Disney's computer programming changes last year resulted in all sorts of "glitches"--e.g., when you book more than one villa they "automatically" go on one "travel plan" and that prevents use of online check-in. I discovered a new one today.
(And MS, bless them, both fixed the problem for my upcoming trip, and told me how to avoid the problem in the future.)
Today, I discovered that Magical Express now sends travel packets only to one person on a travel plan. They will not send duplicates to others on the travel plan. They do send sufficient luggage tags for everyone on both (multiple) reservations, but all in one envelope with only one "check-in" ticket.
It's now the DVC member's responsibility to send the luggage tags to the other parties taking the trip. That's not great, but not so bad. What's "bad" is that only one "villa's worth" in the group can bypass the (always loooooong) check-in line at ME at MCO because there's only one travel packet.
I called to get a second one for the family I'm taking over Labor Day...they're coming in on a different airline, from a different departure city, at a different time. MS told me ME will not send multiple packets. One of the two of us would have to stand in that line to check in as only one of us could have the travel packet that allows one to skip the check-in line.
I rather melted down (altho I think I was nice about it). Did tell the VERY nice CM who helped me that maybe my stress over this could be attributed to day 4 of 100+ degree high humidity weather (it's AWFUL outside!), but it just seemed to me that it's wrong, just plain wrong, to institute a system that requires one traveler to stand in a 15-20 minute line prior to getting on the ME coach...
The CM was incredibly sympathetic...she explained that the "one travel plan" system prevents multiple ME packets and there's no way around that. But she did tell me that in the future to avoid this problem I should just tell MS when I'm booking that I want separate travel plans (totally separate reservations).
I do believe this CM went "above and beyond"...I'm so grateful to her! (I even stayed on the phone to respond to the survey and signed up for a phone call so I could tell Member Satisfaction how great she was)...I didn't scream and swear, and I did say that I was probably overreacting to this difficulty--after all, no one had died and there is a way for the second party to get on ME, albeit at the cost of standing in line...I also told her that my stress was no doubt greater because of the weather so many of us are enduring, and that I know I shouldn't have been complaining to her...instead I asked her to put me through to the person I should complain to--told her that it was such a failure of "disney magic" to institute a system that prevents online check-in and now also makes it more time consuming and annoying to use ME...that's when she put me on hold (with my permission)...I thought she was going to get a supervisor or a Member Satisfaction person so I could register my unhappiness with "the right" people...
Instead, when she came back on, she had solved my problem--she had switched my second villa reservation to a separate travel plan, and thus triggered ME to send a travel packet to the family I'm taking to Disney next month. And even more importantly, she came back with information on how to avoid the problem in the future--simply tell MS when booking that I want separate travel plans/separate reservations. Easy-peasy. But who knew you had to do that to preserve your online check-in capability and to make sure your guests get their own ME travel packet! I was SO thankful.
Anyway...this is probably too long-winded. Really just wanted to share that anyone who's booking more than one villa for the same trip can avoid all the online check-in, ME problems that come w/two villas on one travel plan by simply requesting that they be booked as separate reservations on separate travel plans...
And hurray for MS and their "above and beyond" help for me this morning!
(And MS, bless them, both fixed the problem for my upcoming trip, and told me how to avoid the problem in the future.)
Today, I discovered that Magical Express now sends travel packets only to one person on a travel plan. They will not send duplicates to others on the travel plan. They do send sufficient luggage tags for everyone on both (multiple) reservations, but all in one envelope with only one "check-in" ticket.
It's now the DVC member's responsibility to send the luggage tags to the other parties taking the trip. That's not great, but not so bad. What's "bad" is that only one "villa's worth" in the group can bypass the (always loooooong) check-in line at ME at MCO because there's only one travel packet.
I called to get a second one for the family I'm taking over Labor Day...they're coming in on a different airline, from a different departure city, at a different time. MS told me ME will not send multiple packets. One of the two of us would have to stand in that line to check in as only one of us could have the travel packet that allows one to skip the check-in line.
I rather melted down (altho I think I was nice about it). Did tell the VERY nice CM who helped me that maybe my stress over this could be attributed to day 4 of 100+ degree high humidity weather (it's AWFUL outside!), but it just seemed to me that it's wrong, just plain wrong, to institute a system that requires one traveler to stand in a 15-20 minute line prior to getting on the ME coach...
The CM was incredibly sympathetic...she explained that the "one travel plan" system prevents multiple ME packets and there's no way around that. But she did tell me that in the future to avoid this problem I should just tell MS when I'm booking that I want separate travel plans (totally separate reservations).
I do believe this CM went "above and beyond"...I'm so grateful to her! (I even stayed on the phone to respond to the survey and signed up for a phone call so I could tell Member Satisfaction how great she was)...I didn't scream and swear, and I did say that I was probably overreacting to this difficulty--after all, no one had died and there is a way for the second party to get on ME, albeit at the cost of standing in line...I also told her that my stress was no doubt greater because of the weather so many of us are enduring, and that I know I shouldn't have been complaining to her...instead I asked her to put me through to the person I should complain to--told her that it was such a failure of "disney magic" to institute a system that prevents online check-in and now also makes it more time consuming and annoying to use ME...that's when she put me on hold (with my permission)...I thought she was going to get a supervisor or a Member Satisfaction person so I could register my unhappiness with "the right" people...
Instead, when she came back on, she had solved my problem--she had switched my second villa reservation to a separate travel plan, and thus triggered ME to send a travel packet to the family I'm taking to Disney next month. And even more importantly, she came back with information on how to avoid the problem in the future--simply tell MS when booking that I want separate travel plans/separate reservations. Easy-peasy. But who knew you had to do that to preserve your online check-in capability and to make sure your guests get their own ME travel packet! I was SO thankful.
Anyway...this is probably too long-winded. Really just wanted to share that anyone who's booking more than one villa for the same trip can avoid all the online check-in, ME problems that come w/two villas on one travel plan by simply requesting that they be booked as separate reservations on separate travel plans...
And hurray for MS and their "above and beyond" help for me this morning!
