New credit card guarantees. Restaurant list, policy & common questions in 1st post

[TDC Nala]

And because I'm sure not everyone will read all of the above I am going to repeat, please cool it. There's a couple of discussions here about to take the road into argument and personal attack territory.

 

[CandleontheWater]

First, not everybody gets the dining plan free - or even the dining plan, period. So whether it's free or not won't matter to many people. Next, while it may result in additional revenue, it appears the primary intent is to reduce or eliminate multiple bookings and no-shows.

Finally, when did we stop accepting responsibility for our own actions, or lack thereof? Posters keep complaining, "But this is my vacation! I don't want to be regimented as if I were at work!" Yet some of these same people made three reservations per meal, 180 days before their trips :confused All Disney wants them to do is cancel the reservations they're not going to use, at least a day ahead.

Look, changing your mind about a dining reservation at Disney is NOT a cardinal sin. There is no where in the Disney commandments that state "Thou Shat Keep all ADRS". You are on VACATION, there should be some reasonable accommodation for changes in plans (I don't consider 24 notice to be reasonable). I know that I personally plan to keep every ADR that I make, and I do about 95% of the time.

When I don't make it it is not because I am sitting back in my hotel room being all smug about denying some family access to Ohana, its because of extenuating circumstances.

Once again, if anybody has a reasonable solution for eliminating multiple bookings and no-shows without charging a fee, we - and probably Disney - are waiting to hear it.

There is a very simple solution to this: Disney needs to run a statistical analysis on the percentage of ADRs that are no shows. They need to identify a pattern over time, and look at the information based on location of restaurant, time of day, and time of year.

If they determine that a Ohana has on average a 25% no-show rate, than they can seat 20% of those tables with walk-ups, and the manager can use his discretion and expertise and management skills to deal with the remaining 5%.

This percentage can be tweaked depending on the crowd level, the dining time, all sorts of variables can be taken into account, so that the tables do not stay empty, and they do not have to charge a penalty.

Will this plan be perfect- probably not, but it would be a better way to deal with the situation than penalizing guests.

Disney has this capability, they are choosing not to use it to shift the burden of making the dining system work on the guests, and to extract more revenue from the dining system.

 

[kaytieeldr]

You are on VACATION, there should be some reasonable accommodation for changes in plans (I don't consider 24 notice to be reasonable).

But Disney does.

There is a very simple solution to this: Disney needs to run a statistical analysis on the percentage of ADRs that are no shows. They need to identify a pattern over time, and look at the information based on location of restaurant, time of day, and time of year.

Could I ask why you think they haven't already done this - and discussed various solutions, and determined the no-show fee to be the most effective method of providing ADRs to the greatest possible number of guests who will use them?

If they determine that a Ohana has on average a 25% no-show rate, than they can seat 20% of those tables with walk-ups, and the manager can use his discretion and expertise and management skills to deal with the remaining 5%.

They're not trying to accommodate just walk-ups, but also guests and locals wanting to make same day reservations.

 

[Lewisc]

here are two types of return visitors (well, many more than two... but let's just use these two boxes). "Honest" and "Abuser". The Abuser can already figure out a way around the system. That's part of their thing. The Honest doesn't think that way, or knows about it, but doesn't use it.

.

I don't agree. How about this. There are two kinds of guests. Those who plan their trip 180 days in advance. Make ADRs. Decide the exact order they plan on touring parks. You can call them planners. You could say the have OCD.

There are others who just want to enjoy their vacation. If they're tired in the morning skip breakfast. They get drenched in the park they'd like to go back to their resort rather then have dinner while soaked. Kids ate too much "fun food" on Main Street (after noon parade) and they want to skip dinner no problem. Or they decide they want to have dinner. Nothing is available.
I don't think those guests are "abusers" just because they want to cancel an ADR with short notice.

The old system was a reasonable compromise. Super popular meals required pre-payment. Things like the lua which has limited seating and is unlikely to attract walk ups. CRT which caters to kids who "dress up".

Will Disney stop overbooking? Let any tables from no-shows go to walk ups? sort of OK. Otherwise it's nothing more then a money grab.

