Miffed to be an annual pass holder

[namechangeaga1n]

So...any other annual pass holders for attractions where you could turn up when you liked for the duration of your pass cheesed off that pass tickets are like gold dust, yet you can still buy day tickets!

I understand NT can’t give members priority, but why did their booking system have to be so crap? Not being able to book for the next day?

And why do people still need to book, for places with acres of space to roam when my local playground is packed?

NT have left me unimpressed. They should at least make it up to members who have kept their membership going throughout lockdown by at least giving them a booklet of free coffee vouchers or similar. They have taken members for granted and shown them no goodwill at all.

@Lulu1919

I'm still miffed I STILL can't just pop in to NT properties yet I'm being charged £10 a month

Me too... in fact, I'm furious!!!

@ItsSnowJokes and @Doris86 I totally agree. I think it is very short-sighted of them. Those cold days in November for example, before the Christmas celebrations start, they were our favourite times as Paultons was quiet, and we would go for an afternoon and spend money on food and drink because there were no queues. I think those days will be an awful lot quieter for them this year with no season ticket holders left the way they’re going!

@SlipperyLizard I don’t work there any more but it will be because eventbrite is useless. I used to have to manually export bookings for the Easter egg hunts for every time slot and then format it in excel to make it readable. I’d go in at least an hour or two before my start time to sort it. There isn’t a practical way to do it on the day, you’d have to constantly be checking and formatting the data to look for new bookings.

Won't be renewing our Longleat passes. Only able to afford them this year for first time in 10 years and can't book a slot. So frustrating.

We have NT and EH membership and have still managed to use them both quite a lot over the last year , I’ve only once been not able to book somewhere I wanted and that was a couple of weeks ago ( Claremont) so we went somewhere else instead . The only thing that has annoyed me with NT is when they opened the gardens free to non paying people at the start of the first lockdown which made them unusable to some of us that actually do pay .

Longleat for us. We are very local, so close that we could pop by after school for an hour.

They did so well at the beginning of lockdown.. extended annual passes for when they opened etc however you couldn’t book a spot once they opened up and they increased the price per ticket for you to book. They’ve just opened up again and we looked at renewing but you can not book an annual pass ticket for any weekend or school holiday!!! You can easily buy a full price ticket.

Nope, get some real problems.

@StoneofDestiny exactly this. I would have renewed if I had had some acknowledgment that we'd had a period of time where we couldn't go or some of us just couldn't get any slots at all. Getting nothing at renewal seemed a bit unfair

I've used both our NT and EH memberships plenty in the last year, don't begrudge them a penny.

The booking for outdoor spaces is a bit annoying and I'll be delighted when it's done with but if they had just done a free for all and opened their gates with no booking they would have been lambasted for being "irresponsible". I don't think they could have won.

V&A and the Royal Academy memberships working brilliantly, you have to book in advance rather than dropping in, but fine other than that. The Summer Exhibition starts late September this year
London Zoo is OK - restricted to once a week at the moment - fine in the week, I think weekends are trickier.

@dannydyerismydad
Merlin have offered extensions to all pass users throughout lock down, I’m not sure why you want a refund because your partner is shielding but he doesn’t actually have a pass?

Interesting - I was probably going to join the RHS this year. I hadnt been to Wisley in ages; went last year and so impressed with everything that I was tempted to join. Might hold off for a bit.

Years ago we went to Wisley fairly often, plus we went to the Hampton Court flower show every year. I got an RHS membership partly because I thought being able to go to Hampton Court on members day would be better. But I found that members day was far more crowded so I reverted to going on the 'open' days, and didn't renew membership.

We asked for a refund last year when it was clear we wouldn't be able to use our passes while DH was shielding. We couldn't risk another family member making DH unwell. It was frustrating as if he had been a pass holder they would have refunded all the family passes.

I'm aware of the extension, so hoping we can get some use this year.

"Your membership was ensuring that those historic places survive. They are immensely important and incredibly expensive to maintain. It’s not a theme park but a conservation charity you were supporting. So you were only a member for the benefits. I hope not everyone has had the same attitude or I’ll be expecting lots of new entries on next year’s heritage at risk register."

Problem being that when you are self employed part-time and didn't qualify for any government assistance due to Covid (pension income was a few £100's more than earned income in the critical year) you have to make some rational decisions. I supported the NT for a whole year with no "benefit" but then cut it because I couldn't justify continuing to pay for something that wasn't providing any benefit at all. If I'd been able to actually visit any properties I wouldn't have done.

@MrsTulipTattsyrup stick that in your pipe...