Successful Advanced DAS registration today! Long post! TLDR: despite it taking 5 hours and 10 min from start to finish, we’re very happy we did it in advance. I have a couple of tech suggestions in here and a picture of what the Advances Selection form looks like.
Prep beforehand: this is our second time using DAS Advanced Registration so we’re familiar with the process, and have also been reading a lot of posts about people’s recent experiences. We wrote out a list of all our park dates, desired rides, and approximate times last night so we had it handy and could easily enter it into the form. Planed on requesting the chat as soon as we woke up in the morning today. We knew going into it that it could be an hours-long process.
This morning (Saturday, 28 days out): opened my eyes at 7:01
, knew we wouldn’t obviously get on for the 7am sharp log in, got ready for the long haul. Clicked the link to Request Video Chat at 7:27, answered “Yes” to the three generic eligibility questions, and monitored the chat for a few hours, periodically typing “hi” (though I really don’t think that did anything). We got disconnected from the chat multiple times, but had expected that to happen and just figured out how to refresh or restart and get back into the chat. Never lost our place in the queue. Also accessed the chat on two devices (laptop and cellphone). This gave me and my wife some flexibility to monitor the chat while the other did morning stuff. Also noticed that the cell phone and the laptop got disconnected independently of each other. Eventually when I was doing preselects on the laptop and got disconnected twice during that, I was still able to chat with the CM on my phone while I logged back in on the laptop.
About an hour and 45 in, we got a robo-message from chat admin thanking us for our patience, saying how busy it was, and asking us to reply “Yes” if we were still waiting. We typed “yes” and waited more. 2 hours and four min later, we got the same robo-message again, and we typed yes again. But THIS TIME, three minutes later we got confirmation that we were being connected to a cast member and asked us to verify our dates and planning party. I was actually out at the grocery store keeping an eye on the chat on my phone, when the message from the CM came up, I texted my wife at home so she could get it rolling on the laptop for the video.
It was three hours and forty five minutes from requesting the chat to getting message that it would begin soon. 22 minutes after that we got the link for the video chat. The video chat took less than two min. It was clear the CM knew we were registered previously, asked the same “why can’t you wait in the line?” question, and upon the brief response, instantly approved and took the photo of our DAS rider. Then the CM said they were connecting us to someone else back in the chat for preselects. The CM for registration was very kind and helpful, and expressed no judgement about anything.
Back in the chat we connected immediately with a new CM for our preselects. We have 7 park days and we’re allowed to select rides for all 7 even tho the last ones extended past 30 days (we’re staying onsite). The CM sent us a link to a form to share our preselects for our first four days (the form only has fields for four days at a time (see picture). The form is open response, so you can actually type anything. It suggests for time of day to ask for morning, afternoon, or evening, but I was able to type “late morning or early afternoon” and that was an acceptable response.
Took a couple of minutes for the CM to book preselects and they appeared immediately in the My Disney Experience App under Future Plans. We got whatever we had asked for, though we weren’t requesting too many of the most popular selections. The CM also looked at possible modifications to the times they booked initially because we had an ADR during something (successful modification made!). They also looked for alternates when I asked about adjusting times of two other rides (one couldnt be changes how I hoped so we just kept it, the other also couldnt work so we picked a different ride entirely). Never felt like a bother for me to ask, tho the CM expressed that availability was limited.
Then the CM sent a link to another form for our final 3 days. After I filled it out it it was radio silence for 10 min. I wrote to check if we were still connected and got an auto reply asking to allow additional time for the CM to reply. And then a minute later they were back. Ended up being 20 min between when I submitted my choices for the last three days until they were booked by the CM. This time there was nothing I needed to ask to be modified.
It was exactly an hour to do preselects from start to finish.
Tips, recommendations, and other things to know:
I never felt like we were “waiting” for hours. We monitored the chat periodically but otherwise went on with our Saturday morning. And I feel like the 5+ hours we spent today beats the many more hours we’d be spending over the next month wondering it it would actually be approved again and wondering how we’d have to plan if it wasn’t approved. Preselects are nice, but for us, advanced registration was more about piece of mind.
USE TWO DEVICES! Especially if one can be a phone. That way you can have mobility while waiting for the chat to start.
When I got disconnected on my phone, the only way I could get back in was to close safari, then clear all my browsing history, then log back in and get back to the page. Annoying but not terrible once I figured that out.
There’s no lag on the chat between devices. If I typed something on the laptop, I could immediately see it on my phone.
I have no idea how the preselect form would work on a phone. It might work, but I’d recommend doing it on a laptop if possible. The form is like a second chat box that popped up, but since the chat box took up the entire screen on my phone, I don’t know how I would have toggles between the two.
If you want to look back at the chat transcription after you’re done, you can see the whole thing in the MDE app in the “chat with us” area. It all lives in the same place. (I was using the Safari browser for the active chat tho, I wasn’t using the app for that)
The CM also confirmed that TRON will NOT be available as a preselect. Not that I ever doubted that would be the case.
