AP and Hopper prioritization snafu on MDE

[skylynx]

Staying at Animal Kingdom Lodge on DVC points after a Disney Cruise...have a Gold annual pass and a renewal certificate for another valid in three days (made it before the price increase) linked to MDE along with two 10-day WPFM no-expire passes I stockpiled from Undercover Tourist before the no-expire option went away. My husband has the same. There were two days used on our older (five years) 10 day hopper, and none on the second.

Showed my Magic Band at the Epcot parking lot entrance and they told me it was invalid for parking even though we had already checked in at Animal Kingdom Lodge and used the MBs to get in our room. I pulled out my plastic AP card, and that didn't work either. They waved us on but we were able to enter Epcot with our MBs, however, with no issues, and I got suspicious.

Went to Guest Services only to find out since last February when we renewed our DVC Gold annual pass, our 9 park visits drained one of each of our hoppers and started on the next, even though we'd been told by the Guest Service cast member when we cashed in our AP renewal certificate last year that they had been prioritized to use the APs first. The Epcot Guest Services cast member, Kyle from Wisconsin, assured me not to worry and he'd give us them all back, but I was pretty panicked as we've been saving those 18 total hopper no-expire days for when it no longer makes sense for us to pay for APs and we can stretch them out for a couple of years. Kyle told us he couldn't credit us back any more than a 7-day hopper on on a single ticket medium, so he gave us each a 7-day and 2-day hopper with no expiration date to make up for the 9 days we lost. He then promised he had re-prioritized our account so the AP would be tapped first. He also said we still had all 20 of our Water Parks/Disney Quest visits still on our Magic Bands.

Call me crazy here, but there seems something incredibly misaligned that an activated AP is not the default in an account. How many people get double charged or have their hoppers drained because they didn't know they had to get a Guest Service person either live at WDW or on the phone to manually prioritize APs? My older Android phone won't work with the newer MDE app, but on the MDE website, when I go to My Account, the remaining 10-day hopper still linked to it still shows up before the Gold AP and the Gold AP Renewal Certificate and there is nothing I can do to change the order. Apparently there is a "slider" on the app version that allows you to set the priority yourself, but I have no way to do it (guess it's time to get a new phone). And unlike a Magic Band or older AP plastic card, I can't go to my list of Magic Bands and Cards and deactivate the 10-day hopper so it can't be hit for days. I'd like to link the two new 7-day and 2-day hoppers in MDE so I don't have to worry about losing the physical plastic cards but I'm concerned they will mysteriously get gobbled up, too. Will have to repeat the whole process when we visit again in April and activate the new AP from the renewal certificate, but at least I know to double check.

It ended up being a crisis averted, but a crisis I didn't even know I was having. It took a half hour at Guest Services to resolve it, but Kyle was nice enough to give us one anytime Fastpass to make up for some of the time we lost, so we went on Soarin'.

So a cautionary tale that if you have been storing APs and hoppers or other ticket media together on MDE and can't prioritize them yourself, it might be worth checking that the cast member who claimed to have prioritized your account actually did it. Lost days CAN be put back on but it may take some diligence and a savvy cast member.

Deep breath.

 

[Robo]

So a cautionary tale that if you have been storing APs and hoppers or other ticket media together on MDE and can't prioritize them yourself, it might be worth checking that the cast member who claimed to have prioritized your account actually did it. Lost days CAN be put back on but it may take some diligence and a savvy cast member.

Deep breath.

Agreed.

 

[anomamatt]

Creating "dummy" people in MDE is the best solution to this problem (and assign them the extra ticket(s).

EDIT - But as Robo said below, that only works for unused tix, which isn't applicable here...

 

[Robo]

Creating "dummy" people in MDE is the best solution to this problem (and assign them the extra ticket(s).

That works, and works well, but it ONLY works on tickets that have never been used.
Once a ticket has started being used, it can't be transferred between names, even inside MDE.

 

[GoGoBeans]

What an ordeal. Thank goodness you were able to get your days added back.

We also have several days of non-expiration tickets left and bought APs under the 13 month deal. I'm hoping we don't have an issue with prioritization. I'll ask when I activate the APs, then I was also advised to check with a CM after the tapstile where I can double check what entitlement was used.

 

[ldo]

The CM and supervisor at the tapstile told me this summer that they cannot see which ticket is being used and that I had to check at guest services. I started checking on the way out of the park near our last day to confirm that the AP was used and not the no-expires, so that it there was a problem, they can fix it before we leave. so far, so good.

 

[TinkerTerry]

This is what I feared. Last year I did upgrade to an annual pass. I had also purchased thru Parksavers 6 additional 7 day hoppers. I went to guest relations with my emails and had them give me hard copies of the tickets and I will link them when I need them. Glad it worked out for you.

