Magic Bands

[cdock]

I have some question for those who have gotten the opportunity to test out the magic bands. How did you like them? Did everything work good with them? What all did you use them for? Did you like them better than having the card?

 

[2boys2cute]

I have some question for those who have gotten the opportunity to test out the magic bands. How did you like them? Did everything work good with them? What all did you use them for? Did you like them better than having the card?

Two of my girl friends and their families just got back. They loved the magic bands and had each of their family members wear them all day. We just got ours in the mail for our Oct trip. I was surprised that they are not like a watch band, they have bumps on them that you push through holes to attach them. It made me wonder if they would fall off, and if i should not have my kids wear theirs once we are in the parks. She said, the key is to not put it on too tight, just tight enough so that it won't fall off your hand. That way, there is less pressure on the fastener holes. The only problem they had was that in some reataurants the signal wasn't that strong so it was a pain to scan too pay. but it did work.

 

[STACEY1378]

I have some question for those who have gotten the opportunity to test out the magic bands. How did you like them? Did everything work good with them? What all did you use them for? Did you like them better than having the card?

We just got back from a week trip. We loved them! Our kids 9,7 and 18mths all wore them without a problem. It feels like you are wearing a watch. We used them at Magical Express, The Parks, FP, Dining and shopping. When we checked in at the BCV they gave us glow in the dark 2013 bands for the bands. I used it as reinforcements on the kids. Didn't fall off once.

 

[circus4u]

Just returned from a two week trip using the bands. No problems at all. Use them for everything from charging to your room, door key, ticket, etc. No need to pull out key cards, tickets, charge cards, etc. Just remember the PIN you assigned. I kept entering my ATM PIN from habit (do this three times in a row and you are locked out for 15 minutes)!

 

[marathonmomma]

We used them a couple weeks ago and loved them! We used them for everything. I linked all of our AP's and water park AP's to them beforehand with the exception of my daughters which I had bought, but hadn't gone to will call to pick up yet. The only issue we had was the first day my daughters worked fine for entry into Epcot and all the fast pass + we used. The next day at HS hers did not work and it showed nothing on the band when we tried to enter and then when we went to guest relations. So we basically got a free day since the AP date started that day at HS instead. It was really weird. They did offer to give us an extra FP for the inconvenience. It was great at the water park because I could put my wallet in the locker and never have to worry about going back there to get money for food and drinks. And probably my favorite perk was when I had to carry my totally zonked out 3 year old to the hotel room and i did not have to find my room key. I was able to just stick my wrist up and open the door without disturbing her.

 

[peanut520]

We (2 adult, 4 yo, and grandparents) just got back Wednesday and we used they for everything. Only restaurant we had an issue at was crystal palace but the waiter was already prepared to use our cards since he said the signal was just weak in the there.

One tip I have for the younger ones, my 4yo dd had a much easier time with the Mickey head on the inside I'd her wrist. I think it was more natural that turning her wrist to get the Mickey heads to touch on the readers. Luckily we figured it out on day 2 and had no other issues the rest of the trip.

 

[mkarizona]

We also got back this week but I am going to disagree with PPs. We had two reservations, one with RFID cards and one with magic bands. I really liked the RFID technology. It was really easy to pull out my wallet and tap to open the door. RFID was also used at Test Track to keep track of the car you design which made it really fun.

However the magic bands slowed down the lines significantly. Smaller children especially had difficulty tapping their magic bands just right but even adults often had to tap over and over. If the magic band was at all loose it wouldn't make contact. If the magic band was tight enough to work effectively it was sweaty and uncomfortable.

 

[Takket]

I have some question for those who have gotten the opportunity to test out the magic bands. How did you like them? Did everything work good with them? What all did you use them for? Did you like them better than having the card?

Just got back from WDW and here is the parts of the letter I sent to Disney about our experience with the magic bands....... there are some bugs, but overall it is very nice.

To Disney’s Guest Services,

At Disney’s request, we took part in your new Magic Bands program on our recent trip. I’d like to provide you with feedback of the ups and downs.

First let me say that my wife and I are long time veterans. I believe this was my eleventh or twelfth trip. My wife has been to Disney World over fifty times. We remember when your park passes had to be stamped and there was no such thing as Fastpasses, let alone Fastpasses on a Magic Band.

The new system has some major advantages, and some bugs. I always like to get the bad news first, so I’ll start with the problems we had.

First of all was the wifi network in the parks. I was using the My Disney Experience app on my ipod touch. I do NOT have a smart phone so no access to 3G, 4G networks. I was therefore dependent on Disney’s free wifi networks. On our second day in the parks we were at Hollywood Studios. We had prearranged some Fastpasses the night before but I could not remember what order they were in or what time they were for.

