Friday, June 23, 2000
by Kevin Yee
Already I can sense the current Cast Members out there hitting the "send" button on the email. I know, I know, the actual name of the place is now "Cash Management," but I just can't wrap my lips around the term. It doesn't flow as easily as "Cash Control" It doesn't roll off my tongue. But enough about my mouth.
Cash Control — as I will insist upon calling it — is where all the money goes. Every day. More than a million per day, or at least that's what they told me when I asked them. That's not including the charge drafts, of course, which constitutes the bulk of spending at Disneyland. I'm just talking about cash.
Yup, Cash Control is the real bank at Disneyland. Forget that one which used to be on Main Street. This one is where the money goes that came from the Guests.
It's located backstage, basically between the Moonliner and the Grand Canyon diorama. But really it's right behind the Grand Canyon diorama. It moved in the mid '90s slightly northward, but in the same building. On the PeopleMover (or the Rocket Rods today), you passed by a metal grating on your right side just before you entered the Tron Tunnel. This grating was there to prevent you from seeing Cash Control, though if you craned your neck at the right second you still could.
There is a vault, a coin room, and a front room that works basically like a bank. The front room now sports thick bullet-proof glass. In the old location a few feet away, the front room just had wire grating there. I think they just upgraded to be safe, not because they were ever robbed. Access to the back rooms is through a side door with a keypad entry. When the Brinks truck comes to pick up money, that's how they go.
Each day all the cashiers throughout the park go there and pick up their "change fund" for the day, to start off their registers. At the end of the night (or at the end of their shifts, these things vary), the funds are returned to Cash Control, bulging with money acquired during the day. Exactly how this is done is where my geekdom comes in. But patience. More explanation first.
In the golden olden days, every person scheduled to work as a cashier would stop by Cash Control on his way into work. This is where his shift would start. He'd initial at the line and check out his fund, usually $150, $300, or $500 in various allotments of rolled coin and bundles of $1 and $5 bills (nothing bigger was necessary). If the cashier works Main Gate as a ticket-seller, the fund includes Disney Dollars, since Main Gate is where most guests buy their souvenir money.
At the end of each cashier's shift, he would count up his money, tally it with the register report, and then stuff the whole thing into the cash bag. Then he'd sling the cash bag over his shoulder and saunter across Disneyland to Cast Control, on his way home.
It worked this way for years and years. Simple. No fuss.
Then, one day in the late 80s, some cashier had a (not so) brilliant idea. Have a friend of his "rob" him while crossing the park. They'd split the money later. They were caught, needless to say.
But their escapade exposed a fatal flaw in the system. Should cashiers be trusted? Should money simply be carried around in easily-identified cash bags, which look just like the ones you might find at any bank?
The solution lie in a two-fold strategy. Those locations which had multiple cash registers and cashiers could pick up all their funds at once, and transport them across the park in what would soon be called "cash carts." The earliest ones were made by simply wielding a large metal box permanently onto a vertical dolly, so it looked a bit like an all-metal suitcase on wheels that could be pulled or pushed.
Other locations which could not benefit from a cash cart or easily adapt to it would continue as before, but now the cash bags were to placed inside garden-variety Disneyland merchandise bags. So if you see a Cast Member strolling across Disneyland with a merchandise bag obviously weighed down by something heavy, chances are that's the cash bag.
But back to the carts. The idea here is someone responsible, such as the Working Lead, would pick up all the funds needed for the location for that day. Cashiers could then start their shifts at the location, and the carts would be locked via combination locks while traveling through the park.
Of course, morning leads objected to the gigantic amount of work involved. You see, whenever you check out a fund from Cash Control, it's important to verify its accuracy by counting through all the bundled money and rolled coin to verify it was the exact correct total. There may be too much money in it initially, or too little. Such things throw off your count at the end of the night and make it look like the cashier messed up. Not that errors are common. I'd say out of every 50 bundles of dollar bills I counted, one bundle would contain an extra bill. Maybe one in 100. And it would take the better part of an hour to count through all the funds.
The hardest thing to count: Disney Dollars
The worst ones, fortunately, were things us restaurant types didn't have to count: fresh Disney Dollars. Nothing sticks together like fresh Disney Dollars. Poor Main Street people (most Guests buy their fresh Disney Dollars from the Main Gate). They had lots and lots — and lots! — of bundles of Disney Dollars to count through, always fresh, every day.
After a while of such drudgery, you start doing the math in your head. Leads make roughly $10 an hour (nowadays it's even more), yet here I am "spending" ten bucks of company money to maybe find a one dollar error. Seemed a bit extreme.
But as I was saying, the morning leads just wanted to count the funds necessary for the morning. So cash carts were created for the evening shift also, and the process would be repeated when the evening leads would come on. By now the total number of cash carts, when shoved together at the end of the night for storage, was seriously in the way of the walkway near Cash Control.
Day leads usually left work before the day cashiers even counted out their registers. That means that most, if not all, of the cash bags bulging with money were turned in by the night lead.
Sometimes money was collected out of a register during the middle of the shift, bundled into a cash envelope with the totals reflected on the "whiz" ticket stapled to its outside, and then the whole thing was dropped into a safe located nearby. This whole process was a "pickup," and the pickup safes are scattered throughout the park. No, I'm not going to tell you where they are. That money would be picked up — hence the name — later by a member of Cash Control.
