BOG Reservations

[WallyBear]

For the second year in a row BOG reservations have proved as elusive as a unicorn on a rainbow. Last year, I vaguely remember that some people receive an email with a special code. Is that still happening? Anything else we can do to increase our chances for a reservation other than checking obviously? Thank you!

 

[ErinsMommy]

Sign up for the various reservation watches, sign up for the cancelation thread the month your going and check through Disney dining as often as possible even day prior to when you want reservation

 

[WallyBear]

thank you for the great advice. Can anyone advise how I sign up for a thread? I'm not sure it matters, but I don't belong to Facebook.

 

[ErinsMommy]

If your going in December for example look for the December cancellation thread, open it and at top of the thread click on "watch thread" and you'll get email notifications when someone posts a cancelation -- if you see one your interested in click on their name to start a conversation

 

[Winky65]

We paid $10 for an alert service. It will notify you within a minute of finding a reservation for your dates. Well worth it we thought. We are going Oct 14-22 and have been able to book many different times and dates looking for the elusive perfect time and day and about 5 minutes booked the perfect reservation: 10/17 at 6:50.

 

[Happygirl1]

Are the alert services safe to use and do they put a lot of spam onto your computer? I have been hesitating but after trying to get BOG and Ohana for many months, I am thinking about giving it a try.
Thank you for posting this info.

 

[ErinsMommy]

Never got any spam from Dining Buddy (https://disneydiningbuddy.com/) or scout (http://disneydining.io/)

 

[Disneymoon2013]

We paid $10 for an alert service. It will notify you within a minute of finding a reservation for your dates. Well worth it we thought. We are going Oct 14-22 and have been able to book many different times and dates looking for the elusive perfect time and day and about 5 minutes booked the perfect reservation: 10/17 at 6:50.

Which alert service is this? The one Erin mentioned, Dining Buddy, charges $8 PER RESTAURANT reservation sought... That's a bit steep, IMO.

 

[Disneymoon2013]

Ooo, I saw Scout does 2 free though.. That's better than $8! lol

Edit: I rescind my note. Apparently the 2 "free" is just to view on their site, and it rarely updates. Maybe every hour or longer? Yeah, screw that. I could just as easily keep BOG open and check myself. You have to pay the fee to get the SMS or e-mail notifications, but at least they're cheaper than the other one mentioned in this thread.

I think I'd rather go without than drop an extra $4-$10 on one restaurant reservation (BOG). Seems kind of nuts.

 

[HauntedMansionFreak]

Sometime this week a new service has been advertising opening up. I saw a tweet from them on a twitter page I follow. Feom the way it looks, they already have the res booked and if you want it you pay the fee and then agree on a release time. Im keeping an eye on it to see when they open up. Id rather do that then wait for a text.

Says they will start at $4.

 

[DisLee107]

Sometime this week a new service has been advertising opening up. I saw a tweet from them on a twitter page I follow. Feom the way it looks, they already have the res booked and if you want it you pay the fee and then agree on a release time. Im keeping an eye on it to see when they open up. Id rather do that then wait for a text.

Says they will start at $4.

Seems a little over the line to me..... Essentially someone is acting as a middle man to grab "good reservations" and then extort a payoff from someone to give it out. Not sure Disney would like this too much.....

 

[HauntedMansionFreak]

Alot of shady stuff takes place when it comes to getting reservations. From throwaway rooms to people booking multiple time slots to bots crawling disneys adr system and charging to notify paying members about it. I dont think any of it is extortion.

Its because of Disney that any of these kinds of things happen to begin with. I dont know the ins and outs of how this one works yet but it seems no diff than a travel agent or concierge to me.

 

[Winky65]

Which alert service is this? The one Erin mentioned, Dining Buddy, charges $8 PER RESTAURANT reservation sought... That's a bit steep, IMO.

********.com. $10 gave us a range of the 3 days we we looking for and sent an alert anytime. Dinner reservation was available. We have booked and rebooked probably 10 BoG dinner reservations finally getting the exact one we want. Well worth $10 for us.

