For avid moviegoers, Moviepass has been a small miracle over the past year, a way of seeing a movie a day as often as you want for a fraction of what the average month of that would now cost at any U.S. theater. However, ever since reducing its $35 plans to $10 last summer, the company has been awash in rumors that its new cost-effective approach is causing the company to hemorrhage money. In recent months, the app has rifled through a number of new strategies and price packages, even as it’s also continued to deal with blowback from added restrictions to access and competition from the very theater chains it exists to compete against.
Now, reports have emerged that the app has finally reached the point of serious financial crisis that many observers have been predicting for months. CNN reports that “Helios and Matheson, the parent company of the popular movie subscription service, said that it experienced a service outage on Thursday because it simply had ran out of money.
The company borrowed $5 million in cash Friday to pay its merchant and fulfillment processors, according to a regulatory filing. Helios and Matheson missed a payment to one of its fulfillment processors, and that contractor temporarily refused to process payments for MoviePass.”
Needless to say, the company’s debts have become substantial enough that there’s a serious risk of the app going inactive, sooner rather than later. As of this article’s publication (2:00 PM CST), the following message is still visible upon opening the app: “We are presently experiencing some technical issues with our card-based check-in process and we are diligently working to resolve the issue. In the interim e-ticketing is working. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience while we resolve this issue. This message will be updated once the issue is resolved.”