The way I see it, this clearly could have been a lot quicker. It also could have been a lot longer. But it’s done now. Yay!
Prep beforehand: this is our second time using DAS Advanced Registration so we’re familiar with the process, and have also been reading a lot of posts about people’s recent experiences. We wrote out a list of all our park dates, desired rides, and approximate times last night so we had it handy and could easily enter it into the form. Planed on requesting the chat as soon as we woke up in the morning today. We knew going into it that it could be an hours-long process.
This morning (Saturday, 28 days out): opened my eyes at 7:01
, knew we wouldn’t obviously get on for the 7am sharp log in, got ready for the long haul. Clicked the link to Request Video Chat at 7:27, answered “Yes” to the three generic eligibility questions, and monitored the chat for a few hours, periodically typing “hi” (though I really don’t think that did anything). We got disconnected from the chat multiple times, but had expected that to happen and just figured out how to refresh or restart and get back into the chat. Never lost our place in the queue. Also accessed the chat on two devices (laptop and cellphone). This gave me and my wife some flexibility to monitor the chat while the other did morning stuff. Also noticed that the cell phone and the laptop got disconnected independently of each other. Eventually when I was doing preselects on the laptop and got disconnected twice during that, I was still able to chat with the CM on my phone while I logged back in on the laptop.About an hour and 45 in, we got a robo-message from chat admin thanking us for our patience, saying how busy it was, and asking us to reply “Yes” if we were still waiting. We typed “yes” and waited more. 2 hours and four min later, we got the same robo-message again, and we typed yes again. But THIS TIME, three minutes later we got confirmation that we were being connected to a cast member and asked us to verify our dates and planning party. I was actually out at the grocery store keeping an eye on the chat on my phone, when the message from the CM came up, I texted my wife at home so she could get it rolling on the laptop for the video.
It was three hours and forty five minutes from requesting the chat to getting message that it would begin soon. 22 minutes after that we got the link for the video chat. The video chat took less than two min. It was clear the CM knew we were registered previously, asked the same “why can’t you wait in the line?” question, and upon the brief response, instantly approved and took the photo of our DAS rider. Then the CM said they were connecting us to someone else back in the chat for preselects. The CM for registration was very kind and helpful, and expressed no judgement about anything.
Back in the chat we connected immediately with a new CM for our preselects. We have 7 park days and we’re allowed to select rides for all 7 even tho the last ones extended past 30 days (we’re staying onsite). The CM sent us a link to a form to share our preselects for our first four days (the form only has fields for four days at a time (see picture). The form is open response, so you can actually type anything. It suggests for time of day to ask for morning, afternoon, or evening, but I was able to type “late morning or early afternoon” and that was an acceptable response.
Took a couple of minutes for the CM to book preselects and they appeared immediately in the My Disney Experience App under Future Plans. We got whatever we had asked for, though we weren’t requesting too many of the most popular selections. The CM also looked at possible modifications to the times they booked initially because we had an ADR during something (successful modification made!). They also looked for alternates when I asked about adjusting times of two other rides (one couldnt be changes how I hoped so we just kept it, the other also couldnt work so we picked a different ride entirely). Never felt like a bother for me to ask, tho the CM expressed that availability was limited.
Then the CM sent a link to another form for our final 3 days. After I filled it out it it was radio silence for 10 min. I wrote to check if we were still connected and got an auto reply asking to allow additional time for the CM to reply. And then a minute later they were back. Ended up being 20 min between when I submitted my choices for the last three days until they were booked by the CM. This time there was nothing I needed to ask to be modified.
It was exactly an hour to do preselects from start to finish.
Tips, recommendations, and other things to know:
I never felt like we were “waiting” for hours. We monitored the chat periodically but otherwise went on with our Saturday morning. And I feel like the 5+ hours we spent today beats the many more hours we’d be spending over the next month wondering it it would actually be approved again and wondering how we’d have to plan if it wasn’t approved. Preselects are nice, but for us, advanced registration was more about piece of mind.
USE TWO DEVICES! Especially if one can be a phone. That way you can have mobility while waiting for the chat to start.
When I got disconnected on my phone, the only way I could get back in was to close safari, then clear all my browsing history, then log back in and get back to the page. Annoying but not terrible once I figured that out.
There’s no lag on the chat between devices. If I typed something on the laptop, I could immediately see it on my phone.
I have no idea how the preselect form would work on a phone. It might work, but I’d recommend doing it on a laptop if possible. The form is like a second chat box that popped up, but since the chat box took up the entire screen on my phone, I don’t know how I would have toggles between the two.
If you want to look back at the chat transcription after you’re done, you can see the whole thing in the MDE app in the “chat with us” area. It all lives in the same place. (I was using the Safari browser for the active chat tho, I wasn’t using the app for that)
The CM also confirmed that TRON will NOT be available as a preselect. Not that I ever doubted that would be the case.
The way I see it, this clearly could have been a lot quicker. It also could have been a lot longer. But it’s done now. Yay!