 

[Franzks]

I signed up for Scout and do not regret it. $6 well spent as it searches 8 reservations at a time. It found us BOG a few weeks ago for November. I have managed to get all but one day of our *must* haves. I'm still hopeful for our one remaining day, as it seems they're releasing reservations at various time for various places. Scout searches and just tells me when one opens up. Well worth it in my opinion.

 

[Disneymoon2013]

********.com. $10 gave us a range of the 3 days we we looking for and sent an alert anytime. Dinner reservation was available. We have booked and rebooked probably 10 BoG dinner reservations finally getting the exact one we want. Well worth $10 for us.

Did Disboards asterisk out the site name? That is so weird. I still have no idea which site you're referring to.

I signed up for Scout and do not regret it. $6 well spent as it searches 8 reservations at a time. It found us BOG a few weeks ago for November. I have managed to get all but one day of our *must* haves. I'm still hopeful for our one remaining day, as it seems they're releasing reservations at various time for various places. Scout searches and just tells me when one opens up. Well worth it in my opinion.

If you're looking for that many reservations for a family, it makes more sense to me. I'm trying to get one reservation for 2 people (although I've been searching for 3, since they screw over duos) at BOG. I think I might see pigs fly first before securing BOG. The only reason I got to go once before, on my honeymoon, is because a DISer cancelled her reservation, saw my posts of frustration, and gave us her ADR #. If it wasn't for that, I doubt I would have made it that time either. I don't work at a job where I can hover on WDW's web site all day long at a computer, nor monitor it with my phone, and I guess I'm too cheap to drop an additional $4-$10 for one restaurant reservation. For the honeymoon, I might have used one of these sites, but not for this trip. BOG is the only reservation I wasn't able to get. I booked very few. I am curious to find out about these sites, though, as today is the first time I've heard of them. I agree with another poster. It is shady, and it is a side-effect of Disney's competitive system.

 

[Disneymoon2013]

This is basically what's up with Scout & the rest, and the folks who say they're going to reserve and act as middle men. This happened with upscale reservations in San Francisco apparently: http://developers.slashdot.org/stor...-scripts-to-lock-down-restaurant-reservations

 

[HauntedMansionFreak]

I can pay Scout for a chance that a reservation will pop up followed by another chance I will get it. Or I can pay a small concierge fee to DDA for a res thats already secured and will be released to me at a time of my choosing. Its not ideal that either place even exists but if Im going to pay, Im going to pay a human who has done the work and not some auto-program-web-crawler.

It will be interesting to see what restaurants and dates DDA offers. They tweeted they have BoG for Night of Joy.

 

[ErinsMommy]

I can pay Scout for a chance that a reservation will pop up followed by another chance I will get it. Or I can pay a small concierge fee to DDA for a res thats already secured and will be released to me at a time of my choosing. Its not ideal that either place even exists but if Im going to pay, Im going to pay a human who has done the work and not some auto-program-web-crawler.

It will be interesting to see what restaurants and dates DDA offers. They tweeted they have BoG for Night of Joy.

Never heard of DDA? Link?

 

[Disneymoon2013]

I also haven't heard of DDA.

I'm trying out Scout's "free" 2 searches, but it appears to be junk. According to their page, they haven't reapplied their search in 41 minutes now. I have to assume that either A. they've set up their bot to screw over the freebie option, in which case why offer it at all...? or B. Their bot sucks and only checks hourly or similar. Based on some others' comments on here, I'm guessing option A is more likely. It makes me even more resistant to paying them anything at all. Don't offer free without being honest about the situation. Geez.

I'd rather pay real humans than a bot, too. Definitely hoping to hear about DDA.

 

[HauntedMansionFreak]

There is no official link that Ive found yet. I came across them on Twitter by accident. Its "at" **************. I got curious and check it every couple of days. Its advertised to be available this week.