FastPass+ Changes Coming!

[luckyman_apd]

There is no perfect solution and reading these boards for as long as i have people will always complain about something. FP+ is available to everyone at the same time. If you are not using it in advance then only blame yourself. You can plan 3. Once this 3 are gone I think adding more is a great solution. If you arrive after 2pm...you had an opportunity to schedule your 3 the same time I did. If I'm in the park at 9am why shouldn't Disney accommodate me with with a chance to add an extra fp ride? Remember what their goal is.....to have us all spend less time in line and more time to spend money in the park. They want me spending more time in the gift shop after the ride than waiting in another line. If you after re getting their 5 hours after me....that's time they could be getting getting me getting me to spend more money. It's not designed for everyone's convenience. ...it's designed to make them more money. They've spent over a billion dollars on this. They want a return on that investment. And if it is an advantage to those staying on Disney property well good. That is their goal. To make more money and if you choose to stay on their property because of it....that was the goal. It's a business. Keep that in mind. The only convenience they bring you is only to make you happier to spend more money.

 

[nolanboys]

There is no perfect solution and reading these boards for as long as i have people will always complain about something. FP+ is available to everyone at the same time. If you are not using it in advance then only blame yourself. You can plan 3. Once this 3 are gone I think adding more is a great solution. If you arrive after 2pm...you had an opportunity to schedule your 3 the same time I did. If I'm in the park at 9am why shouldn't Disney accommodate me with with a chance to add an extra fp ride? Remember what their goal is.....to have us all spend less time in line and more time to spend money in the park. They want me spending more time in the gift shop after the ride than waiting in another line. If you after re getting their 5 hours after me....that's time they could be getting getting me getting me to spend more money. It's not designed for everyone's convenience. ...it's designed to make them more money. They've spent over a billion dollars on this. They want a return on that investment. And if it is an advantage to those staying on Disney property well good. That is their goal. To make more money and if you choose to stay on their property because of it....that was the goal. It's a business. Keep that in mind. The only convenience they bring you is only to make you happier to spend more money.

Although I agree with some of your thoughts, FP+ as it stands will actually make disney lose money on us. No more PH option for us as standby lines are long even at RP if we save our FP for later in the day and the same if we have FP+ in the morning. If disney let you book the extra FP+ on their app that would be one thing, but to have to wait in the FP+ kiosk lines - yuck! We spent more time at the resort and more time eating in our room as we left the parks because of the lines.

 

[jahber]

There is no perfect solution and reading these boards for as long as i have people will always complain about something. FP+ is available to everyone at the same time. If you are not using it in advance then only blame yourself. You can plan 3. Once this 3 are gone I think adding more is a great solution. If you arrive after 2pm...you had an opportunity to schedule your 3 the same time I did.

Just to clarify, it is not true that everyone has access to FP+ booking at the same time. While the 60 day onsite/30 day offsite+AP distinction might not seem big to you, it has already created a mess with Anna and Elsa FP+. People are finding AT 60 days that there are no more FP+ available late in the morning. It turns into a game like ADRs used to be--check every day and try different combinations of members in your party. And if someone buys their tickets day-of, they are unable to book ANYTHING in advance. Once 7DMT opens, I can't imagine trying to score that FP+ day of. If that's not a valid "complaint" about how the new, "improved" system works, I'm not sure what is.

 

[WilsonFlyer]

People are often quick to criticize based on what they see today, not knowing that the planning stages for staged changes and implementations are already way further out then they realize.

This didn't just happen because of "complaints" and this too, is not the "end."

 

[luckyman_apd]

Who said you couldn't change them on the app? Why would you have to wait at a kiosk? I've been a "tester" of the system 3 times with our PAP, and will take our final trip this summer. The ONLY problem I've had is that the battery on my room door died and I had to wait for someone to come up and open it with a real key, and then maintenance came to replace the battery. No where in the article of planned changes did it say you had to use the kiosk to add the extra FP+. Until new additions or changes are made it's all speculation. I HAVE changed my selections through my phone app while in the park. Our last trip my father used 1 day tickets from years ago...so we had to add his FP+ each day in the park, and in most cases we were able to coordinate him with what we had scheduled. My complaint now is that there is not park hopping feature. But it's been pointed out to me that this is still the testing phase and "many" changes are planned.....some due to consumer feedback. I was encouraged by CMs to submit feedback and request AP info or DVC info be loaded onto your MDE account so your band registers your appropriate discounts at the register. I had to "prove" I was an AP holder to buy a pin by showing my PAP connected with my MDE account on my phone. I don't have anything else to show I'm a passholder. My voucher was redeemed right to our bands when they were activated.

