MoviePass Has Shut Down Again

Surprising few, MoviePass has shut down once again. The controversial movie ticketing app says the move is an attempt to update to provide a better end product for their customers. An exact timeframe for the downtime wasn’t revealed in the initial report and the app is already offline as of July 4th.

“There’s never a good time to have to do this,” MoviePass Inc. chief executive Mitch Lowe said in a statement earlier in the week. “But to complete the improved version of our app, one that we believe will provide a much better experience for our subscribers, it has to be done.”

“We have listened and we understand the frustrations of our subscribers,” he continued. “To provide the level of service you deserve and we can be proud of, we need to improve our mobile app. We plan to make this improvement by utilizing an enhanced technology platform, which is in the final stages of completion,” he continued.

MoviePass first launched in 2011, promising fans they could see any movies any time they wanted, with the only exception that could only see one movie per day, a package the startup charged consumers $9.95 per month for. After realizing the heaps of money they would be losing as a result of their business model, the company started rolling out various changes, limiting customers to seeing certain movies at certain times, often times changing or implementing new rules every other day.

Last December, the company introduced pricing, where it nearly tripled in some markets. For more rural areas, MoviePass packages were available anywhere from $9.95 to $19.95 while those located in urban centers had to pay between $14.95 and $24.95 depending on the package they chose.

“We have a lot to prove to all our constituents,” Lowe shared with Variety at the time. “We don’t just have to prove ourselves to our members, we also have to prove ourselves to the investment community, our employees, and our partners. We believe we’re doing everything that we possibly can to deliver a great service and we’re in the process of fixing all the things that went wrong.”

Have you been a subscriber of MoviePass? Should the app come back online, do you plan on continuing your service? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!