System still a mess

[Brett Wyman]

We weren't told, but I suspect it was a major change to the back end systems - and a major change to backend systems is often disruptive to service. Honestly, we didn't do ourselves any favors when we speculated on bug fixes and feature additions (those don't involve days of downtime).

Some third party DVC availability sites(that aren't allowed to be mentioned here) are no longer working. They can no longer "crawl" the DVC database to provide the availability. So I think one of the updates was to shut those guys down.

 

[AnnaKristoff2013]

Yes, the site functions much worse today than it did two years ago. Not saying it was perfect two years ago, but their entire customer service apparatus is VERY disappointing at this point.

I mean, the fact that the average wait time to call every aspect of Disney World Customer service (not just DVC member services) has been like 2 hours **for the last 18 months** is really disgraceful.

 

[RoseGold]

Some third party DVC availability sites(that aren't allowed to be mentioned here) are no longer working. They can no longer "crawl" the DVC database to provide the availability. So I think one of the updates was to shut those guys down.

Wouldn't need those sites if the DVC site just freaking worked.

 

[RoseGold]

They can do some amazing things within the parks/rides but can't seem to design an efficient website. I gotta believe that they could if they wanted to.

Oh they have a very excellent website if you want to book a cash hotel room.

 

[RoseGold]

I figured out the update guys! Your room checkout screen now times out after an hour.

So if you’re on hold with member services to borrow four points, you just completely lose it AND your waitlist doesn’t pick it up. Awesome!

 

[CvilleDiane]

I figured out the update guys! Your room checkout screen now times out after an hour.

So if you’re on hold with member services to borrow four points, you just completely lose it AND your waitlist doesn’t pick it up. Awesome!

Oh no! I hope your waitlist is confirmed later today!! With the manual piece it can take a bit. Fingers crossed!

 

[crisi]

Some third party DVC availability sites(that aren't allowed to be mentioned here) are no longer working. They can no longer "crawl" the DVC database to provide the availability. So I think one of the updates was to shut those guys down.

I think one of the effects was to shut those guys down. Its unlikely that was any sort of requirement. I really suspect it was a completely unanticipated side effect of back end architecture changes.

I really suspect that this was a step to implementing microservices, in which case, we are likely in for a bumpy ride for a long time while Disney scales a steep learning curve. That would be supported by "scraping" 3rd party apps no longer working.

 

[crisi]

Oh they have a very excellent website if you want to book a cash hotel room.

There are ample good "off the shelf" packages for hotel rooms - you can plug in the SAP package into your existing ERP (Disney uses SAP). The software market to specifically manage timeshares is smaller - and while you can use hotel software, its going to require a good deal more customization. (The timeshare software will require customization - timeshares have a wide variety of different rules - room booking at a hotel is easy - I've developed that software.

 

[RoseGold]

Using our points within the rules they set is their primary job. Their job is to run and book these properties.

Between the disaster of a website and the phone wait times, I would say they are failing pretty spectacularly. The website has been an issue for a long time, it's not like this is new. I'm particularly concerned if the borrowing "glitch" is targeting resale buyers. I know it made me miss my booking today.

 

[crisi]

Using our points within the rules they set is their primary job. Their job is to run and book these properties.

Between the disaster of a website and the phone wait times, I would say they are failing pretty spectacularly. The website has been an issue for a long time, it's not like this is new. I'm particularly concerned if the borrowing "glitch" is targeting resale buyers. I know it made me miss my booking today.

I guess I joined before there was a website to book on and when you generally had to wait 20 minutes on hold mid day (longer if you called first thing) to secure a reservation. I used to spend lunch on the phone to book - because I wouldn't want to spend first thing in the morning time. And the borrowing glitch is not purposefully targeting resale buyers - its an unforeseen issue - Disney would not let a requirement get through that would cause legal problems if it were found in discovery.

