Fast Pass Plus wasn't THAT bad…. a lot of hype for how awful it was

[DisneyKidds]

I'm finding that the worst WDW wait times are much higher than the worst USO wait times.

Just curious as to how you found that, if you aren't using the standby lines in the Disney parks? I thought the plan was to use FP+ to get 'more for less' by just ducking into the Disney parks to use your FP+ and see some parades and fireworks.

 

[SmithSmith]

Wait... so the posted time in front of the ride was different than the posted time on the app? That's what this seems to say, but I want to make sure I'm reading it right

Can't speak for North of Mouse, but we noticed MDE wait times to be completely different than posted waits at the ride. Whenever my DH checked the MDE, the posted waits were always inflated! Based on my experience, I wouldn't trust the app.

 

[wisblue]

i do think the concept of FP+ is a great idea and i see why Disney implemented it. But for my family (and many others like mine) who have been there so many times and go for 10+days when we go, using FP+ takes away our freedom of choice to a degree. we make FP+ reservations for the first few days since we know where we will be going, but towards the end our plan of attack normally goes out the window because one day we will get more done than we planned so the next day we want to hit a different park, or we want to go back and redo something. well, with the FP+ system its harder to do that. its hard to change FP+ for the big rides once we have them booked. We tried. It really hurts us just waking up and deciding where we want to go since we really cant ride any good rides if we change our minds. Thats my only problem with it. Not as spur of the moment changes can be made.

I think this depends a lot on the time of year (and overall crowd levels) and how early you're willing to get to the parks or how late you're willing to stay. Not to mention what you consider a "good ride".

We have had very good luck doing a lot of good rides without having FP's in advance because of entering the parks on a CM Gate Pass. A lot, but not all, of that success is a function of getting to the parks early but, of course, that has always been true.

Here is a link to a brief trip report of mine describing a 4 day trip in early November (the weekend of the Wine and Dine Half Marathon):

http://www.disboards.com/threads/spontaneity-is-not-dead-a-barebones-trip-report.3359156/

This also includes my suggestions on how to make a trip with FP+ as unstructured as possible while still experiencing a lot of the parks' major attractions.

 

[Laketravis]

Just curious as to how you found that, if you aren't using the standby lines in the Disney parks? I thought the plan was to use FP+ to get 'more for less' by just ducking into the Disney parks to use your FP+ and see some parades and fireworks.

Combination of both observed while in the parks and checking when we weren't. The wait times at WDW are available to you over the Internet no matter where you are at.

Checkout easywdw.com/waits

Like right now, Splash has a post wait time of 125 minutes. Last night we were standing in front of Space when it was 75 minutes at 10:45pm.

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[DisneyKidds]

And we all

Combination of both observed while in the parks and checking when we weren't. The wait times at WDW are available to you over the Internet no matter where you are at.

Checkout easywdw.com/waits

Like right now, Splash has a post wait time of 125 minutes. Last night we were standing in front of Space when it was 75 minutes at 10:45pm.

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And we all know how accurate those are.....

 

[Laketravis]

Can't speak for North of Mouse, but we noticed MDE wait times to be completely different than posted waits at the ride. Whenever my DH checked the MDE, the posted waits were always inflated! Based on my experience, I wouldn't trust the app.

We checked that yesterday and found that there is a bit of a lag in the time it takes MDE to update wait times, so sometimes it will show what the posted time was before it was updated, and that could be more or less.

Easywdw.com/waits has been spot on so far every time we've compared. I think they simply use a shorter refresh interval than MDE does.


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[Laketravis]

And we all

And we all know how accurate those are.....

Are you here now? I am, and I'm comparing the EasyWDW times to the actual posted times and finding them to be pretty much spot on.


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[mesaboy2]

We checked that yesterday and found that there is a bit of a lag in the time it takes MDE to update wait times, so sometimes it will show what the posted time was before it was updated, and that could be more or less.

Easywdw.com/waits has been spot on so far every time we've compared. I think they simply use a shorter refresh interval than MDE does.


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Yep, this.

 

[Laketravis]

I think most people understand that posted wait times are not an exact science and there will be some variation. Like when a posted wait time is 10 minutes and you see 100 people filing into the line. You can pretty much expect that time to no longer be valid.

Nor do I believe there to be consistent and gross exaggeration as some have suggested. I really don't see what WDW would gain by regularly stating wait times to be higher than they actually are, they get enough bad press as it is. In fact, I would think that USO would have more to gain by inflating standby wait times because it could spur additional Express Pass sales, but I'm betting the risk of that accusation keeps their posted wait times on the conservative side.


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[nilla]

We rarely waited more than 20 minutes for anything before fastpass+ came about. We rarely waited more than 20 minutes for anything after fastpass+ came about.

Attitude is a much bigger influence on how your trip turns out than anything else.