I tried to check the times on the app but it kept telling me that my password was incorrect. I thought this was a problem with the app but after several failed attempts I tried loading a webpage on the Safari app on my ipod and realized the problem was actually that I had no connectivity. My signal meter showed that I had a strong connection to your network but I could not load anything. This was a persistent problem through most of the day at the Studios.

However, sort of by accident, I discovered that when I was inside a building I seemed to be able to connect without much trouble. I understand that the closer you are to a wifi source, the stronger the signal is. I don’t know if all your transmitters are inside buildings or if you have them outside too but the network really seemed to have connectivity issues outdoors. It wasn’t just at the Studios either. I had the same issue at Epcot, and again once I went inside, for the most part, it seemed to work fine. I even remember the exact spots I was standing when I tried connecting. They were outside the Jack Sparrow Adventure in the Studios and Japan in the World Showcase.

Again, what was so puzzling, was my ipod was showing strong signal strength but not able to load anything. I would understand if the signal was weak because I was too far from the source but that didn’t seem to be the case. Just something for you to think about. I don’t know how many of your Guests would be using wifi to use the app, but they are probably going to have the some problems I did. The app is only as useful as one’s internet connectivity.

Also the app itself seems to have a problem when there is no connection. As I mentioned it kept telling me that my password was incorrect when in fact the problem was I had no connectivity. This led me to type and retype the password half a dozen times until I finally just gave up and assumed the app was not working. If the problem is really the connection to the wifi the app should recognize that and generate an error saying it cannot contact the server. If people think it is their password that is wrong you will get customer service calls for the wrong problem.

The second problem we had was linking our passes to the account. We were told this could only be done at Guest Services (other than doing it yourself) and we really wanted someone who knew what they were doing to help us as my wife had purchased an annual pass and we did not want to “screw it up”. (And we had heard rumors before our trip of others having trouble linking up annual passes, and the Concierge at the Beach Club said the app had “been down” that day as well.). So we walked from our resort (The Beach Club) to Epcot’s International Gateway. We first bought my wife’s annual pass and my 5-day hopper, then had to wait in line at the Guest Relations booth next to the ticket booth to do the linking.

The entire process turned into quite a fiasco. There were two windows open with guests at each window. I don’t know what their problems were but they each tied up the windows for a good 15-20 minutes. One of them was so upset that she said she was going to go on Oprah and tell her all about how bad she had been treated at Disney. It was kind of comical actually, if we weren’t stuck behind her. My wife and I each wondered if she knew Oprah went off the air a few years ago.

When she was finally done and left the attendant in the booth told us “one minute” because she had to “finish this up”. We thought she was wrapping up paperwork from the upset guest but in fact she was just leaving. We waited another 10 minutes or so for the guest at the first booth to finish up whatever they were trying to do. The only reason why we tolerated this long wait was because it had started pouring rain, so there was nowhere else to go.

In the future it would be a good idea to instruct Cast Members not to tell Guests they will be back in “one minute” when in fact they are leaving. We know she left too because we saw her say goodbye to the other Cast Member in the booth. She could have just said she was closing her window and the other woman would help us in a moment. That would have been frustrating but at least it wouldn’t have been a lie.

When we finally made it to the booth it was another 15 minutes or so before we got our passes linked. The woman in the booth told us her program had been having issues that day just as the app had (as the Beach Club Concierge had told us). She had to call someone on the phone (some sort of IT person I assume) to verify our My Disney Experience account, then manually add the passes. I would think with all the scanning technology at her fingertips this process would just take a few taps of a Magic Band and be done. It did not. I’m not blaming the Cast Member. She did everything for us as quickly as possible, but the system she was working with clearly had problems.

All told we probably lost a good hour of park time getting all this sorted out. I don’t know why the system was struggling that particular morning but if the Cast Members are having that much trouble sorting out just adding tickets to someone’s account now in beta testing, imagine the lines at Guest Relations when the entire park is turned over to this system.

Perhaps the Cast Members at the ticket booths or at the hotels could be trained in this too? It seems like this should be easy for them to do. I’m not sure why only those in Guest Relations can help link a pass to an armband.

The next problem was with the Fastpass plus system on the app. While taking a break for a drink in The Land, we decided to setup Fastpasses for Tuesday and Thursday. The first thing it asked me was to “select a day”. I clicked on Tuesday, and made my selections. I hit “Done” and it brought me to a screen showing my Fastpasses and a link that said “Add to my plans”. So I clicked that and then the “Select Fastpass+ Experiences” link. Then I clicked “Make new Fastpass+ selections” on the next screen.

