Hilarious difference between the Disney and Universal family call

[JakeAZ]

So we have a 12 person family trip coming up.

9 of us are going to Universal for 3 days before arriving at Disney for 7 days.

We had a family call before our ADR window to go over everything.

The Disney call took almost an hour.

We had to talk about:
Where we wanted to eat, where w'd be OK eating (if first choices weren't available), which parks we wanted to start the day in, which parks we may want to finish in (for dinner reservations), making sure we didn't conflict with a Xmas party, making sure we took into account Deluxe hours (and how they worked), how the VQ worked for Remy and then there was Genie+! Who knows if it will launch by then, but we had to discuss all the features / ins and outs and how best to try and maximize it, if we used it. There were lots of questions and some exasperation.

Once we got to Universal, it was about 3 minutes.
We are staying at Royal Pacific. It includes express passes for all 3 of our days. We have to stand in line for Hagrid and Velocicoaster. We'll eat when we are hungry.

There was a lot of "that's it?" "Are you sure you didn't miss anything?"

Crazy how different these two places are.

 

[Farro]

Disney call seems more fun to me!

 

[Claudia1]

And the Universal food is cheaper! (We often do split stays between the 2)

 

[MomOTwins]

So we have a 12 person family trip coming up.

9 of us are going to Universal for 3 days before arriving at Disney for 7 days.

We had a family call before our ADR window to go over everything.

The Disney call took almost an hour.

We had to talk about:
Where we wanted to eat, where w'd be OK eating (if first choices weren't available), which parks we wanted to start the day in, which parks we may want to finish in (for dinner reservations), making sure we didn't conflict with a Xmas party, making sure we took into account Deluxe hours (and how they worked), how the VQ worked for Remy and then there was Genie+! Who knows if it will launch by then, but we had to discuss all the features / ins and outs and how best to try and maximize it, if we used it. There were lots of questions and some exasperation.

Once we got to Universal, it was about 3 minutes.
We are staying at Royal Pacific. It includes express passes for all 3 of our days. We have to stand in line for Hagrid and Velocicoaster. We'll eat when we are hungry.

There was a lot of "that's it?" "Are you sure you didn't miss anything?"

Crazy how different these two places are.

Just want to give you a heads up that we had a similar attitude about universal last March, went in all cocky and realized pretty soon we made a terrible mistake not planning better! Come dinner time, every restaurant at the resort was fully booked and when we went at 6pm to City Walk the restaurants all quoted earliest available was 9 or 10pm!

We had Express passes from Portofino, but we often waited 30-45 mins in the “express” line—sometimes longer than standby! They give out express to too many people. I wish I’d had a touring plan like at disney. Never managed to get into Ollivanders because the wait never dropped below 90 mins and you can’t use EP on it. Hagrid’s had virtual queue and we managed to get one after several failed attempts (hated that there were do many drop times throughout the day I had to set alarms for and remember to be on my phone at) but still waited close to two hours in line after we were admitted to VQ. The next day we tried to get VQ again but they weren’t operating it that day and by the time we realized the VQ wasn’t going to open we missed our chance to rope drop it. Also the park hours felt very limited—closing at 7pm or 8pm—we thought we’d be able to do something after dinner but nope. Finaliy we didn’t realize water rides open a couple hours after park open, and some rides close earlly if their queue is too long, so we wasted a lot of time showing up at closed rides.

So yeah, you have to plan more at Disney. But that also gives you more control so your vaycay doesn’t go off the rails.

 

[hopemax]

I will also reiterate, in a COVID world, restaurant reservations may be necessary for table service meals. It started when restaurants had restricted capacity, and I think it's turned into a habit for some people now, plus with the labor issues they may not be at 100%. It's not like Disney where you have to do it right at 60 days. But for peak dinner times, you have to do it earlier than you would ever think for Universal. We would book for a 4:30 dinner about 3 weeks in advance and the later times were already gone. Lunch is more forgiving, but a couple days in advance, maybe more with the size of your party. But with the larger party you might be planning on counter service anyway. Keep an eye on their reservations and if things start filling in, you can book and not get taken off guard.

 

[JakeAZ]

Thank you guys for the advice.

I should have mentioned, we have club rooms, so breakfast is covered and we are only doing QS inside Universal.

We also get there in the afternoon of the first day and will use that shortened day to knock out Olivander's without having to use any of our other 2 full days in the parks.

Yes, I understand we may not get on Hagrid's or Velocicoaster, but you can't plan in advance for those.

 

[shawthorne44]

We also get there in the afternoon of the first day and will use that shortened day to knock out Olivander's without having to use any of our other 2 full days in the parks.

We did that our first trip and it worked well. It was also nice for DD to have her wand for the entire trip. Plus the wand locations don't work as well with the full sun on the sensors.

Also the waits for those two rides don't seem so bad lately.

 

[tbholc81]

Thank you guys for the advice.

I should have mentioned, we have club rooms, so breakfast is covered and we are only doing QS inside Universal.

We also get there in the afternoon of the first day and will use that shortened day to knock out Olivander's without having to use any of our other 2 full days in the parks.

Yes, I understand we may not get on Hagrid's or Velocicoaster, but you can't plan in advance for those.

Best bet for Hagrids is to go at opening, walk directly there and wait in line before the virtual queue is open. We did this in August and got on after about a 40 min wait.

We also had dining reservations for our evening meals. Without them we would not have been able to have a sit down meal.

 

[cafetao]

And the Universal food is cheaper! (We often do split stays between the 2)

This has not been my experience. I found the food in Universal to be more expensive on my recent trip. The items in the Harry Potter area seemed especially outrageous.