Abusers will just book 2 (or more) ADRs the same day, one with a penalty and one without. Cell phone will have dining on speed dial. Cell phone will ring a reminder 24.5 hours in advance. They will cancel any guarantee ADR they don't plan on keeping but keep the other on "spec".

I think Disney should stop accepting ADRs 180 days in advance (exceptions for lua, etc) Consider holding back some of the capacity for either walkups or same day (or prior day for breakfast/lunch) reservations.

People don't want to waste dining plan credits. I'm on the dining plan I want a TS meal every day. I'm not using the dining plan and I can't get an ADR I'll settle for a CS meal, dine in one of the fine restaurants in the S/D or DTD. I suspect the DDP (free or otherwise) leads to more reservations on spec.

 

[Colleen27]

But I can't imagine they held the ADR tables indefinitely. So the whole "restaurant is empty because of ADR no-shows and they are turning away walk-ups" thing just doesn't compute in my brain. What....... did they hold the table forever?

Maybe before this step they needed to get more aggressive with releasing those tables within 15 minutes of the slotted time.

What I don't get is that I've read reports of people being told they were too late for their ADR and would be treated as a walk-up, and a few of people being told they couldn't be accommodated at all because they showed up late. So if that is the case, why are tables sitting empty while walk-ups are turned away? And since there is no shortage of people looking for walk-up seating, why is a 24hr policy needed? Why not 3 hours and actually seat walk-ups if that isn't enough time to refill the ADR slots? Don't we see people commenting all the time that Disney should hold back some tables for walk-ups? A no-show fee with a short cancellation window would essentially do just that.

 

[Colleen27]

The first timer calls Disney and is told "if you don't cancel in 24 hours you have to pay" They make a note and they are done. They know the rules. They aren't going to be "screwed" It's the "return visitors" who have learned all the 'tricks' on how to defeat the system.. (Book reservations in different names, book different parks etc...) Those are the one's at risk of forgetting to cancel the 3 or 4 extra reservations they made "just in case" Sorry, but I don't buy it's about the "First timers" It's about the "I don't want to change my behavior" and we will just have to do that!

First timers will know the rules and not know any different, but they don't necessary know how demanding a Disney vacation can be or how long Disney transportation can take, and most importantly - they likely won't know that Disney might make exceptions to that 24hr rule in the case of illness or something similarly unexpected and uncontrollable. And I do think that paying a cancellation fee for a meal missed because of a sick or just plain exhausted kid will leave a bad taste in those families' mouths. But a lot of Disney's changes and policies these days have given me the impression that they're not really looking to nurture repeat guests but are rather banking on there being a never-ending stream of first-timers and once-in-a-long-timers to pack the parks.

I'm at NO risk of getting hit with fees for "just in case" reservations because I don't make them. Every ADR I make, I intend to keep. I still hate this policy. We've taken 5 Disney trips as a family - on 3 of them we've had occasion to cancel a meal because someone in the party was throwing up for one reason or another. Letting pre-paid dining plan credits go unused (or used at the food court instead of a signature restaurant) and losing a chunk of very expensive vacation time to that illness is bad enough without also being hit with a $50 fee for cancelling our dinner plans.

 

[mcd2745]

There is a very simple solution to this: Disney needs to run a statistical analysis on the percentage of ADRs that are no shows. They need to identify a pattern over time, and look at the information based on location of restaurant, time of day, and time of year.

If they determine that a Ohana has on average a 25% no-show rate, than they can seat 20% of those tables with walk-ups, and the manager can use his discretion and expertise and management skills to deal with the remaining 5%.

This percentage can be tweaked depending on the crowd level, the dining time, all sorts of variables can be taken into account, so that the tables do not stay empty, and they do not have to charge a penalty.

Will this plan be perfect- probably not, but it would be a better way to deal with the situation than penalizing guests.

Disney has this capability, they are choosing not to use it to shift the burden of making the dining system work on the guests, and to extract more revenue from the dining system.