But I'm not making excuses for them. What I am saying is that we contributed to setting expectations that this downtime was about fixing things for us. There was no indication that this was ever going to make anything better for the membership. Now we are disappointed because not only were our expectations not met (ones WE set for ourselves), but whatever they did made our issues worse. And I'm trying to set the expectation that these issues may take months to resolve completely - and if Disney IS moving to microservices and DOES NOT have a complete and total handle on what they are doing (and Disney IT has been a joke for decades) - expect more oopsies. Make your decisions to keep your DVC accordingly - resale prices are really good right now and my own expectation is that the website will continue to have sub par performance and Disney will continue to under staff Member Services. If I'm wrong, I get to be pleasantly surprised rather than disappointed.

 

[prouddaddycdn]

The system is basically useless at present if you want to modify an existing reservation. I keep refreshing availability and have rooms pop up that I try to book only to get the dwarfes error screen repeatedly. I refresh my search and rooms disappear and new ones appear and the same thing happens. Refresh yet again and the original list of rooms are back and still get the dang dwarfes. Spend 1 - 2 hours on hold at a time with customer service to only learn that all these rooms are apparently phantom rooms and don't really exist. What a mess. Very disappointed as of late with the whole DVC experience.

 

[paults]

Like I said before they went on a Disney cruise that weekend and didn't work on the website.
Now I think maybe that was a booze cruise and when they got back they thought the website was upgraded and left it alone.

 

[RoseGold]

I guess I joined before there was a website to book on and when you generally had to wait 20 minutes on hold mid day (longer if you called first thing) to secure a reservation. I used to spend lunch on the phone to book - because I wouldn't want to spend first thing in the morning time. And the borrowing glitch is not purposefully targeting resale buyers - its an unforeseen issue - Disney would not let a requirement get through that would cause legal problems if it were found in discovery.

It's not the 90s. This is a luxury product that is sold as such. A functional website was a reasonable expectation a decade ago. Combine the pile of something website with over an hour wait on the phone, and this is not what I bought into. And it just made me lose my room this morning.

If any other hotel chain ran like this, they wouldn't be getting my money.

 

[we"reofftoneverland]

It's not the 90s. This is a luxury product that is sold as such. A functional website was a reasonable expectation a decade ago. Combine the pile of something website with over an hour wait on the phone, and this is not what I bought into. And it just made me lose my room this morning.

If any other hotel chain ran like this, they wouldn't be getting my money.

Exactly. Don’t they do any “industry standard” research? And what happened to Disney setting the standard for customer service. At this point they are just bottom barrel. They might want to teach their employees the basics of customer service instead of this:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/tech...ning-documents/ar-BB1gvDHj#image=BB1gvDHj_2|3

 

[n2mm]

Omg, it’s like the system is circling the bowl. It’s so unstable. I’m afraid if I try to use it, my points will get eaten and I have to call. Which is a nightmare

 

[Orsino]

At least Disney had the common sense to buy their way to streaming technology for Disney+. Can you imagine the disaster if Disney tried to build it themselves?
Can't Disney buy a tech company to do their IT stuff? Oh wait, maybe they did but just bought a bad one.

 

[MillauFr]

I think they're limited by the Windows 95 platform they use. I'm only half kidding. It's not their IT people that is failing Disney. It's Disney's refusal to spend money and move into the 21st Century with their systems.

No they are using MSDos 3.1. They really need to outsource their IT systems to Amazon

 

[New Mouse]

Disney would not let a requirement get through that would cause legal problems if it were found in discovery.

So thats not how Disney legal works. They do a cost benefit analysis... if we let this legal problem slide, how much will it cost us to pay someone off in the end? How much will it cost us to fix it now? Will we lose future sales?

Once that determination is made, thats how they determine to proceed.

There is a reason Disney pays off so many people who sue them.

 

[supersnoop]

There is a reason Disney pays off so many people who sue them.

I'm under the impression they fight most battles and rarely "pay off" people who sue.

 

[Pens Fan]

I just tried to log in and got the dreaded “you need to change your password” message. It said it was due to not logging in for long time. Uh no. I log in all the time. They did send the email to reset the password which didn’t work. They’ve now locked my account completely across all Disney platforms.

On hold with tech support for God knows how long …..

Update: After an hour on hold with the general tech support line, I tried calling DVC MS on another phone and got through to their tech support within 5 minutes and they were able to fix the problem. (It was a Festivus miracle!! ) I still have no idea why it got locked in the first place or why my numerous requests to have it reset online didn't work, but it's fixed.