As opposed to the 60 day vs 30 day for FP+, when I say everyone has equal access....I mean everyone staying on property. From a business standpoint, why shouldn't WDW give advanced planning to those staying onsite? How is that any different than Magic Hours? We take full advantage of those for the exact same reason we will use FP+....to spend less time in lines. Park opening and the last hour of night Magic Hours are some of the shortest wait times you will find. If you don't like it, then stay onsite. The whole plan (like anything else Disney) is to get more $ from your wallet.

We traveled to California almost 2 years ago....2 weeks after Carsland opened. Radiator Springs Racers ran out of FP tickets pretty much 10 minutes after park opening everyday. Why? Because guests staying in a DL hotel got to enter the park an hour earlier than those staying offsite. I chose to save money by staying at the HOJO, and I had to wait 2 hours in line to ride it. I wasn't thrilled, but that's the perk to those staying onsite. The more recent and popular an attraction (such as radiator springs racers or Frozen princesses) it's obviously going to attract a whole lot more attention. It's not like you have to be exclusive to get this perk at WDW, you just have to stay on property....and unlike DL, they offer Value to Deluxe offerings. If you like to stay offsite, I have no problem with that, but you shouldn't be upset with a business trying to increase their business.

 

[Msmithmd]

Lucky man- I agree with most of your long post above.

The thing about selecting the fourth fast pass only at a kiosk actually came direct from the Disneyparks blog here, in the article originally mentioned at the start of this thread:

http://disneyparks.disney.go.com/bl...alt-disney-world-resort-hotel-and-day-guests/

It's about three-quarters of the way down the page: "once they've used the three that they booked, we'll allow them to select another at the kiosks in the parks..."

Just FYI.

 

[wdrl]

The thing about selecting the fourth fast pass only at a kiosk actually came direct from the Disneyparks blog here, in the article originally mentioned at the start of this thread:

http://disneyparks.disney.go.com/bl...alt-disney-world-resort-hotel-and-day-guests/

It's about three-quarters of the way down the page: "once they've used the three that they booked, we'll allow them to select another at the kiosks in the parks..."

I for one will wait and see how it all plays out once Disney activates the ability to select subsequent FastPass+. When Tom Skaggs says "we'll allow them to select another at the kiosks in the parks. . . .", that is not the same as saying "we won't allow them to use smartphone apps to select another FP+."

 

[Msmithmd]

Totally agree, wdrl. This is something I hope was put out incorrectly, or will be changed as they implement.

Having to use the kiosks for extra FP kinda defeats the whole purpose of moving the FP system off the legacy paper machines and into the web. But I'm never overly optimistic when it comes to the logic of Disney IT services.

 

[lawgator]

I am wondering if you have booked your 3rd fast pass for the day to see Illuminations, Fireworks, or Fantasmic, will that mean that you can never get a 4th one because those events are at the end of the day (unless there are extra magical hours or late hours). Hopefully, they will only count attraction rides, but we'll see. That being said, I am glad for the changes and hopeful it will all work out just fine.

 

[tjkraz]

I for one will wait and see how it all plays out once Disney activates the ability to select subsequent FastPass+. When Tom Skaggs says "we'll allow them to select another at the kiosks in the parks. . . .", that is not the same as saying "we won't allow them to use smartphone apps to select another FP+."

Agree. I cannot see any reason why Disney would intentionally route tens-of-thousands of guests to labor-intensive computer terminals rather than allowing them to use smartphone apps designed to serve the same function.

As for wait times at the kiosks, based upon my observations they have declined dramatically now that all guests can book in advance. We were in the MK on March 30--which I believe was the final day before MDE access opened up to everyone--and then again on April 4th. Lines were MUCH shorter on April 4th.

We walked past stations mid-day at Tomorrowland Terrace, outside Buzz and in Liberty Square. Compared to same time of day on 3/30, instead of seeing a couple dozen parties waiting in line there were fewer than 10 at each location.

Overall we had a very positive experience with FP+ over 8 nights at WDW. The ONLY technical glitches we experienced--over a party of 8 people--were the following:

- Should have had two credit cards linked to different party members for charging purposes but all charges went to one CC. Almost certainly Cast Member error. We knew we were in for trouble when the CM spent about 15 minutes pecking away at keyboard trying to set everything up.

- One MagicBand from a prior trip did not work.

That's it. We easily made over a dozen changes to our FP+ reservations both while in the parks and from the resort. All worked flawlessly. And we found we had plenty of opportunity to bump rides back if we were delayed. On one occasion, I was in line at Columbia Harbor House with 20 minutes remaining before a FP window ended. After 5-6 taps on my iPhone, I had the FPs pushed back about 2 hours to a timeframe we could easily make.