Disney already has done this. They know the average no-show percentage for each restaurant. And they also have it broken down at least by month. They know Ohana's no-show rate in January is very different than it is in July. They use this info to determine how much to "overbook" each restaurant. So to use your example, if they assume a 25% no-show rate (of course the real number has to be much lower), they overbook by 25%, leaving no room for walkups. Problem is, this leads to problems on days when guests don't act anything like their statistical averages suggest they would have. So on the day they don't get 25% no-shows...say only 8% no-shows. Now they have to fit all these people in and you start getting huge backups and wait times. This policy has to be aimed at eliminating no-shows as much as possible, to reduce the likelihood of such days. As unavoidable as it is, one thing all businesses hate is uncertainty. They all aim to make customer behavior as predictable as possible.

I don't agree. How about this. There are two kinds of guests. Those who plan their trip 180 days in advance. Make ADRs. Decide the exact order they plan on touring parks. You can call them planners. You could say the have OCD.

There are others who just want to enjoy their vacation. If they're tired in the morning skip breakfast. They get drenched in the park they'd like to go back to their resort rather then have dinner while soaked. Kids ate too much "fun food" on Main Street (after noon parade) and they want to skip dinner no problem. Or they decide they want to have dinner. Nothing is available.
I don't think those guests are "abusers" just because they want to cancel an ADR with short notice.

If that's someone's "style", that's fine. I totally understand wanting that flexibility - particulalrly on vacation. But if that's your style, don't make ADRs then. These people want to have their cake and eat it too. They want flexibility, but they also want a table always waiting for them when they decide they are ready to eat. Everything in life has trade-offs. That's just the way life works. Everyone needs to make the decision what's more important to them...the flexibility, or having reservations at the restaurants they really want.

 

[Cafeen]

I don't agree. How about this. There are two kinds of guests. Those who plan their trip 180 days in advance. Make ADRs. Decide the exact order they plan on touring parks. You can call them planners. You could say the have OCD.

There are others who just want to enjoy their vacation. If they're tired in the morning skip breakfast. They get drenched in the park they'd like to go back to their resort rather then have dinner while soaked. Kids ate too much "fun food" on Main Street (after noon parade) and they want to skip dinner no problem. Or they decide they want to have dinner. Nothing is available.
I don't think those guests are "abusers" just because they want to cancel an ADR with short notice.

I think we agree here. The abusers are NOT the ones that will get hit with the penalties. They are NOT the ones who will end up missing an ADR they had planned on going to because something came up.

The abusers will skip ADRs they had planned either by canceling 24 hours ahead of time, or using other methods to avoid the charge. In my simplified bit, everyone who does not abuse the system is an "Honest" user .

The old system was a reasonable compromise. Super popular meals required pre-payment. Things like the lua which has limited seating and is unlikely to attract walk ups. CRT which caters to kids who "dress up".

Will Disney stop overbooking? Let any tables from no-shows go to walk ups? sort of OK. Otherwise it's nothing more then a money grab.

Abusers will just book 2 (or more) ADRs the same day, one with a penalty and one without. Cell phone will have dining on speed dial. Cell phone will ring a reminder 24.5 hours in advance. They will cancel any guarantee ADR they don't plan on keeping but keep the other on "spec".

I think Disney should stop accepting ADRs 180 days in advance (exceptions for lua, etc) Consider holding back some of the capacity for either walkups or same day (or prior day for breakfast/lunch) reservations.

People don't want to waste dining plan credits. I'm on the dining plan I want a TS meal every day. I'm not using the dining plan and I can't get an ADR I'll settle for a CS meal, dine in one of the fine restaurants in the S/D or DTD. I suspect the DDP (free or otherwise) leads to more reservations on spec.

The point I will disagree is the number of days in advance. I have dealt with 90 as well as 180, and personally I do prefer the 180. Disney needs to get off their butts though to support this decision and make sure that promotions and hours are out well in time for this. This is an entirely separate issue though .

As far as the new responses of "Well, it's not that way, it's this way!". To be fair, those criticizing the system were asked "What would you do better?" Now that we've given some answers, and made sure to include those, we're told "Well, it's not like that!" /shrug. It's one or the other.

 

[dismommom]

I agree 10000000% that the window needs to be shorter. I've said this many, many, many times. IMO, the 180 day window is the #1 reason there is so much abuse of the system. You're right, with such a long window, they have created this 'fight' for ADRs that significantly outnumbers the demand for actual meals.

