Park Hopping Fail - Not Allowed Entry for Liberty Tree Reservation

[disneygirlsng]

I just gotta say, I respect that you acknowledged your mistake and didn't use this as a rant against Disney (as many others often do). Rather using it as a helpful lesson learned and to warn others not to make the same mistake.
Glad you enjoyed your dinner!!

 

[MKMK]

@MKMK did they charge you the no show penalty? Or did they waive that?

They waived the no show which we appreciated.

 

[DreamsCrusher]

You really should correct the title of this post. It can't be a "Park Hopping Fail" if it was because some folks didn't hop.

 

[Dug720]

You really should correct the title of this post. It can't be a "Park Hopping Fail" if it was because some folks didn't hop.

Bingo! It was a "User Error on Park Hopping Fail".

 

[MATTERHORN]

Yeah, that is the park hopping rule! Have to enter park of original reservation first. But it seems they don't make it KNOWN so much! Sorry. I knew because I specifically asked!

 

[gharter]

Thank you. That is why I posted our experience, so that others could learn from our mistake. This is a new type of logistical planning I hadn't completely investigated before we arrived.

Its unfortunate that it happened, but Disney has been very clear about their policy for Park Hopping as soon as they announced park hopping would return.

 

[Pumbaa_]

Thank you for sharing your experience. I think that many are not understanding how hopping in the new world works. That you actually have to enter the park where you reserved your space before heading to the next park.

 

[Chumpieboy]

A cautionary tale for annual pass holders trying out the new park hopping rules for the first time. We had park reservations at Epcot. We went to Epcot and then to Magic Kingdom for our dinner reservation at Liberty Tree. We were denied entry into the Magic Kingdom because not everyone in our party had entered Epcot first. Guest Services cancelled our Liberty Tree reservations and we were left with no dinner reservations. To add to the frustration, the app said there were no reservations on property available until after 9 pm. We figured out if we kept refreshing the app, a reservation would pop up and if you grabbed it fast enough you could get it. We heard others expressing frustration at the lack of available dining reservations. We have been pass holders for years and finding any dining reservations (let alone your favorite restaurant) seemed to be harder than it was during the busiest of holiday times. The story ends well as after refreshing many times, we finally got a reservation at resort restaurant we had never tried and it was a nice meal.

Are those not the posted rules? What's different about your situation that I'm not getting?

* only one park reservation per day
* must use the first reservation before hopping
* if you didn't otherwise have a MK park reservation you can't enter MK
* dining reservations do not guarantee park entry

 

[Farro]

Oh my gosh! They admitted it was their mistake, move on!

Thanks for info OP!

 

[GADisneyDad14]

OP - I appreciate your experience report. While the park hopping rules are clear, they do take a little getting used to in practice, especially for APs and frequent guests who may be used to moving around property at will.

I could see something like that easily happening to us. We often have days where we adjust the plan on the fly - some stay at the pool for an unplanned resort day, some hit the park as intended, or whatever the case may be. It’s a lot easier to sit here from afar and think through any unintended consequences of park dining plans that evening than it is in the throes of a WDW vacation - so it seems to me a very easy mistake to make.

Your post will help me keep things like this in mind on our future trips.

 

[MKMK]

OP - I appreciate your experience report. While the park hopping rules are clear, they do take a little getting used to in practice, especially for APs and frequent guests who may be used to moving around property at will.

I could see something like that easily happening to us. We often have days where we adjust the plan on the fly - some stay at the pool for an unplanned resort day, some hit the park as intended, or whatever the case may be. It’s a lot easier to sit here from afar and think through any unintended consequences of park dining plans that evening than it is in the throes of a WDW vacation - so it seems to me a very easy mistake to make.

Your post will help me keep things like this in mind on our future trips.

Thank you. First, I want to thank you for all your amazing posts thru the years.... whenever I see a GADisneyDad14 post, I know there will be trusted, excellent advice to share. Would like to think I am a decent planner, but we did exactly what you described, changed our plans on the fly and being new to this process, didn't thoroughly think thru the implications.

 

[gatour]

OP, thanks for the info.

Was the ADR under the name of one of the people who did not go to Epcot?

 

[MKMK]

The reservation was under my name and I did go to Epcot with other members of our party,

 

[Farro]

The reservation was under my name and I did go to Epcot with other members of our party,

See, that's weird. Your ADR should not have been cancelled if you did follow the rules. Some of you could have gone on to your ADR! Just not the ones who never went to Epcot. Did they ask you if you wanted to cancel first?

The only other thing I can think is MK was closed due to capacity, therefore hopping was just not allowed, period.

 

[supersnoop]

Your ADR should not have been cancelled if you did follow the rules.

I must be reading that differently. I'm reading "they were nice enough to cancel the reservation without charging me the no-show fee" as opposed to "they wouldn't even let half of my party in to dine." I don't think the OP wanted to dine with only part of the party.

 

[Jennasis]

Yeah...pretty sure the OP didn't want to split up their dining party and keep the LTT res. They wanted to eat with their whole group, hence the move to Trattoria.

 

[MKMK]

I must be reading that differently. I'm reading "they were nice enough to cancel the reservation without charging me the no-show fee" as opposed to "they wouldn't even let half of my party in to dine." I don't think the OP wanted to dine with only part of the party.

You are correct. My husband didn’t go to Epcot and we didn’t want to eat without him.

 

[Farro]

Okay that makes sense. I thought they just cancelled it automatically!

 

[Blondie58]

New expectations due to Covid = not fun. Too many people are taking park reservations and not using them as they change their minds on what they want to do. No issue as we all have last minute changes about what we want to do. Butthe system does keep otheres from getting into a park as capacity appears to have been met. I bet there were folks that did not show up to MK that day. Had they cancelled you could have picked their unused park reservation and had dinner as scheduled. Nice that the CM cancelled for you so you did not get charged. Looking forward to things returning to normal with fast passes, park hopper, monorails open, long hours, shows, concierge services, etc, etc.