Three questions--ROTR, group with FP and standby, and hours change

[chevab2020]

Three questions:
1. Does ROTR boarding group go on your magic band just like a FP, so that you can give your magic band to someone else to ride?
2. Does anyone have experience coordinating to ride at the same time when part of your group has a FP for a ride and part of the group is waiting standby for the same ride? I’m wondering how practical this is.
3. What is the earliest/fastest way to be alerted when Disney adds open hours to the schedule? Any newsletters to sign up for or accounts to follow, etc.?
Thanks!

 

[sharonabe]

2. Does anyone have experience coordinating to ride at the same time when part of your group has a FP for a ride and part of the group is waiting standby for the same ride? I’m wondering how practical this is.

I don't see how there's any way to do this. The two lines are usually completely separate. The FP line will fluctuate depending on how many people are in it. You could make it a game and see how close you could get, but there's just no data to give you any clue as to when to get in the FP line in order to try to meet up with those in standby.

3. What is the earliest/fastest way to be alerted when Disney adds open hours to the schedule? Any newsletters to sign up for or accounts to follow, etc.?

There's usually a thread on this forum for most months of people watching for it. If there's not one for your month, you could start one. You need to check Disney's site daily, many times daily, so with a thread, you'll have others checking too and someone will catch it and post.

 

[Miffy]

1. Yes, you could give your MB to someone else, just like a FP+.
2. The only way to coordinate would be for the FP+ holder to stand in the standby line and not use their FP+. Other than that, no.
I think 3 has been answered already. You just have to keep checking.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

For park hours updates, Touring Plans offers a convenient service where you enter your trip dates and they email you when hours change. It’s not instant, usually in the next 24 hours or so. I ‘think’ it is a part of their annual subscription service, but it’s not very much relatively speaking. It can be very helpful for those that don’t want to always watch the park calendar or a thread around here.

 

[chevab2020]

Thank you both. I guess I was wondering if the FP people got to the front and the standby people were almost there, is it feasible for the FP people to kind of stand to the side and let others go first and wait for their group to get to the front. But if the two lines never mesh, or if it’s too chaotic loading the rides, then I guess it won’t work.

 

[Miffy]

Thank you both. I guess I was wondering if the FP people got to the front and the standby people were almost there, is it feasible for the FP people to kind of stand to the side and let others go first and wait for their group to get to the front. But if the two lines never mesh, or if it’s too chaotic loading the rides, then I guess it won’t work.

Completely impractical. I'm trying to think of a ride where this would be possible, but I can't come up with anything. There's really no place to stand aside and wait on most rides and on a couple of rides where there might be, your standby people might not even be in the same theater with you (I'm thinking Soarin' here), so it'd be pointless.

You might be able to work this at FoP, but if you've got an FoP FP+ and your friends don't, you could be waiting hours for them to meet up with you. That doesn't sound like fun to me and I'm not sure they'd let you hang around that long anyway.

For some shows, the FP+ seating area is separate (Beauty and the Beast, e.g.), so your friends might be able to locate you, but they'd be let's say very unpopular with everyone sitting around you assuming you'd even be allowed to make a seat for them. The only exceptions to this I can think of offhand are Voyage of the Little Mermaid and the Frozen show at DHS. You and your non-FP+-holding friends could actually all walk in together if you timed it right. But FP+s aren't really needed for either of these shows.

 

[Ohiostatefan606]

Three questions:
1. Does ROTR boarding group go on your magic band just like a FP, so that you can give your magic band to someone else to ride?
2. Does anyone have experience coordinating to ride at the same time when part of your group has a FP for a ride and part of the group is waiting standby for the same ride? I’m wondering how practical this is.
3. What is the earliest/fastest way to be alerted when Disney adds open hours to the schedule? Any newsletters to sign up for or accounts to follow, etc.?
Thanks!

I follow a number of different FB pages dedicated to Disney. WDW Prep School, Kenny the Pirate, Chip & Co. They will tell you when hours have been updated. We were at Disney over MLK, I checked the Disney website every morning as our trip approached. It was early January before they updated hours for our weekend. Because I was watching I was able to adjust our FPs when the updated the hours.