The Merlin Annual Pass

General theme park and attraction industry chat, along with the world of theme park gaming.
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Emma8037
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Thank you for the reply’s well her mum rang towers yesterday and they told her she can have upto 4 people with her for £15 each and go to the ticket office so like I said confused ! Thanks
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Dan
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The Merlin Annual Pass Facebook page has posted details of a renewal offer for Premium passholders.
Exciting news Passholders!

RENEW your PREMIUM Merlin Annual Pass THIS SUMMER and get a FREE RESORT THEME PARK ANNUAL DIGIPASS worth £50 and an extra £20 off your renewal price!

Your memories can last a lifetime with FREE Theme Park digital photos...

RENEW NOW: https://bit.ly/2y8o7qz
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Swarm Chris

That's a nice deal.

Also, love the terms and conditions at the bottom, whoops! :lol
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Dan
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Swarm Chris wrote:That's a nice deal.

Also, love the terms and conditions at the bottom, whoops! :lol
Haha, I didn’t even notice that at first glance :P

It does beg the question though, who do Merlin employ to proof read these things? :-k
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Swarm Chris

Dan wrote:
Swarm Chris wrote:That's a nice deal.

Also, love the terms and conditions at the bottom, whoops! :lol
Haha, I didn’t even notice that at first glance :P

It does beg the question though, who do Merlin employ to proof read these things? :-k
Only spotted it because I wanted to see when the offer ended! :)

I think they should outsource proof-reading to the fan-sites!  :P
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Robert.W
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Oh my god :lol :lol

Merlin never cease to amaze.
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Dungeon-X-Smile
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Wow.... I'm speechless. 
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Ladyofthelake
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As reported on TowersTimes News, Merlin have re-launched the Monthly Membership scheme.

The scheme is available in two options - Standard or Premium, with each tier offering the same benefits as the equivilant annual pass. Customers pay an initial joining fee, followed by monthly payments for a minimum of 12 months, after which you can cancel at any time by giving notice at least 5 days before your next payment is due.

It is interesting to see Merlin make this option available again, especially as the last time they attempted it they stopped taking new memberships after just over 12 months had passed. It is a good idea, and makes a Merlin Pass more affordable for some families, let's just hope the scheme lasts a bit longer this time. However, it does make me wonder if one of the reasons for bringing this back is that they are struggling to sell new and renewal annual passes.
Swarm Chris

Interesting that the membership price is less than paying it all in one go?

That seems, strange.
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Ladyofthelake
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Swarm Chris wrote:Interesting is that the membership price is less than paying it all in one go?

That seems, strange.
I suspect that is a way of trying to encourage families to use the scheme as, unlike with the Annual Pass, there isn't the option to have a family membership at a discounted rate. I've not had time to do many calculations yet, but I suspect in some cases the total annual cost may work out cheaper for some families on the Annual Pass rather than the Monthly Membership.
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nicky.borrill
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Ladyofthelake wrote:
Swarm Chris wrote:Interesting is that the membership price is less than paying it all in one go?

That seems, strange.
I suspect that is a way of trying to encourage families to use the scheme as, unlike with the Annual Pass, there isn't the option to have a family membership at a discounted rate. I've not had time to do many calculations yet, but I suspect in some cases the total annual cost may work out cheaper for some families on the Annual Pass rather than the Monthly Membership.
Still cheaper monthly... Monthly comes to £137.87 per year, family annual is £139 per person... very strange indeed.

I did note that after the 12 months is up the membership roles on until cancelled. Perhaps it’s an attempt to shift folk to this payment model so that they continue to benefit even after a year is up, due to the fact that many people will not cancel in time, even if they intend to eventually. It’s almost a given that the vast majority of those that intend to cancel will pay at least a month or 2 unnecessarily.

A bit like mobile contracts and gym memberships!!!
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Swarm Chris

Just took another look at the various prices. It seems that all of the monthly membership prices are valued at the family rate, making the single pass rate redundant (one caveat to come). The ongoing cost for standard is £107.88 (vs £109) and premium £143.88 (vs £149).

Now here is the caveat, I can see no cases where the ongoing cost will ever decrease. Whereas the annual pass renewals have frequently had various offers that could save somewhere in the region of £40-50pp on a premium pass renewal (valued on the DigiPass offer and 3-months free offer). This could mean you pay around £120-130 (vs £179) for a single premium renewal, or £100-110pp (vs £149pp) for a family renewal.

Out of interest, did they increase the annual pass cost this year, as I can't find an email about it? Normally happens in the autumn if I remember correctly. If not, they could well be seeing pass sales drop - although if so, I wonder how many people swapped to a single park pass?

Also makes me laugh they still have the VIP pass advertised for new passes. They must be only accepting a handful of new passes a year, if that!
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Muppet738
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Don't know if anyone else saw but an Merlin Pass Holders Facebook annual sales starts 17th January.
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streetmagix
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It's flown slightly under the radar but the renewal sale has now started: https://www.merlinannualpass.co.uk/compare-passes/renewal-passes?utm_source=google&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=jan_renewals_2019

Seems weird to run 2 different sales at 2 different times, one for new and one for renewals but there we go.
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Justin
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I can only see the expected renewal sale?

Is there a new pass sale this year?
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Michelle
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I think streetmagix is probably referring to the sale that has not long finished on new passes. Although if I remember correctly is there not usually some kind of discount later in the year too, maybe May/June time? I could be making that up entirely, it is early :lol
Swarm Chris

Yep they split them up, I'm guessing to give them some ability to continually market the pass over the winter. Fair amount of negative views on this sale though across social media though, either due to timing being a little later than normal or the price may have gone up?

There was a summer sale for renewals last year, but it was a little later than normal and ran until the end of August. It came with a free annual DigiPass, so long as you could actually get a park to give you one. On my attempts at Thorpe:

1. Couldn't find the coupon at the ticket office (after sending me away without half the things they were supposed to have given at renewal), so had to come back at the end of the day when they said they would have found it.

2. Ran out of plastic passes at the DigiPass booth. Even though they were still selling DigiPasses.

3. Told that my coupon would not be valid after that visit and I should exchange it for a temporary paper arm band, normally used for a single visit. Pointed out the expiry date was April 2019, and eventually they gave the coupon back.

So in hindsight, if there's a discount sale, take the money, as chances are they'll try to find a way to not fulfill the rest of the deal through general Merlin incompetence.

Sneaky edit: forgot they also gave me a Merlin pass with the wrong dates on during this saga, which would have lost me several weeks of validity if I hadn't spotted it before leaving.
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Justin
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[/size]
Easter Sale NOW ON! 
Get your Merlin Annual Pass Sale NOW to enjoy an incredible year at over 30 of the UK's top attractions. Sale ends at midnight 7th May 2019
More details here!
Swarm Chris

As reported by TowersTimes, the Merlin VIP Annual Pass has been discontinued from today, with no new or renewal passes being sold.

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This annual pass used to give unlimited fastrack at the UK resort theme parks along with other benefits. Given its premium value it's perhaps slightly surprising to see it gone, especially given the long waiting list. Could we see a new product in the near future?
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Robert.W
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Good. The sense of entitlement it created among some of its members was awful. 
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