MoviePass has been down twice in a week after the company ran out of cash. To restore service last Thursday, it had to receive an emergency injection.
Update (Monday, August 6): MoviePass can’t seem to make up their mind. Today they announced that they will not raise their price from the $9.95/month plan. Instead they will be imposing a new limit on tickets.
Starting August 15 subscribers can only purchase three tickets per month as part of their plan. Afterwards they will have the option to buy additional tickets with a discount that could be up to $5.00.
Let’s see how long this newest update lasts…
Update (Tuesday, July 31): In an effort to save MoviePass the company announced today that it will be raising prices for subscribers to their standard plan. Currently set at $9.95/month, the plan will go up to $14.95/month within the next 30 days.
They also confirmed the plan to limit “First Run Movies” that open on 1,000+ screens – so basically any major motion picture studios release. This limit will be in place for the first two weeks of said movies release unless they’re made available for a special promotion.
Update (Monday, July 30): MoviePass is down again — the second time in less than a week. At the time of this writing, the app is returning a “There are no more screenings of this…” message if you try to look at showtimes for theaters that are not Landmark-owned. The Landmark theater chain is the only one with a direct deal with MoviePass.
MoviePass has yet to issue a statement about today’s outage.
According to Business Insider, at an all-hands meeting on Monday, MoviePass’ CEO said that big upcoming films including The Meg and Disney’s Christopher Robin will not be a part of MoviePass’ offerings. What’s more, he implied that the practice of not offering tickets to major movies would continue for the foreseeable future.
Original story (Thursday, July 27): According to Bloomberg, MoviePass was unable to pay their processors on Thursday, leading the company to temporarily shut down. The timing was poor, as many were hitting the theater Thursday night to try and see the new Mission Impossible movie.
MoviePass parent company Helios and Matheson Analytics Inc requested a $6 million loan to pay the processors they work with and get back online, but they now must pay half of their new loan by August 1, and the remainder by August 5.
Though MoviePass used Twitter to deny that it had to do with their credit card processors, a statement by Helis and Matheson issued to the Security Exchange Commission suggested otherwise. “The $5.0 million cash proceeds received from the Demand Note will be used by the Company to pay the Company’s merchant and fulfillment processors,” they said.
“If the Company is unable to make required payments to its merchant and fulfillment processors, the merchant and fulfillment processors may cease processing payments for MoviePass, Inc. (“MoviePass”), which would cause a MoviePass service interruption. Such a service interruption occurred on July 26, 2018.” (Emphasis ours)
The company’s outlook has been grim for months because the math of the service ($9.95/mo for one movie a day) simply does not turn a profit. MoviePass reportedly burns through $22 million per month.
If MoviePass shuts down (it seems inevitable), there’s good news for those of you near AMC: The major theater chain recently announced their own movie subscription service that offers a surprisingly fair deal.
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