I completely disagree, however, that a shorter window would result in more empty tables. I believe it would definitely reduce the number of empty tables as then a much higher percentage of the reservations are being made by people who fully intend to show up.

Sometimes the park hours aren't even posted yet, or any discount room offers are not availabel yet. We love Disney but more than once we've had to replan vacations once the offer come out to the public. I'd also like to know where all these restaurants with empyt tables are. When we go to our ADR we usually have to wait a half hour to 45 minutes after our scheduled time and the restaurant is not empty. I thought Disney was a vacation spot not a military institution. We all could enjoy some variables while on vacation.

 

[CandleontheWater]

Disney already has done this. They know the average no-show percentage for each restaurant. And they also have it broken down at least by month. They know Ohana's no-show rate in January is very different than it is in July. They use this info to determine how much to "overbook" each restaurant. So to use your example, if they assume a 25% no-show rate (of course the real number has to be much lower), they overbook by 25%, leaving no room for walkups. Problem is, this leads to problems on days when guests don't act anything like their statistical averages suggest they would have. So on the day they don't get 25% no-shows...say only 8% no-shows. Now they have to fit all these people in and you start getting huge backups and wait times. This policy has to be aimed at eliminating no-shows as much as possible, to reduce the likelihood of such days. As unavoidable as it is, one thing all businesses hate is uncertainty. They all aim to make customer behavior as predictable as possible.

if Disney does their statistics right, and constantly tweaks the formulas, than they won't have 8% walk ups when they predicted 25%. Its science

How many of us are familiar with touring plans from the unofficial guide, they work the same way, using statistical models to predict crowd behavior and are usually quite accurate. Of course there are going to be days when your wait times are a little more due to unforeseen circumstances, but those are the exception and not the norm.

Right now they often have trouble with properly managing their ADR system, and I haven't seen any articles or any evidence that they are using statistical models to their advantage. If anyone has any they would like to share, I would really be interested, because I am fascinated by things like that.

What really gets me is that Disney is having trouble with the dining system, I think we can all agree on that, and instead of working on it in house, they are (literally) passing the buck to the guests. Now we are the ones who are going to have to police the system, or pay the penalty.

I know there are people out there who will never miss an ADR, but there are others, honest people with the best intentions, who will be harmed by this new policy. The truth is that any of us could be slapped with a no-show fine, even the most contentious of us could be caught up in circumstances that would lead to canceling an ADR less than 24 hrs in advance. Maybe I'm a bleeding heart, but I don't want to see people get penalized when I believe that Disney can (and should be the ones to) fix this problem.

 

[MSLRAC]

I'm looking forward to the threads a few months from now when people are gettning hit with these charges.... I bet that many of those on here talking about how wonderful this plan is will rethink it when it actually takes practice.

This is a money maker. They may give away free dining but now people who take it and miss an adr it's costing. It is definately not going to be free anymore!

I too am looking forward to those threads and wondering just how quickly some people's tune will change. It's easy to be on one side of the fence now but things happen and even the most accountable of a person doesn't always have 24 hours to cancel an ADR.

I agree that something needs to be done about people making multiple ADRs and then not showing up but I just don't know if this is it. I see too many ways around this and I suspect that it will be the people with the best of intentions that suddenly become ill, injured, etc that will end up paying.

I am a planner and I have no issue knowing where or when we want to eat during our next trip but this new policy has really gotten me second guessing our ADRs, the DxDP and even staying on site. We fully intent on going to each and every one of our ADRs but we have 3 kids and I know that things happen...DS got sick our first day there last trip.

Just knowing what we went through with DS, I have a real issue with the 24 hours and being charged if all of our party doesn't show up. Luckily, we'll have a few months of this policy being implemented before we have to make our ADRs so we can see how it's actually going to work before we decide.

I love all things Disney but depending on how this actually plays out, this might totally change our trip.

 

[Jestocost]

if Disney does their statistics right, and constantly tweaks the formulas, than they won't have 8% walk ups when they predicted 25%. Its science

Over the long run, yes, on a given day or even for a few days running, that's not how the "science" works. If you flip a coin, there's a 50-50 chance over the long run that you will flip heads half of the time and tails half of the time. That doesn't mean that you won't sometimes flip five, 10 or more of one in a row, however.

