Anyone else ask for a season pass refund?

[boston_e]

So as I stated earlier I requested the refunds for my wife and I but also asked in an email if this COVID-19 thing goes away or everyone gets a vaccine , as 25 year pass holders can we purchase back our passes at a discounted cost and I was told nope... we can purchase them back at the going rate . How’s that for customer service!

I am very sorry to hear this. This is never how a loyal customer should be treated, especially after K cancelled spring for everyone last season (keeping the season passholder $$, except those who purchased the Spring Pass), yet opened right up for mtn biking.

I dunno, it sounds pretty entitled to me. They let you have your money back, but that's not enough, you think you should still be able to get a discount later if you feel like it? So killington should bear all the risk and you should get all the benefit? That doesn't seem very fair.

As for last season, I don't know about you but I had 40 days on my pass when K shut down. I don't feel shorted at all.


Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

I have to agree. I would not expect Killington to offer an early purchase price just because someone bought and returned a pass earlier in the year... not to mention there is still the no use guarantee that anyone can take advantage of.

I also agree on last season, I didn't feel shorted based on my number of days, not to mention Killington did give everyone a voucher for having closed early.

No perfect answer but I think Killington is doing pretty good by the customers given the cards we have been dealt.

[Geoff]

I’m having the same thoughts, but I’m guessing the mountain will close before that happens.

Why would the mountain need to close? The resorts have a viable plan to operate safely. The state has no reason to close the resorts. Tighten up quarantine enforcement, maybe. The businesses that line the access road? Not so much. I always boot up in the condo and go straight to the lift anyways.

If the majority of people follow the quarantine rules, which is highly doubtful, you have to seriously question the profitability of the resort without 60-70% of their customers. Closing may be the best option financially if that actually happens. I'm also guessing that ski resorts make the vast majority of their profits, if not all of their profits, from food, alcohol, rentals, and ski shop sales which will all most likely be way down this year either way. Break even is probably the best that they can hope for even if most people break the rules. An executive with a large movie theater chain told me several years ago that they barely break even on ticket sales and that all of their profits come from the concession stand. He said "we are actually in the snack bar business." I have a feeling the ski business is even more so when you think of the massive overhead involved with operating a mountain, especially in the east with heavy snowmaking expenses.

The resort has that huge pile of season pass money. It might be an austerity budget but they can run the lifts. I’d guess the snowmaking budget is half of usual so a lot of double blacks won’t see any snowmaking. If they shut the doors for the winter, they have to refund all that season pass money. No way they would do that.

There's rumors swirling this morning. Gov. Scott might just do it for them. A full industry shutdown before the end of this week would not shock me at all.

Why would he do that? There’s already a reasonable plan in place to operate Killington in a low transmission rate way. I remain dubious that the alcohol-oriented private businesses in town will do that. I imagine most are on the financial ropes. It’s totally rational to try to keep your business alive.

I also think he would be discussing it with the resorts. If it were imminent, I don’t see how Killington would be blowing snow on middle Chute at sunset today.

[easyrider16]

Last thing K wants is to shut down. Shutting down means they lose out on all the beast 365 monthly payments until they reopen, and credits for all the passholders.

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

[KingsFourMan]

At this point I'm figuring if my kids school goes full remote, I'll do the 7 day + test quarantine and move to Vermont for a few weeks and get all the value out of our passes during that time.

I’m having the same thoughts, but I’m guessing the mountain will close before that happens.

Why would the mountain need to close? The resorts have a viable plan to operate safely. The state has no reason to close the resorts. Tighten up quarantine enforcement, maybe. The businesses that line the access road? Not so much. I always boot up in the condo and go straight to the lift anyways.

If the majority of people follow the quarantine rules, which is highly doubtful, you have to seriously question the profitability of the resort without 60-70% of their customers. Closing may be the best option financially if that actually happens. I'm also guessing that ski resorts make the vast majority of their profits, if not all of their profits, from food, alcohol, rentals, and ski shop sales which will all most likely be way down this year either way. Break even is probably the best that they can hope for even if most people break the rules. An executive with a large movie theater chain told me several years ago that they barely break even on ticket sales and that all of their profits come from the concession stand. He said "we are actually in the snack bar business." I have a feeling the ski business is even more so when you think of the massive overhead involved with operating a mountain, especially in the east with heavy snowmaking expenses.

