never anyone sitting at the exit of a ride. I have a feeling that you are thinking of the FreeWay entrance. There is a sign that we put up there when we close down which I'm sure he put up. Once we put this up, we return our normal position next to the phone so we can keep the guests waiting in line company, and answer the phone when we get the call to go back up.

This stems from another problem which is having a FreeWay on Magnum period. It's not necessary, it confuses people, and they get very angry when we tell them they have to walk around--even if there is no one in line. I don't agree with this policy, but just like the breakdown policy, we have to enforce it. People get pissed at us because they think we are on a power trip or something...people can seriously be stupid. You wouldn't believe how much people will fight just walking around to the real entrance. Over the course of the summer there would be several confrontations because of it. One time a guy actually lunged forward as though he was going to hit me in front of his kids.

Man.....People should calm down, I mean come on they are there to come to the park and have fun with friends or family. I don't see why some people have to get outraged over something like that. And I'm sure some people have been arrested for going to crazy, even after being offerred free admission.

I've learned this, if you want to ride TTD, be prepared to wait an extra hour or two if you really want to ride. The sign might say 1 hour but you might almost get there and the ride is down.

Whats with the secrets? One word, liability. The only official voice of Cedar Fair to the public is through the public relations department.

A typical ride operator is not expected to have the engineering required to describe an incident nor the training or the skills to communicate that to the public without possibly opening the park to some sort of liability. Even the most innocent and best intentioned statements to the wrong people are trouble. And honestly, sometimes you really do not want to know. I do not want to know there was an AFR of train 3, and the set up was the result of the clean up. The best rule of thumb is strict guidance in effectively handling the most probable situations. You guys have read your ride manuals detailing SOP and spiels for each situation right?

With respect to poor attitudes of some ride operators, I have zero tolerance. If you believe your job is that miserable you know what you need to do, quit. I know, you cannot be happy all the time every day, but you sure can learn to pretend to be when you are a piece of the product being sold at the gate – the customer experience. The result will not be an empty park. The fact is the ride operator is a job in demand, there are always people who would love to work an attraction. If it were so difficult to find people to operate a ride, CP would not pay as little as they do to perform the job. If expectations become so high that the pool of talent is so limited that positions are not being filled, it just indicates that CP needs to offer better incentives or compensation to attract higher quality talent.

When a single greater may come into contact with thousands of people imparting a portion of their enthusiasm and attitude, it can have a tremendous impact on the perception of the park. It is a no brainer that firing that individual and paying someone else an extra $25/day is a wise financial decision if it causes just one person a day not to return. However, since pay is still relatively low it is apparent they do not need to. Disney has set the precedent for high expectations. Disney even employs ghost riders to report sour greeters who are then summarily fired on the spot. Their park is not devoid of workers yet. Once again, refer to the posture, impression, and attitude items under the greeting section of each ride manual.

-j

I agree with what some of the others have said here. Who's to say that you would understand what the problem is anyway? If there's a chance that the employee could be fired, why risk it? What good could come out of telling you what is wrong with it anyway?

Here's my experience....

Scene: Last Year [2004]

Ran to TTD

Sat along fence waiting for opening.

*announcement about 'lengthy delays'*

Refusal to leave line, because never ridden before and wasnt giving up now...

*start 8, yes EIGHT hour wait*

I'm a hundred percent sure they do it because of repetitiveness...I counted the amount of times guests asked...various questions....

I counted 730...and the cool ops, gave diffrent people excuses..
[Such as the supposed "gyro at the top of the tower is broken"]

Then, some guy claiming to be an op, kept saying there was a crane comming out...never came out. :P

But. yeah. Just had to tell my story and give my opinion. :)

Wow, 8 hours, did you end up getting to ride? I've seen some people wait in the station the whole day, all the way untill the night, and then them being the only ones there, and no ops around. But they re-opened right before close, I'm sure those guys waiting were thrilled!