Is DCL still not putting your dining room rotation on room keys?

[MomOTwins]

I will offer three thoughts in defense of the app.

It was really great having the table number right there along with rotation. I used to forget that a lot and it was one less thing to think about on vacation. Plus allowed us to get into the restaurant a bit faster on the first night as we didn't have to wait for someone to look up our table.

On our Wish cruise we were waitlisted for main dining and a spot opened up on day 2. Was really efficient how they sent us a message in the app (no need to check back in the room for voicemail) then updated the dining time and table # right there in the app. I imagine they used to burn through quite a few replacement cards in the old days when people would make a dining change.

Having the little reminder "ding" my phone when I had dinner, a show, or a favorite-d event like trivia com up was great. I'm not super punctual by nature and on vacation when time is flying it's even harder for me to keep track of where I need to be and when. Letting the phone do the work for me was great.

I admit it does sound nice to have a job where you could lock up a phone for week and never check email, but if I did that I wouldn't have a job to come back to. Admittedly my job is one where we often have client emergencies that can't wait, but I do think especially these days with people working remotely more employers are expecting their employees to be reachable on vacation. Add that to the people who want their phones to stay in touch with family/contact dog sitter/take photos/read books/browse social media/read the news, and I'll wager that the people who 100% unplug on vacation are in the very small minority. No decision Disney makes is going to be ideal for every single guest but for most guests, the phone is not a big inconvenience.

 

[71 Truck]

So if you lock up your phone, does that mean you carry a camera? one of us always has our phone to capture those rare character moments on deck 4, or that perfect sunset. Im not sure I could carry a camera again. Plus for that moment of hunger and think, what’s on the menu for tonight. I don’t pay for internet, so I don’t get emails. Good riddens to the wave phones. Messaging on my iPhone is much easier. We’ve cruised 7 times since cruising returned in 2021 and since everything was on our phones, including menus back then, contacting guest services, adding tips. We’ve pretty much are use to it now. At least we get real menus now and we no longer have to get in an online queue to get off the ship while in port….that was the worse queue system ever.

Yes, I carry a camera al though it is only my wife and I so not so interested in getting pictures with the characters as much.
I like to take sunrise pictures and pictures around the ship with as few people in them as I can. I will get up at 6am to do this. I also like to take sunset pictures and my camera takes much better pictures then my phone.

I like to lock my phone up after we call back home once on the ship and be done with it for the week. On our last cruise we were in St Thomas so we were able to call home to say hi then the phones were back in the safe till Saturday morning.

 

[n2mm]

I will offer three thoughts in defense of the app.

It was really great having the table number right there along with rotation. I used to forget that a lot and it was one less thing to think about on vacation. Plus allowed us to get into the restaurant a bit faster on the first night as we didn't have to wait for someone to look up our table.

On our Wish cruise we were waitlisted for main dining and a spot opened up on day 2. Was really efficient how they sent us a message in the app (no need to check back in the room for voicemail) then updated the dining time and table # right there in the app. I imagine they used to burn through quite a few replacement cards in the old days when people would make a dining change.

Having the little reminder "ding" my phone when I had dinner, a show, or a favorite-d event like trivia com up was great. I'm not super punctual by nature and on vacation when time is flying it's even harder for me to keep track of where I need to be and when. Letting the phone do the work for me was great.

I admit it does sound nice to have a job where you could lock up a phone for week and never check email, but if I did that I wouldn't have a job to come back to. Admittedly my job is one where we often have client emergencies that can't wait, but I do think especially these days with people working remotely more employers are expecting their employees to be reachable on vacation. Add that to the people who want their phones to stay in touch with family/contact dog sitter/take photos/read books/browse social media/read the news, and I'll wager that the people who 100% unplug on vacation are in the very small minority. No decision Disney makes is going to be ideal for every single guest but for most guests, the phone is not a big inconvenience.

I agree. I like touching the heart to make a movie or trivia a favorite and getting a ping reminder. We are seniors and totally comfortable with our phones. No internet onboard unless it’s my window to book a dvc room. dcl wants you to do it all on the app. Heck you even have to book your placeholder through the app now. I often miss announcements from the cruise director during midday, but can see if new things get added to the app.