The night lead, as I say, usually had to turn most of the money in. At my restaurant, the night lead was usually me, because I liked working late and sleeping later. I even started to collect money from other locations and turning it in for them, since I liked the responsibility. And I liked the process of turning them in. More about that in a second.
And now, finally, my geekdom.
I'd collect as many cash funds from other locations as I could, to turn those funds in for them. Some nights I'd cart back $60,000 just from a couple of restaurants. But it didn't really feel like money. It felt like little pieces of paper; there was no connection to its purchasing potential. I guess that's a healthy reaction that kept me from being tempted.
It wasn't about the money. I wanted as many funds as I could to turn in.
I'd head out the back way, behind the Jungle Cruise and make my way over to Main Street, cross that and go backstage again, cutting over to Cash Control. And then, as they say, the geekdom began in earnest. You see, at the end of the night there are many cashiers and leads returning to turn in money. They all want to go home. So if I show up with my many cash funds, and we had several even if I didn't add to our bounty on purpose, then people get angry if it takes long.
So I got fast at it, so that those others in the line wouldn't be mad at me. The cash and credit receipts are bundled into an envelope, to which is attached the whiz-ticket count sheet. I'd pull those out while the Cash Control host would mark down which fund I'm returning, and he'd give me back the coin receipt, which I'd put into the bag with the coins. Then he'd toss the whole thing into a giant laundry cart nearby. And we'd repeat, for each fund I had to turn in.
This was the fun part, you see. I did it for years on end, so I got more than fast at it.
I was quick. I was lightning. If there had been a prize for cash-fund-turn-ins, I would have won hands down. And Brian or Berge, the two usual closers working the Cash Control side of things, were also blindingly fast at their end of the transaction, so I'd seek one of them out and line up my cashbags on the counter. Then... ready, set, GO!
We raced.
There was no winner of course. But if someone messed up or slowed down, the other had to wait and thus that person "lost." Usually it was too close to call. All of us were fast. No one fell behind. We'd rip through twenty cashbags in the time it took others to do three.
The A/C blowing in his side of the thick glass meant that the coin-receipt, when he tore it off, tended to fly out from the window out toward me. I'd lunge back to the window from the side (where I was prepping other cashbags for him) and catch it midair, then shove it into the coin bag and toss the coinbag on his laundry cart. That was fun timing. On the very last bag I had to turn in, I'd twirl 360 degrees and try to catch the fast-flying receipt while spinning, shove it in the bag and back over to him in one fluid motion.
I did warn you it was geeky.
The line of cashiers and leads behind us cheered the spectacle. I think they were happy they would have less time to wait, but I'm sure it was fun to watch anyway. It was really rather odd. Plus it was late, and this workout energized me for the beer drinking which would inevitably follow after I clocked out. I think the beer helped convince me the crowd was cheering WITH me, not laughing AT me.
You are laughing WITH me right now, aren't you?
I think I need a beer.
Next up: A Day in the Life of a Working Lead
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Change Fund = money a cash register uses to start the day with. Amount can vary by location, but is usually $150 or $300. Depending on location, a change fund might have more coin or bigger bills, the better to deal with the kind of traffic this register is used to getting.
Whiz Ticket = cash receipt, onto which was written how much cash could be found in the accompanying envelope (or coin bag).
Are you a CM or a former CM? I would love to hear and share your stories! E-mail me! Stories and comments you submit become property of and may be published on this site; we normally don't publish last names of current CMs, but if you wish to remain anonymous altogether or do not want me to share your stories, please let me know when you e-mail me. — Shoshana NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in reader-contributed stories do not reflect those of Cast Place or MousePlanet. CM – Cast member; company lingo for “employee.” Empowerment Evolution – The 1995 attempt by newer park management to introduce modern accountability and market forces into the stodgy Disneyland methodology and power hierarchies. The name was meant to “empower” rank and file employees by removing layers of their management, though now there are more managers than ever. TPO – Theme Park Operations; the division of the Disneyland hierarchy that actually works in the theme park itself. TDA – Team Disney Anaheim; the name of the on-site administration building. Area manager – used to be responsible for an entire land, with all business divisions in the area reporting to him. Area supervisor – the immediate boss for location supervisors who divide up a department of intelligently grouped locations. The area supervisors in turn reported to the area manager. Nowadays all supervisors and area supervisors have been replaced by managers and assistant managers — the same idea, but smaller “business units" than a department; usually just one location in fact. RFT – “A” status; a full-time hourly employee. RPT – “B” status; an hourly employee five days a week but just not quite 40 hours usually. CR – “C” status; an hourly employee who works weekends year-round and five days a week during all school holiday periods (including summer and Christmas break). CT – a part-time hourly employee who works five days a week during all school holiday periods (including summer and Christmas break). No seniority, so shifts worked are usually quite short. Locate the employment center to fill out an application, and they will call you for an interview (dress nicely, just shy of an actual suit). Once there, follow these rules, in this order of importance: 1. Smile and be very friendly. They want outgoing people.
2. Do not let the group interview throw you off balance. They want outgoing people who can “perform” a little bit.
3. Do not worry about job (in)experience. They don't care. They want friendly people, not experienced and/or hardened people.
4. Do your best to convince them you already have a Disney attitude: you want to work with people, you're a team player, and you would consider this a dream job (however, don't overdo it on the crazy-Disney-fan side either). Strike a nice balance.
5. Did I mention the importance of a smile? 
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