I selected myself and my wife, and proceeded to make my Fastpass picks for Thursday. At least I thought it was for Thursday. I didn’t realize that it still had Tuesday selected until I made all my selections and saved them. There was a small bar at the top with the date on it which I didn’t notice. The app never warned me that I was about to overwrite the Fastpass selections I had already made, so they were lost.

Fortunately, I noticed this at the end and had to go back and make my Tuesday selections all over again, then go back and select Thursday. The problem goes back to the “Add to my plans” link that comes up after you make your first Fastpass selections. From my point of view that was asking me if I wanted to make more Fastpass selections. When I clicked on it and then clicked into the Fastpass menu again, it was anything but obvious that I was still dealing with the same day. Only at the end of the second round of Fastpass selections did I realize it has never asked me what day I wanted to choose!

I think the “Add to my plans” link should be eliminated and replaced with perhaps two links. One saying “Add to my plans for this day” and a second one saying “Add plans for a different day”. Clicking the first link could bring you to the same menu it does now and when making new Fastpass selections it should be made clear that you already have 3 Fastpasses for that day and ask you if you want to edit or replace them. Right now it brings you to a screen that asks you to “Select party members” and there is a little link on the right that says “already has Fastpass selections.” However, once you click next, it tells you nothing else. You make 3 Fastpass selections. Is it overwriting the ones I already have? (Yes it is, but how can I know that? It doesn’t tell you). Is it adding to the three I already have so I have six Fastpasses? No, it is not, but other than trial and error (which I did) I have no way to know what it is doing.

Clicking the second link I proposed, “Add plans for a different day”, would bring you back to the calendar to start the process over. This would eliminate the problem that happened to me of not realizing as I tried to make plans for Tuesday and then Thursday that the app had never prompted me for a new day selection after I made the Tuesday plans.

Lastly, on the bugs side, I would say I wasn’t a fan of the three automatic Fastpass selections. One day I just wanted to go on Star Tours so I selected only that, but as you know it automatically makes two more picks for you. I’m not sure why it was designed that way. I was perfectly happy to just go on Star Tours and then ignore the other Fastpasses, but isn’t that a problem for Disney and your crowd control? If everyone did what I did, wouldn’t you have a huge number of no shows on those attractions? You could fill up all your Fastpass slots for a particular attraction, only half the people ever come back, and some other poor guy has to wait in the standby line because all the Fastpasses are gone even though only half that Fastpass holders are showing up.

Why not, if someone only asks for one Fastpass, just give them the one they asked for? I’m sure you have crowd control experts that have figured out all the math on that, but it just struck me as unnecessary.

One last snafu we encountered with the Magic Bands and beta testing— it was a doozy.

We received an email inviting us, by reservation number, to beta test Fast Pass Plus for lunch at Be Our Guest. We were very excited about this opportunity and as soon as we saw the email (about an hour after it was sent- we didn’t hear it ring while watching the fireworks) my wife tried to log in to reserve a day and time. Every single day for the rest of our trip showed no availability for Fastpasses.

My wife was pretty disappointed about this as she really wanted to go. She went to the front desk (Concierge was closed for the night) and asked for assistance. She was told that many guests were receiving this same message and that there was nothing anyone could do about it except the people at Guest Relations in the Magic Kingdom.

So the next day we made a special stop at the Magic Kingdom before the Halloween party we were going to attend to ask if they could help us to get a spot reserved for Thursday, the day we were going to be in the MK early.

We were told that no, we could not reserve the date (though the date was supposed to be able to be reserved online, and we were supposed to be able to preorder our meals too) but would have to return to Guest Relations that Thursday morning and attempt then to get a spot at Be Our Guest for the testing. We were not promised a spot, even though we clearly showed them the email invitation with our resort reservation number on it.

We could not understand how so huge a glitch could happen and be so difficult to fix. With an event clearly so in demand as the Be Our Guest beta test would be, you would think that the app would have been tested for bugs beforehand.

We considered ourselves VERY lucky that Guest Relations was able to fix the glitch for us on Thursday, and gave us a handwritten invitation to take down to Be Our Guest and present. We were swept past the long line of people waiting standby and had an unforgettable lunch in the West Wing. So all the trouble we went through to participate in the testing was definitely worth it even though the multiple trips to Guest Relations to ask for assistance ate up a lot of time on our trip. That meal was one of the absolute highlights of our trip.