 

[Kennywood]

I go on vacation to "unplug". I really hate that all cruise lines are forcing us to use apps now. I like putting my phone in the safe and not having to feel connected all the time.

 

[Flossbolna]

Thanks for this info. I was going to plan to visit to Aulani next year. If I have to be on a phone and on an app, I will not be traveling there.

It is not as bad at Aulani. Most events were indeed published on the TV. And a stay at Aulani is still far less driven by scheduled activities than a cruise. We managed to have a great time there, I just thought it was so customer unfriendly to move one aspect to an app that then is not even available for all guests.

 

[nancipants]

It's probably the Elder Millennial in me, but I really cannot fathom locking away my phone. I use it for too many things unrelated to the internet.

 

[Kwami]

Thanks for this info. I was going to plan to visit to Aulani next year. If I have to be on a phone and on an app, I will not be traveling there.

The Aulani app is mostly useless. The map doesn't track your location and it's not well made, so it's not very useful for navigating. The activities are almost all listed on the Aulani website, too, and you can also book dining reservations there. If you have MagicBands, then you can use those to pay at shops and restaurants and to open your room door. If not, then you can use your room keys.

I think character appearances might only be on the app and I couldn't even always get that to work.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

You're now able to get a copy of the daily activities, correct?

From what I understand, it's hit or miss if the basic activities sheet is available. Some people report being able to get it at Guest Services, others say their room host get it for them. It's also reported that it wasn't available.

 

[Mommb]

You can cruise with very minimal use of the DCL app. If you check the app at the start of each day, you can make a paper list of everything you want to do that day, the time, and the location, then lock your phone away. You do run the risk of missing changes that are made to events and locations during the day, but that happened with paper navigators too.

The only things I did on my Fantasy cruise last month that absolutely required the app were finding my dining location the first night and purchasing a placeholder for a future cruise. I am guessing that if you truly couldn't or wouldn't use a phone, Guest Services could have told you your dining location.

I thought I would dislike carrying my phone around, but I did like some of the benefits. I liked getting reminders for activities I flagged, messaging my family on the ship rather than leaving notes in the cabin as we used to do, and checking our stateroom account without having to go to Guest Service for a printout.

I thought of my phone as a digital version of the Navigator. On previous cruises, I either carried the Navigator around with me, stopped by the room to look at it, or looked at a copy by Guest Services. On this cruise, having my phone was like carrying the Navigator. It wasn't necessary, but it was helpful.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I thought of my phone as a digital version of the Navigator

Oh, I understand that. But you don't have to worry when/if you lay the paper navigator down somewhere and lose it. I find looking up stuff on the app Navigator more cumbersome than on a paper one.

And, to get back to the original question, how difficult would it be to put the dining rotation back on the KTTW card? It's certainly much easier to look at your KTTW card then have to call up the info on the app.

 

[Kwami]

And, to get back to the original question, how difficult would it be to put the dining rotation back on the KTTW card? It's certainly much easier to look at your KTTW card then have to call up the info on the app.

The original excuse for removing the dining information was that it would reduce the work levels for staff, which was necessary because of the staff shortages. I suppose that might be true in some small way. If you change your dining rotation, then you might want guest services to print you a new card. That does take more than zero minutes!

But, I can't imagine that this was so much of a burden that they had to make a change. Similarly, I can't imagine that they're saving so many cards and ink that they had to make a change. So... maybe they just wanted to nudge us further into the app?

I don't know.

 

[MomOTwins]

The original excuse for removing the dining information was that it would reduce the work levels for staff, which was necessary because of the staff shortages.

Probably because of all the first-timers at guest services who wouldn’t understand the card and had to ask about dinner.

 

[Kwami]

Probably because of all the first-timers at guest services who wouldn’t understand the card and had to ask about dinner.

I somehow figured out dinner without asking guest services, but I guess I don't remember how... Did they explain it on the old navigators? Did my stateroom host explain it? Someone somewhere explained it!

 

[tvguy]

I will offer three thoughts in defense of the app.

It was really great having the table number right there along with rotation. I used to forget that a lot and it was one less thing to think about on vacation. Plus allowed us to get into the restaurant a bit faster on the first night as we didn't have to wait for someone to look up our table.