 

[Silver Queen]

OP, I can't thank you enough for your thread. We will be in WDW on March 1st and were worried that would happen to us. We have 5 days left on our non-expiring passes and will be activating our Gold APs on this trip. We had planned to stop at Guest Services before we went into the park to raise this concern. Now we will be especially alert and will also make it a point to also stop at Guest Services on the way out of the park to confirm that the correct entitlement was used. Once again, many thanks!

 

[elaine amj]

I have NE tickets too (although no AP). I've been super nervous about prioritization issues so when I bought new tickets for my upcoming trip, I created a 2nd MDE and changed the names on my original MDE. I know it usually works fine - but I don't like the glitches I am hearing can happen.

 

[Stini228]

I wish the priority could be assigned via MDE yourself. My husband is a CM so I have a Spouse Maingate pass, and an AP...last year my Maingate was priority so we burned thru a bunch of guest admissions in error. They ended up creating two MDE profiles for me as there was no way I was going to check with guest relations before each park entry!

 

[cvjw]

I have multiple used and unused non-expiring tickets linked to my MDE account, along with our annual passes.

I created "fake" profiles for my family to link the non-expiring tickets to. That way, they will never be accidentally used. I have been told that Disney automatically prioritized annual passes over any other tickets, but I have always been super skeptical. It is Disney IT you are dealing with, which makes me very nervous.

You can have a used non-expiring ticket moved to a different person in your MDE account. I had it done last year. I accidentally linked some used non-expiring tickets to the wrong people in my MDE account, and a nice CM moved them around for me.

Edited to add how I set up the "fake" profiles. A CM told me that the fake profiles should be semi close to your real name so there aren't any issues proving who you are when you actually use the ticket. I have our real names, our middle names + last names, our first names + middle names, our initials + last names, etc as our fake MDE profile names.

 

[eeyoreandtink]

I would definitely use the fake profile approach in the future!

 

[skylynx]

I'm happy to hear that someone else might avoid prioritization errors eating up the wrong tickets by reading this post. Our Disney days are just too precious.

For us, the averted but still very real double-charging situation was that if I had not had the denial of my AP card at the Epcot parking booth and worried enough to check out why, I could easily have gone another year unknowingly depleting my second 10-day hopper while my activated renewal AP sat there untouched and then if we decided not to renew in 2018, find out I had none of my 18 park hopper no-expire days left.

It is still kind of troubling that Disney is certainly aware of the prioritization problems and yet says nothing about the need for prioritization or the risks of the wrong ticket media being used while it encourages guests to link tickets to MDE. I looked on the FAQs just to be sure there was no warning there I missed and should have been aware of. This is what it says in response to the question : Do I have to link all my tickets to my Disney account?


No. However, to take full advantage of MyMagic+, we recommend that Guests link their tickets to their Disney account.

Linking a ticket to your Disney account allows you to conveniently access your tickets through your MagicBand or card, so you don’t have to worry about bringing multiple pieces of paper with you on your vacation. You can link theme park tickets, water park tickets, special event tickets and annual passes.

In addition, linking theme park tickets to your Disney account allows you to make FastPass+ selections in advance for attractions and entertainment for the days that you plan to use the linked tickets.

Don’t worry! If you lose your MagicBand or card and it is linked to your Disney account, you do not also lose your tickets. You can request a replacement MagicBand or card and access your tickets through the new MagicBand or card. Replacement MagicBands may be subject to a fee.

Please hold on to any annual pass that you link to your Disney account, as you may need to show your pass for theme park complimentary standard parking (if your pass includes parking) and food and merchandise discounts—along with a valid photo ID, such as a driver’s license or passport.


Nothing here at all about conflicts between different types of ticket media and the importance of setting a prioritization so you don't get double charged for visits. Maybe I'm belaboring the point, but I think this system sets up people for losses by not mentioning the risks.

 

[wilkeliza]

The system isn't really set up for someone who has multiple tickets on the account. Non-expiring tickets went away a couple years ago so I think the system is not really set up to consider people still have those tickets linked to their account. Also Disney doesn't really want people buying tickets and sitting on them for years upon years in hopes of saving some money. That's why all new tickets will have an expiration date. If anything it is going to get more confusing for the handful of people that do this as Disney begins to tighten the gaping holes in their ticketing policies to try and force people to buy direct and at the prevailing rates.

 

[skylynx]

Nearly everyone I know (who is a Disney person) has old tickets still hanging around their MDE accounts, so it might be more than a handful. Disney may now regret people hanging onto tickets but it was of their own design offering them all those years for an upcharge, and they have had all those people's money (and mine) up front. To us, the no-expire feature was well worth sinking the money into those hoppers in advance. Just wish I could prioritize the order myself if they can't manage the IT effort of making APs automatic defaults. Disney offered lifetime drink refills with certain DVC purchases a long time ago and you can only imagine how they manage that today! Sometimes your ideas just bite back, I guess.