The resort has that huge pile of season pass money. It might be an austerity budget but they can run the lifts. I’d guess the snowmaking budget is half of usual so a lot of double blacks won’t see any snowmaking. If they shut the doors for the winter, they have to refund all that season pass money. No way they would do that.

Wouldn't you better off returning money rather than losing money incurring massive overhead costs that won't get recouped? If enough people ask for a refund, or decide to defer until next season, at some point the math turns red. Tough call for sure.

Regardless passes are certainly a lot less attractive when you are paying full price but getting so much less - you can only ski if you go through the hassle of making a reservation which you may or may not be able to get, the lodges are all essentially closed, a shorter season, the probability of significantly less snowmaking, the probability of longer lift lines due to spacing, the possibility of reduced lifts during non-peak times, and the possibility of a mid-season total shutdown and having to deal with whether or not you got a fair credit or your money's worth. That all doesn't sound like much fun to me so we opted out and I'm sure a lot of other people are feeling the same way, how could you not? Killington is doing the best they can with a really difficult hand but this has all the makings of a serious clusterf@#k.

[iriponsnow]

So as I stated earlier I requested the refunds for my wife and I but also asked in an email if this COVID-19 thing goes away or everyone gets a vaccine , as 25 year pass holders can we purchase back our passes at a discounted cost and I was told nope... we can purchase them back at the going rate . How’s that for customer service!

I am very sorry to hear this. This is never how a loyal customer should be treated, especially after K cancelled spring for everyone last season (keeping the season passholder $$, except those who purchased the Spring Pass), yet opened right up for mtn biking.

I dunno, it sounds pretty entitled to me. They let you have your money back, but that's not enough, you think you should still be able to get a discount later if you feel like it? So killington should bear all the risk and you should get all the benefit? That doesn't seem very fair.

As for last season, I don't know about you but I had 40 days on my pass when K shut down. I don't feel shorted at all.


Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

FWIW, I purchased 5 passes last season with the plan to ski K mostly when everyone else was winding down. Respected the closure & did not skin- ended the season with 80 some days, but only 7 @ K. Typically, we ski K until June. First world problem indeed.

[boston_e]

At this point I'm figuring if my kids school goes full remote, I'll do the 7 day + test quarantine and move to Vermont for a few weeks and get all the value out of our passes during that time.

I’m having the same thoughts, but I’m guessing the mountain will close before that happens.

Why would the mountain need to close? The resorts have a viable plan to operate safely. The state has no reason to close the resorts. Tighten up quarantine enforcement, maybe. The businesses that line the access road? Not so much. I always boot up in the condo and go straight to the lift anyways.

If the state does shut the mountains down, I doubt it is the mountains operating plans that they would be concerned about, but rather all the ancillary stuff that goes along with the mountain being open (employee dorms, "share houses" where people from different areas pile in 3 and 4 to a room, apres ski parties etc etc)

They might just view shutting everything down as easier than trying to patrol all the resort towns for gathering violations etc.

[Atomic1]

Yeah I get it , I made the choice for the refunds after seeing the spike in cases. Then I had second thoughts... not the first time I probably screwed up , won’t be the last either... my thought pattern now is hopefully things improve and they offer the spring pass option and boom... I’ll see you there !

[boston_e]

Yeah I get it , I made the choice for the refunds after seeing the spike in cases. Then I had second thoughts... not the first time I probably screwed up , won’t be the last either... my thought pattern now is hopefully things improve and they offer the spring pass option and boom... I’ll see you there !

The way things look right now, it may very well have been the right choice. I'm holding out hope that things look different in Feb / March and I can make good use of the passes. If not I'll take the no use guarantee.

[Big Bob]

I kept my Beast 360 with the IKON Base pass and just bought a Northeast Epic midweek pass. 4 areas in NH so it gives me a choice and 5 Stowe days to boot. Okemo was not on it for some reason and who wants to go there or Mt Snow...I would drive to Sugarloaf, closer than Mt Snow for me, and Maine welcomes NH residents for now!