On our Wish cruise we were waitlisted for main dining and a spot opened up on day 2. Was really efficient how they sent us a message in the app (no need to check back in the room for voicemail) then updated the dining time and table # right there in the app. I imagine they used to burn through quite a few replacement cards in the old days when people would make a dining change.

Having the little reminder "ding" my phone when I had dinner, a show, or a favorite-d event like trivia com up was great. I'm not super punctual by nature and on vacation when time is flying it's even harder for me to keep track of where I need to be and when. Letting the phone do the work for me was great.

I admit it does sound nice to have a job where you could lock up a phone for week and never check email, but if I did that I wouldn't have a job to come back to. Admittedly my job is one where we often have client emergencies that can't wait, but I do think especially these days with people working remotely more employers are expecting their employees to be reachable on vacation. Add that to the people who want their phones to stay in touch with family/contact dog sitter/take photos/read books/browse social media/read the news, and I'll wager that the people who 100% unplug on vacation are in the very small minority. No decision Disney makes is going to be ideal for every single guest but for most guests, the phone is not a big inconvenience.

Valid opinion. But not mine. Everything used to be on the KTTW card including your table number. I don't enable notification dings when I am at home, no way I'm doing that on vacation.
We could drink a lot of beers talking about whether an employer should contact an employee on vacation. However, I will add that every instance I dealt with where an employee was unreachable on vacation, every issue that came up got handled without them.

 

[71 Truck]

From what I understand, it's hit or miss if the basic activities sheet is available. Some people report being able to get it at Guest Services, others say their room host get it for them. It's also reported that it wasn't available.

We were on the Fantasy for a Nov/Dec cruise in 2022. When we got on the ship and met our state room host we asked about getting the basic activity sheet. I told him I did not have a problem picking it up myself however he insisted he would take care of it. He did tell us it would not be available till after 8am on the morning it was for unlike past navigators that were placed in the room the night before.
We would get up, go to breakfast and by the time we returned our room was clean and we had the navigator for the day. I hope Disney continues doing this. There were a lot of people I saw especially on sea days walking around with them.
With that said there was almost nothing left on the bed paperwork wise for the evening turn down like there was in the past.

 

[Dug720]

If/when you're on a ship and a port day becomes a sea day (can happen at other places than Castaway) the app allows you to know real-time when the CD and entertainment team adds activities in as soon as they do rather than having to haunt the guest services area for papers put out to see what has been added in. MUCH easier!

 

[disneygeek401]

I personally don't get the hate for the app, I enjoy being able to have everything at my fingertips. The app can also tell you when activities repeat, which is nice for planning purposes.

 

[n2mm]

I personally don't get the hate for the app, I enjoy being able to have everything at my fingertips. The app can also tell you when activities repeat, which is nice for planning purposes.

I agree. When I’ve got down time once onboard I go through the app and heart/favorite all the movies I want to see and repeating throughout the entire cruise, then I can choose the best times for my schedule. I do the same for trivia and I can then compare similar times to see conflicting times. Of course our deck 4, blue chair nap times is when we’re looking at the menu for dinner. That’s is not a feature of the paper navigator. I don’t miss the paper ones at all. But we returned to sailing after the startup in august 2021 and have cruised 7 times since and are use to the changes. I’m amazed how many hurdles we’ve had to jump since the august 2021 return.

 

[71 Truck]

I personally don't get the hate for the app, I enjoy being able to have everything at my fingertips. The app can also tell you when activities repeat, which is nice for planning purposes.

For my wife and I it's not as much about the app it's about having to carry our phones with us. We like to check in with family on the embarkation day and as soon as we sail away the phones are turned off and in the safe they go.
On our November/December 2022 cruise we had a stop in St Thomas. We were able to call home while on the island then once back on the ship back to the safes the phones went.
For us it's more about disconnecting.

Our last cruise before the shut down was November/December 2019. We tried the app but it never worked properly for us, It kept logging us out and we missed things.
Some one like my mother who is 80 and not a tech kind of person would be completely lost.
I am glad they went back to a basic kind of navigator. For us we look at what we want to do,fold it up and in the pocket it goes.

 

[Bonnie1222]

I go on vacation to "unplug". I really hate that all cruise lines are forcing us to use apps now. I like putting my phone in the safe and not having to feel connected all the time.

You are not the only one! We actually use and old phone and the only thing on it is the DCL app. But still hate being teathered to it.