Someone is very much excluded. If I can't spend the 60 minutes with my family, because I have to sit and wait with my disabled daughter, our family will be separated and myself and my daughter will be excluded and by ourselves possibly half the day
I would argue nobody is excluded
by Disney. Our disabilities may exclude us from being able to wait in line but Disney is actually trying hard to let families ride together, even if one or two or three members of the party would normally be unable to access by long queues or paying for LL. I thought it was going to be
DAS only for severe developmental disabilities and that I would have to miss rides or do rider switch. Yes, it is inferior for me (and even worse for my husband) to miss out on family time in the lines (while he wrangles our kids alone), but it’s wonderful that we’ll still have the option to ride together even if G+/ILL sells out before we can use it. I’m not saying you don’t have the right to
feel excluded, upset, or disappointed—but that’s subjective and different than Disney excluding you.
The main point I wanted to reply to point out is the assumption that the times we’d be split up would be “half the day”— unless all you do are headliners, I would guess 80-90% of the total day would be together— shorter queues, parades, shows, dining, heck just walking from ride to ride—plus the final 10-20m and riding itself the whole group is back together.
That is excluding them, sorry, but splitting up is indeed excluding people, even if it is "only" for the time waiting, that is time they could be spent together.
Families that want to stay together the whole time absolutely can— they can ride shorter queues or purchase LL access, the accommodation is inclusive allowing people who can’t wait in line the option (but not necessity) to rejoin their party.
I went in to guest services to ask a question about bathroom line exits, …The guy looked at my account and said, "well I don't feel you really need any help as you have been able to go on a LOT of rides" as if I was faking it. I was really shocked at how rude and t he was to me and my son.
First, I think it’s unacceptable that the CM spoke this way to you, especially since you were using the system in the exact way Disney encouraged it for the past few years. I would have been upset if someone said it to me and especially in front of my children— it’s one thing to track use and another to throw permitted use in a guest’s face. Honestly shocking. Thank you for this extremely valuable report. I mentioned pages ago in the thread that Disney has the ability to track everywhere you scan in (and probably the time your ride photos was taken and where and when you ate, shopped, pulled a VQ, etc) but I was wondering if they would actually use it. I am very supportive of them looking to see how much capacity was used, and what historical park behaviors have been to determine if people are lying and/or if they really need the system (again, just to be clear, I do not have any reason to suggest you fall into either of those categories!).
Your experience does seem to indicate that usage of the DAS is also likely to come into play on ease of reapproval. They aren't just putting extra scrutiny on certain conditions, but also on super-usage. It seems any GS employee can now see the usage data.
Makes sense. I would say on average during park visits with DAS I use it for 2-5 rides a day, because I can’t stay in the parks that long…but once on Christmas Eve when I was trying to power through for my kids I think I used it more than 7 times (along with
Genie+ for a few rides)… I was already expecting to be denied because my problems are physical health related, but I think it makes sense that the people who manage to get 10+ rides a day in (and I can occasionally do that many if the stars align) are generally speaking not the people that DAS was designed for and should get extra scrutiny.
Interesting, so what happens for someone who one day uses it a lot because they are actually having a good day and can handle a lot of attractions, but the next maybe only 1 or 2 times?
I think Disney has made it clear that DAS is not designed for physical health conditions (like mine) where you have a ton of variability in days — it’s too easy to misuse once you have it— they want to give it to the families who really struggle to get to an average guest experience, even with DAS, for whom a good day is several rides.
I just thought it was important to note they are definitely tracking what rides you go on, how many, etc. Feel free to go up and ask yourself. This was not at the tents, but at a building sort of near Haunted Mansion. He had a full computer.
I think the tracking is also a good way to prevent abuse of its sophisticated enough. You can see how many times someone requested rider switch, RTQ— what Disney really needs though are tools that lets them see that the same 8 adults keep splitting into groups of 1 and 2 and all requesting RTQ because they don’t have anybody to wait in line for them. These tools exist but I’m not sure given Disney’s tortured relationship with IT technology that Disney will use them.
This new process has been so chaotic and stressful for families. And then I wonder will this actually stop abuse if you don’t require any form of documentation? Just spending some time here or on other platforms, you can find out that they are just looking to see if you can’t stand in lines. What is stopping people from lying about this? There is no way to prove this over a video chat.
So is this new system the best way to fight abuse or just for them to get more people buying Genie plus ?
It looks like they are tracking how people actually spend their time in the parks and empowering guest relations cast members to see where someone has been…that same data will absolutely help them clamp down on renewals from misusers/liars/exaggerators. I’m cautiously optimistic that this is already happening and why two people who seem to have very similar family circumstances (and even similar conditions) are being treated differently.
. Or DAQ, Digital Access Queue?
