Current WDW and DVC service quality

WeIcomeHome

Mouseketeer
Joined
Mar 12, 2023
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I have seen lots of people on these forums complaining about the decline in service, "Disney magic", member benefits, etc. I am curious where has the biggest decline in user experience been for you? Has it been associated with the parks in general or specific to DVC? What reasonable changes would you like to see to return the DVC/WDW experience to its former glory?
 
That's a pretty broad question with a lot of room for subjective interpretation.

In terms of real, measurable things, IMO there hasn't been much negative impact on DVC perks. Annual Passes aren't available for sale, nor is the TIW card. Neither of those is fully under the DVC umbrella but I can see how they color some people's opinion. Aside from that, DVC perks steadily increased in quality during most of the 2010s and have largely stabilized around the pandemic. Members save on shopping, pretty much every table service restaurant, we have lounges, late night parties, Halloween character meets, etc.

Within the parks themselves, there has been some discussion of ride breakdowns increasing. I suspect that was fostered by a combination of things like reduced downtime during the pandemic, parts shortages and insufficient staffing. Is it improving today? I dunno.

A few services have never returned to their pre-pandemic state. Extra Magic hours are different and there's no package delivery. But nearly every attraction and restaurant is now open.

I think a lot of the dissatisfaction is rooted in products & services that were slow to return, combined with higher prices and a few unpopular policy changes which will probably never be rolled-back (Genie+, end of DME.) Less than a year ago, people could rightfully be angry that there weren't any characters at Ohana breakfast, Chef Mickey's wasn't a buffet, Storytime with Belle was still closed, TRON was still not open after 5 years and parking trams were not running. Today all of those issues have been addressed. (Well, maybe not the trams.)

As for cast members, that's where we wade deeply into the subjective. During my longest 2022 visit, I was actively looking for grumpy CMs and sub-standard service. And I didn't find much. There was one CM interaction that kinda rubbed me the wrong way but it was a minor thing. And not much different than in the past.

I'm always a little skeptical of those who glorify the past while disparaging the present. My experience with WDW only goes back about 25 years, but I have a vivid memory of CM encounters in 1997 and 2004 that left a bad taste in my mouth. So things weren't all sunshine and lollipops back in "the good old days."

Being a Disney cast member is always a challenging job, even more so in this day an age when customers expect to benefit from every insider tip and trick they've heard about on social media or tik tok. My own experience is that if you greet a Disney employee with a smile and a "good morning", you will get the same in return. That's still true today.
 
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