A lot of people here feel like Disney is their own personal club and they freak out over every single change. I've learned to take it all with a grain of salt

Well said! Note my tagline

 

[nilla]

Has anyone heard anything about rumored future changes allowing you to book more than 3 FPs in advance?

 

[Mad Hattered]

Are you here now? I am, and I'm comparing the EasyWDW times to the actual posted times and finding them to be pretty much spot on.


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Psssst.....he just wants to start a fight with you. Hope you are having a good time, Lake!

 

[Laketravis]

Psssst.....he just wants to start a fight with you. Hope you are having a good time, Lake!

My thoughts as well.

We're having a great time, thanks! I think this might be one of the best trips so far, and I'm hoping to be able to share some tips and tricks that we've learned when it's all over and we get ready for our next one in June.


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[mesaboy2]

Has anyone heard anything about rumored future changes allowing you to book more than 3 FPs in advance?

Rumors, sure. Facts, none.

 

[DisneyKidds]

Are you here now? I am, and I'm comparing the EasyWDW times to the actual posted times and finding them to be pretty much spot on.


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Not disputing that. Now if I had a nickel for every time someone posted that they got on a standby line of 45 minutes and were out in 30......

 

[Laketravis]

I think the reality is that most people don't start a stopwatch when they enter a line and stop it when they board the attraction. The passage of time can 'feel' different than what it actually was. People who stand still for 5 minutes might think they were waiting 20 minutes while people who were moving thru an attractive queue for 20 minutes might think it only took 5.

The entire benefit of FP depends on long lines. Without long lines, why even waste one's time with FP?

Last night when the SB for SM was posted at 75 minutes, we probably waited in the FP queue for about 15. Just think how much higher the SB line would have been if FP was a walk on.


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[Disfan1968]

I think the reality is that most people don't start a stopwatch when they enter a line and stop it when they board the attraction. The passage of time can 'feel' different than what it actually was. People who stand still for 5 minutes might think they were waiting 20 minutes while people who were moving thru an attractive queue for 20 minutes might think it only took 5.


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It's kind of like the bus stops, where you overhear people saying that they have been waiting "over 20 minutes" for a bus when you know for a fact they have been standing in line for precisely 11.

 

[luvsJack]

I think most people understand that posted wait times are not an exact science and there will be some variation. Like when a posted wait time is 10 minutes and you see 100 people filing into the line. You can pretty much expect that time to no longer be valid.

Nor do I believe there to be consistent and gross exaggeration as some have suggested. I really don't see what WDW would gain by regularly stating wait times to be higher than they actually are, they get enough bad press as it is. In fact, I would think that USO would have more to gain by inflating standby wait times because it could spur additional Express Pass sales, but I'm betting the risk of that accusation keeps their posted wait times on the conservative side.


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I don't know what you are experiencing now, but last week the times were off. Was Disney doing it on purpose, no. I believe there was a problem with the system. The app and the posted times were the same as each other but they were not accurate.

Now if I walk up to an attraction and it says "5 minutes" and 200 people walk in ahead of me, of course, common sense would tell you that the time is off. But that isn't what was happening. The "wait time" for PoC was the time it took to walk through and straight on to the boat. But 30 min was posted, so unless a whole bunch of people suddenly decided to do something else, the time was off. Now on PP, you can't see the line as they are in the "house". We saw a wait time of 30 min and it was 60. No one got in line while we stood out front deciding if we were going to go ahead and ride then or wait. We watched the time because we had another FP to get to.

Earlier in the day PP had 10 minutes posted, as people walked in the CM was saying "its more like 40". At Stitch it also said 10 and the CM said "well I am supposed to go with the time posted, but. . . "

WDW is not going to gain anything by purposely doing this but there was obviously something going on. It wasn't just someone forgot to give the red card to someone on PP because that would not affect PoC. It wasn't break downs, because there was actually a line there and it was moving. And yes, it was consistently this way the three days we were there. We compensated and it didn't really make an impact on us either way. We had a great trip but the times posted on the attractions and on the app were off and by quite a bit on some attractions.

 

[Laketravis]

I don't think there is any mystery to it. The posted wait time is not fabricated, it was whatever the last sampled red card read was. So the fact is that is what the SB wait time was when the sample was taken. Much like a photograph of a busy intersection - it's true for the moment it's taken. It's certainly understandable how that can change, for better or for worse, even minutes after the last read and not updated until the next read.


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[wisblue]

I don't think there is any mystery to it. The posted wait time is not fabricated, it was whatever the last sampled red card read was. So the fact is that is what the SB wait time was when the sample was taken. Much like a photograph of a busy intersection - it's true for the moment it's taken. It's certainly understandable how that can change, for better or for worse, even minutes after the last read and not updated until the next read.


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I don't think the posted wait time is simply the last sampled red card.

It definitely isn't that when the parks first open and the line is building quickly.

I also thought that when some websites were reporting actual and posted times, the actual time was the last reported red card.