So there are a few places where you can pay ~$55 for a normally $95 Disneyland park hopper (I’ve seen them on some fellow’s listing site and some auctioning site, for example). Are these legit? Are they legal? If so, how do they work? What’s the catch?
I would only buy discounted DL tickets from a reputable ticket broker. There are a few, but if a ticket is being offered for 40% off, it is likely not reputable.
In particular, I would never buy tickets from an auction site. You are likely buying someone’s supposedly partially-used ticket, which is against DL’s policies. (Tickets are non-transferable.) There is no way to protect yourself, since the number of days remaining on the ticket can only be verified at the park. You’re quite likely to find yourself ripped off.
There’s a good overview here:
Skott,
If they aren’t the multi-day passes where you have no way of knowing if they are used up, then I personally think you are probably safe, though $55.00 does seem cheap. Then again, as someone who is in the Southern California area, I can certainly tell you that Disneyland tickets are a regular staple of every random raffle, company picnic prize, birthday gift for the hard-to-shop-for, etc. Plus, between Costco, the military, Kaiser Permanente, and all the other random employers who offer discount tickets, they are quite easy to come by.
I have certainly gotten a Disneyland ticket at some point in my life that I didn’t feel like using, and whereas I gave mine away, plenty of people would rather sell them. I’d be a bit suspicious of Craigslist in general, but if it’s someone on eBay who otherwise has a number of sales and a 100% feedback, I’d take a chance…
Caveat Emptor.
My daughter’s ex spent several months in the slammer selling bogus D’Land tix.
Having worked at Disneyland before, I can tell you that there are discounts everywhere like Yarster said, but most of these are in the 10% range. You will not find a legitimate dealer of Disneyland tickets for 40% off unless it’s some kind of special ticket.
Each year, once in Dec and once in July or June, Disneyland gives it’s employees 2 free tickets. These are good for one use and says specifically that they can be transferred. They are tickets like the ones the employees use where you can park hop, the only difference is you can only use it once. They expire a year and a half from the time they are given.
These tickets, since they are free, may be something that somebody is trying to sell off. I’ve given them away as Christmas gifts or to relatives, but I can see people selling them for a massive discount.
I just read somewhere that it’s like a ticket rental or something? I’m guessing that someone buys a five-day park hopper for $180, then rents out the tickets for $55 a day? I dunno.
Some of the people on eBay have a couple thousand positive feedbacks. It almost seems suspicious 
Well, there are plenty of people who have established eBay stores that is their main or secondary source of income. Pretty much every antique and pawn shop goes this route to make extra money and reduce inventory since they have a finite space to hold all their random merchandise. If I’m the owner of such a store, and otherwise have a personal item I received (like a Disneyland ticket), and am not in the mood to use it, but was otherwise planning to go to Vegas, perhaps $55 is worth it to me to sell it quickly.
As others have said, caveat emptor, but if that’s the circumstances, I’d feel even more secure in the purchase. I would ask the seller what type of ticket it is to ensure there is no fishiness going on and why they are selling it if you’re suspicious.
As I indicated above, this is strictly against Disney’s policies. Once a ticket is used, it is non-transferable. If they catch you doing this, you can be banned from the parks.
I’m actually a lot more familiar with WDW in Florida than DL in California. At WDW, they enforce the non-transferability of tickets in two ways–by making it against the law in Florida to transfer tickets (not just a matter of company policy), and they link tickets to a finger scan. I’m not sure if this is done in DL or not.
Finger scan, definitely not. I dunno about the law.
They certainly use them in FL because of the multiple parks. Do they have multiple parks in CA under the Disney umbrella?
Just Disneyland and DCA, and most people get park-hopper tix that let you visit both in the same day.
I suppose locking him in the It’s a Small World ride for a week or two would have constituted Cruel and Unusual Punishment.
Wow! I just looked at how some of the ebay tickets work and they sure are back alley deals. For $94 (a little better than half off normal price) you can buy tickets, but you pick them up the day of your Disneyland visit and drop them off that evening. You meet the person somewhere near Disney for the deal.
It sounds like these people make some good money with lots of passes or somesuch being rented out by the day.
Forgot to add that these sellers have thousands of positive reviews.
In Florida people offer Disney tickets at a discount, the rider being that you have to sit through a Time Share presentation.
Also in Florida as another poster has said you are fingerprinted (By scanner) on entering a park so that multiple people cannot use one ticket.
Here in Orlando there are these “tourist information centers” all over the place that are really a sort of theme park ticket broker. They advertise some pretty high discounts, often 50% off. My sister worked at one of these places once, and to get the big discount you have to fulfill some pretty narrow requirements - IIRC to get the half off Disney tickets, you had to be from a specific zip code in New York or something. Otherwise, the discount was a more modest 10% or so. The tickets themselves were legit, though.