Same thing with no shows at a restaurant. Even with the best data in the world, short-term variance will result in potentially significant deviations from historical norms when you look at any given day or meal in isolation. You could remove a lot of that variance if you modeled dynamically to account for things like weather, but that would have to be done on a same-day basis or just a few days in advance. As a result, it could help a manager with a decision about how many walk ups to seat that day, but it doesn't help at all as far as adjusting the number of advance bookings.

 

[canoe86]

The option is to not eat on Disney property. The rules are the rules, you can vote on them with your money and your feet.

I'm surprised and yet, not so surprised at some of the responses.

Lets take the sick kid scenario, oft mentioned in this thread.You can make an advanced reservation, with a 24 hours cancellation policy KNOWING that anything can happen when you have kids. ( I have 4, btw) If something happens after the cut off line, you pay the fee.NOW, if you know the fee in advance, you are not REQUIRED to make an advance reservation. You could assume your kids will be sick, not make the reservation and try to walk up to every restaurant.

A reservation is sort of a insurance policy. Make the ADR to insure you have a table at a certain time. The cost of that service is a 24 hour cancellation policy.

 

[Euphoria027]

First, not everybody gets the dining plan free - or even the dining plan, period. So whether it's free or not won't matter to many people. Next, while it may result in additional revenue, it appears the primary intent is to reduce or eliminate multiple bookings and no-shows.

Finally, when did we stop accepting responsibility for our own actions, or lack thereof? Posters keep complaining, "But this is my vacation! I don't want to be regimented as if I were at work!" Yet some of these same people made three reservations per meal, 180 days before their trips :confused All Disney wants them to do is cancel the reservations they're not going to use, at least a day ahead.

Once again, if anybody has a reasonable solution for eliminating multiple bookings and no-shows without charging a fee, we - and probably Disney - are waiting to hear it.

You are AWESOME. The only thing you didn't put in here that has come up a hilarious number of times is that Disney is not at fault if you book the Deluxe Dining Plan and aren't hungry (shocking!), that's not their problem either. And that isn't a personal attack on anyone... I just feel like at that point you're getting awfully case by case specific about why this plan is a bust.

 

[mcd2745]

if Disney does their statistics right, and constantly tweaks the formulas, than they won't have 8% walk ups when they predicted 25%. Its science

Human behavior is a science.....but far from an exact science.

 

[Lewisc]

If that's someone's "style", that's fine. I totally understand wanting that flexibility - particulalrly on vacation. But if that's your style, don't make ADRs then. These people want to have their cake and eat it too. They want flexibility, but they also want a table always waiting for them when they decide they are ready to eat. Everything in life has trade-offs. That's just the way life works. Everyone needs to make the decision what's more important to them...the flexibility, or having reservations at the restaurants they really want.

We're not talking about fine dining. We're talking about dinner on a vacation. People want to skip a planned dinner. Family got soaked. Hot. Sweaty family. Wants to go back to resort. Overtired kids won't be good. Kids with a stomach ache won't be good. All somewhat legitimate reasons. Giving families a financial incentive to show up to dinner with a screaming kid might bother other guests.

Disney could allocate a certain number of tables for walkups.

The point I will disagree is the number of days in advance. I have dealt with 90 as well as 180, and personally I do prefer the 180. Disney needs to get off their butts though to support this decision and make sure that promotions and hours are out well in time for this. This is an entirely separate issue though .

As far as the new responses of "Well, it's not that way, it's this way!". To be fair, those criticizing the system were asked "What would you do better?" Now that we've given some answers, and made sure to include those, we're told "Well, it's not like that!" /shrug. It's one or the other.

I have an issue with a system that suggests people need to make vacation reservations 6 months in advance. A family which plans a vacation 60-90 days in advance should have a shot of getting an ADR to a popular character meal.

The option is to not eat on Disney property. The rules are the rules, you can vote on them with your money and your feet.

I'm surprised and yet, not so surprised at some of the responses.

Lets take the sick kid scenario, oft mentioned in this thread.You can make an advanced reservation, with a 24 hours cancellation policy KNOWING that anything can happen when you have kids. ( I have 4, btw) If something happens after the cut off line, you pay the fee.NOW, if you know the fee in advance, you are not REQUIRED to make an advance reservation. You could assume your kids will be sick, not make the reservation and try to walk up to every restaurant.

