Renting a wheelchair for the first time, how do you stop it from being taken

[cottontail]

Hello:

I am in need of a hip replacement, but coming to wdw and will need to rent a wheelchair. Some of the time in the parks I want to park it and walk myself into the rides if it is not too long a line, how do I know that someone is not going to take the rental wheelchair. We are not renting from wdw, but looking to rent from an outside agency for the whole 9 days there.

Deb.

 

[krisnme]

I had this same fear when DS first used a wheelchair. I would take a bike lock with us and lock the wheel to the frame of the chair so the rear wheel cannot turn (never lock it to a pole, the CM's get really unhappy if they need to move it!) After a while I stopped locking it, and after years of trips, have never had a problem with the chair being taken. If you are worried, use a bike lock, but also tie a bandanna or bright ribbon to the handles so people don't accidently take your chair, mistaking it for their own. Also, most lines are mainstreamed, so if you want to walk, you can take the chair and just push it. That way if the line is halted for some reason, or longer than you expect, you will have a place to sit.

 

[Mary976]

Many of the outside rentals I've seen include a card for the back of the chair where you write your name..."this belongs to Mary" or something similar. In many years of traveling to WDW, DD's personal chair has never been taken and I've never heard anything on this board about chairs disappearing.

The one thing I will say is that if you leave your chair near the strollers, sometimes CMs will "rearrange" them to neaten them up and it might not be in the exact same spot as before.

Mary