Okay, now for the positives. Once all the passes were actually on my Magic Band, they were SO easy to use. Once I got the dates on the Fastpasses straightened out they were so much better than the old system too. My wife is in a wheelchair that I push and under the old system, using Soarin as an example, we would have had to roll all the way to The Land, up the entrance hill, down the ramp inside, down the single elevator (which is a whole other story!) just to get to the Fastpass booth, then repeat the entire process once our Fastpass time was up to go back.

I loved that the new system gives you time options of when you come back. Some times the earliest time is not the best. Nothing was worse than getting a paper Fastpass for noon to 1PM when you already had a Disney Dining priority seating set up clear across the park in Norway for the same time.

It is great that all the information for Fastpasses and park tickets is stored on the bands as well. Since I do push the wheelchair, in the past I was often fumbling around after going through the security check trying to organize all our bags and find my pass card at the same time while people were stacking up behind me. No more fumbling in my wallet now (This is also very nice for opening your hotel room door). Also in the past the card readers always seemed to have trouble, leading to delays at the entrance. This never happened with the Magic Bands.

Since there were two readers at each entrance, my wife and I quickly learned the fastest way through was for me to wheel her to within reach of the first scanner, while I used the second one. We would tap our Magic Bands at the same time, get green at the same time, and be on our way! Kudos to Disney for putting two readers on each side rather than just one.

Using our Fastpasses was much more efficient too. Gone are the days of the Cast Member checking your paper Fastpass, looking at the clock, looking back at your Fastpass. Now you just tap and when they see green, they wave you through. It may only save five seconds per person but multiply that by however many people pass through the Fastpass line in a day, and it all adds up. It is also a nice touch that it displays our names and the Cast Members tell us, by name, to enjoy the ride.

I found the armbands themselves to be not at all intrusive. I wasn’t even aware I had them on when I was not thinking about it. Sometimes lining up the Mickeys was a bit difficult but after a day or two I sort of knew where to position Mickey on my wrist so I wasn’t contorting my arm in odd directions to line him up.

Also since they were waterproof, this made swimming completely stress free. I used to have to carry my room key in a little Ziplock bag in my pocket in my bathing suit so no one would steal it. Now I just jump in the pool with my Magic Band with no worries about getting it wet or anyone stealing a room key because I was foolish enough to leave it poolside with the towels. This was a wonderful feature.

It also made admission to the pool easy as well. The Cast Member scanned my Magic Band, saw I was a Beach Club guest, and let me right in. I asked if I needed a wrist band and he said no since I had the Magic Band. Even better! No more annoying wrist bands to cut off later. This system will help Disney keep the pool crashers that aren’t resort guests out of the pools too, which makes the experience better for the rightful users.

When we returned, via taxi, from Downtown Disney to the Beach Club, the security guard at the gate also was able to scan our Magic Bands, and welcome us back, by name. Another great feature to make sure the rightful guests are allowed into the resorts, and those that don’t belong are denied access.

The rest of the features on the app we did not use very much. Dining we arranged long before we left, so we did not use that. We did make use of the Park Hours guide which was helpful. The Wait Times we referred to a few times but the crowds were so low we found it unnecessary.

All in all, the experience, after a bit of a learning curve, was much more efficient than the old system. You are definitely on the right track. My Magic Band is currently on my night stand and I look forward to my next chance to use it! We will be back.

 

[The Saints]

These bands seem fantastic and they will soon have all the bugs fixed...

 

[wiigirl]

These bands seem fantastic and they will soon have all the bugs fixed...

x2

 

[kanadar]

I have to admit I only read about half of that letter as it was quite long haha. But the last issue you brought up about having to have 3 fastpasses, wouldn't really affect crowd control. In fact it would just make someones wait time shorter for that particular ride because they aren't having to wait for more fastpasses. People not using a fastpass just makes the standby line shorter. I agree it's not necessary to make someone get 3 fastpasses though, still in testing phases though

 

[beer dave]

I have to admit I only read about half of that letter as it was quite long haha. But the last issue you brought up about having to have 3 fastpasses, wouldn't really affect crowd control. In fact it would just make someones wait time shorter for that particular ride because they aren't having to wait for more fastpasses. People not using a fastpass just makes the standby line shorter. I agree it's not necessary to make someone get 3 fastpasses though, still in testing phases though

I know this is knit picking, but technically one of the people in the stand by line could have the fpp that was given to someone who doesn't want it. One is no big deal, but if 100 people have one they didn't want...or 1000... you get the point. The days of handing your unused FP's to a deserving stranger as you exit the park are gone. (or soon will be)

 

[kanadar]

You do have the option to opt out. You get a card still with your room and you are not required to participate.