Another time we switched our Epcot visit to another day due to a poor forecast for the waterparks. Got next-day reservations at Via Napoli and our FPs for Test Track, SE and Mission Space were switched without incident.

Also made numerous little tweaks to our plans while in the parks or night before.

At times, standby lines did seem longer than we're used to but hard to tell how much of that is attributable to Spring Break crowds vs. FP+. But even after waiting 45 minutes for It's A Small World, I guarantee we saved time overall compared to the years of chasing paper FP tickets across the parks.

 

[Mousewerks]

As for wait times at the kiosks, based upon my observations they have declined dramatically now that all guests can book in advance. We were in the MK on March 30--which I believe was the final day before MDE access opened up to everyone--and then again on April 4th. Lines were MUCH shorter on April 4th.

We walked past stations mid-day at Tomorrowland Terrace, outside Buzz and in Liberty Square. Compared to same time of day on 3/30, instead of seeing a couple dozen parties waiting in line there were fewer than 10 at each location.

I can say that when we were there between March 23-29, the lines for the kiosks were VERY long. Often 20-30 people standing in line. So, your observation of April 4 is good to hear.

re: credit cards. I'm pretty sure they can only assign credit cards to an MDE account and they can't differentiate within that account. We wanted to put a Disney gift card on our account and just have our son have access to it. That couldn't be done. The best they could do was put that on my MDE account and ensure it was the first resource used. Needless to say, we gave him the card to use. This is something that they would do well to upgrade. Each of the RFID tags has a different ID. They should be able to apply a spending resource per RFID tag. I'm sure their software doesn't allow that now.

But like you, we had absolutely no problems with our magic bands. We stayed in a Tree House and thought it a great boon to have the kids with their own magic bands to get in and out without a problem. We also had no problem updating things on our smartphones and computers. Overall I was very pleased with the whole system.

We will be going back this coming October. I have a feeling things will be much different then in terms of capabilities of the system.

 

[tjkraz]

re: credit cards. I'm pretty sure they can only assign credit cards to an MDE account and they can't differentiate within that account.

All I know is two adults staying in the same room went to the front desk with credit cards in-hand and provided instructions as to which party members should have charging privileges on each. The CM comprehended our intent...worked with each of us one-at-a-time...scanned the cards...requested PIN numbers...verified who should be attached to each card.

Then at the end of the stay we got one bill with all the charges to one card.

It was a minor inconvenience since 95% of the charges were made by the party who had their card charged. I'm sure we could have gone to the front desk and gotten it resolved but it was easier to handle between ourselves.

I only mentioned it for the sake of full disclosure regarding our entire MDE/MagicBand experience. Every other aspect of the system--dining reservations, FP+, room entry, park entry, room charges, Test Track interactive elements--worked flawlessly.

 

[keishashadow]

I have seen the kiosks in action. This is not an improvement.The lines at the kiosks are often longer than the stand-by lines at the rides.It is a forever process beacuase each person going to the kiosk has to set up the fastpass similar to doing it on-line on your computer, which nearly takes forever even when you are doing it at home. If they are going to allow you to get additional fastpass only after using the first three, they should at least have it set up so you can do it on your iPhone at MDE..

has it been indicated you wouldn't be able to do the 2nd round of FP+ per day on iphone

I had been intending to write a post about this but haven't gotten around to it. Rope drop has fundamentally changed with FP+. Standby lines grow MUCH faster than before and even FP returns have lines. It is even more important to ride that first headliner in the morning, especially at the tiered parks. That said, a proper touring plan still works wonders for not standing in line.

so true! Touring with our 3 y.o. GD in January we walked away from crazy long return lines @ BTM & StarWars, just didn't want to devote the time it'd take to wait in the FP line let alone factoring in baby swap.

hoping things are much smoother for our upcoming trip end of May

 

[tjkraz]

...even FP returns have lines.

On this point, it's worth noting that FastPass returns have ALWAYS had lines. No variation of FastPass has ever been "present your ticket and walk directly into the ride vehicle."

In my experiences, all that's really changed is you're spending a little more time waiting outside the attraction FP queue and less time inside the queue itself. The obvious reason is the additional time it takes for each guest to scan their wristband at the entrance compared to flashing a stack of paper tickets.

On rides like Kilimanjaro Safari and BTMR, we found ourselves waiting around 5 minutes in an exterior queue to scan our bands. But once we entered the attraction, wait time was less than the old FP system.

Our longest wait was about 10 minutes outside Toy Story Mania because an earlier attraction break-down had driven up the volume of FP+ returnees. Inside the wait was the shortest we've ever had on TSM with Cast Members literally rushing guests through the queue to keep the line moving.

Overall, I didn't detect any increase in total wait time.

 

[chateau]

It did during testing, but no more. Character meets were a waste of a FP then (except princesses).