A reservation is sort of a insurance policy. Make the ADR to insure you have a table at a certain time. The cost of that service is a 24 hour cancellation policy.

Disney doesn't set aside tables for walkups. The choice is frequently make an ADR or skip the restaurant. I don't want to be in a restaurant with screaming kids of parents who don't want to pay a cancellation fee.

 

[MELSMICE]

It seems as though there are a lot of posters that say they make their ADR's 180 in advance. It's those same posters that say "it's tough to plan a Disney vacation, knowing how you're going to feel or what you want to do on that day at that time". Very contradictory.

I, personally, like the policy. We do not plan 180 days out. Heck, we don't even plan 7 days out. We are very frequent visitors. We have done our fair share of dining at Disney restaurants & have never been overly impressed with any of them, with the exception of the California Grill. When we first started doing Disney quite frequently our trips would consist of park day/pool day/park day/pool day, so I guess we never experienced the over stimulation/exhaustion. That is not my idea of a vacation. Now they are pool days everyday with parks in the evenings for a few hours.

We always rent a car & usually eat off site, however, on occasion we may decide to try a Disney restaurant. We may be sitting at the pool & I'll call dining to try and get an ADR. Sometimes we can get something, sometimes we can't. Not a big deal but I do believe if there is a stricter policy with regard to booking & canceling we may have a better shot at being able to get a table that evening.

We'll continue to travel the way we enjoy. No ADR's, rent a car, eat off site usually and occasionally try to get an ADR. I won't have to worry about the cancellation policy because that's not the way we vacation.

I still stand by my opinion that I think it is a good policy. I think it will make more tables readily available for walk up guests. There are some "first timers" who don't plan as much as others, so this may actually be a benefit to them. They'll be able to experience Disney dining without making an ADR or worrying about a cancellation fee.

 

[eliza61]

if Disney does their statistics right, and constantly tweaks the formulas, than they won't have 8% walk ups when they predicted 25%. Its science




I know there are people out there who will never miss an ADR, but there are others, honest people with the best intentions, who will be harmed by this new policy. The truth is that any of us could be slapped with a no-show fine, even the most contentious of us could be caught up in circumstances that would lead to canceling an ADR less than 24 hrs in advance. Maybe I'm a bleeding heart, but I don't want to see people get penalized when I believe that Disney can (and should be the ones to) fix this problem.

Ding, ding ding,

I am constantly amazed that wdw, a major tourist destination, in this technological age can't do very simple stuff that any other restaurant the world over manages to do. LOL!!

Disney is doing this for cash and cash only. The most this will do will maybe ease the walk up traffic. AT most. Basically it will get a lot of first timers who will end up paying the fee because anyone who is remotely disney savvy and has a kid with the latest cell phone will very easily get around this system.
It will not stop anyone from double booking (wouldn't stop me in the least, flame away) or make those hard to get adrs any easier to get.

Im not mad at disney, they're job is to increase revenue, I'm just not buying the line that they can't solve this supposedly rash of "empty tables" from no shows.

 

[WDW1979]

I'm not saying it won't have any effect, but my guess is the reduced number of no-show reservations will not have the full effect that some might hope on making things easier in terms of getting seating with no reservation (i.e. walk-ups). I think that over the years Disney must have employed some sort of statistical analysis where they can judge that at restaurant X on a Friday in August, the number of no-shows will be within a range around X%, and Disney probably has used that knowledge to overbook. If they have a certain level of confidence based on past experience that only 70% of people will show up for their reservations at Crystal Palace for breakfast on a Friday in August, then I am sure they will overbook. Disney is not going to say "well, 100% of our dining slots are now taken, and even though we know only about 70% of them are going to show up, we will not adjust for that because we like to lose money".

They will overbook less now with the new policy, but only because they know more people will show up for reservations and so Disney will be able to adjust their statistics in terms of how much less to overbook, not necessarily because they want to make more slots available for walk-ups.

 

[collegejunkie]

so what happens if you cancel the CC that you gave when making these ressies under the new rule?