Total Nightmare @ Disney

[LilyWDW]

That is horrible, I would ask for manager right there. First 4PM is not acceptable, second, attitude is horrible. If they do not have enough people to clean then hire more or do not let everyone to have late check out.

Check in STARTS at 3pm. You are not guaranteed a room at 3pm. So for this point, there is nothing that was done wrong.

Now, being rude isn't called for... but then again, we only have one side of what was said.

 

[maxiesmom]

That is horrible, I would ask for manager right there. First 4PM is not acceptable, second, attitude is horrible. If they do not have enough people to clean then hire more or do not let everyone to have late check out.

It is not horrible, check in STARTS at 3:00. It IS impossible to check every single guest in at 3:00. Can you not imagine the line if a few hundred guests all wanted to check in right at 3:00? Also, the Value resort check in time is 4:00.

The CMs attitude sounds bad, but he was right.

 

[MickeyMinnieMom]

That is horrible, I would ask for manager right there. First 4PM is not acceptable, second, attitude is horrible. If they do not have enough people to clean then hire more or do not let everyone to have late check out.

Staying at BLT as DVC members (check-in at 4pm), our room was not ready until a little after 5pm. We had been there since 11am. With two kids under the age of 4 who hadn't napped, we were all a little cranky! Of course, our choice to show up at 11am!!

I went directly to the front desk (as I always do if there are any issues), and was told that the check-in policy (in practice) is really more like "begins at 4pm". At that point I asked for management. I stated my displeasure with what I referred to as a "unique" rule based on my traveling/hotel experience (including working in the hotel biz for a stretch).

I didn't seek any "compensation" of any kind, and just suggested (for what it was worth), that if this really was the case, Disney should revise how it communicates with guests re: what "check-in time" really means. Management was VERY nice, very apologetic, tried to find a room in our category to put us in immediately, etc. Once we were in a room, the manager called to see if we were all settled.

For us, though we were a little cranky for a bit, this was no big deal, really. Neither was the phone that didn't work in the room, or the TV whose cable was mysteriously disconnected from the wall (took us a while to figure that was the issue - those flat screens are a little odd!). Things were fixed in pretty short order, and we went about our business.

Honestly, I forgot all about ALL of this until reading this thread! Gotta' love !! The magic of Disney, even if a bit delayed, wipes out all the small stuff for us!

 

[nanalisa]

Check in STARTS at 3pm. You are not guaranteed a room at 3pm. So for this point, there is nothing that was done wrong.

Now, being rude isn't called for... but then again, we only have one side of what was said.

My reservation for our WDW trip says "Check in at 3:00 pm, check out at 11:00 AM" It does not say that check in starts at 3:00 pm. I'm not buying that. Only once did we have to wait past 3:00 and without complaining the BC didn't charge us for that night.

 

[jenjersnap]

When we were at WL last month, our room was not ready until 4pm on the day of our arrival. We had "checked in" at the front desk at 7am, and had made no special requests. In fact, when it got to be 3:00 we asked at the front desk why our room wasn't ready and the guy was TOTALLY rude: "It is not HUMANLY POSSIBLE to have all the rooms ready by 3!"

Wow, we had a similar experience at WL minus the rudeness. We checked in early and our room wasn't ready until 5 p.m. They were apologetic about it, but also gave me a line about it not being possible to have EVERY room ready by 3 p.m.

 

[MickeyMinnieMom]

It is not horrible, check in STARTS at 3:00. It IS impossible to check every single guest in at 3:00. Can you not imagine the line if a few hundred guests all wanted to check in right at 3:00? Also, the Value resort check in time is 4:00.

The CMs attitude sounds bad, but he was right.

I definitely can't speak to Disney's specific policy, but I did work in the hotel biz for a while. While of course, we would not have been equipped to handle hundreds of guests all lined up to check in precisely at 3pm, we did guarantee a room be available/ready for all expected guests at that time.

Guests trickled in at all hours, with a concentration around 3-7pm. We got rooms cleaned as they were vacated, and of course scheduled housekeeping staff accordingly to deal with the busier time (between 11am checkout and 3pm check-in).

Granted, Disney runs a much larger operation, and perhaps this isn't feasible? I suppose I think information up front - like clearly stating that check-in BEGINS at 3pm/4pm - goes a long way. As does an "I'm sorry" and nice attitude when a guest experiences a problem. I have personally always had positive experiences in this regard at Disney.

 

[rie'smom]

They still do. But if everyone is already busy when you call, then everyone is already busy when you call. If A/C was out in the OP's room, it's entirely possible it was out in other rooms as well. Doesn't matter how many people you have on a shift if a bunch of people all have problems at the same time. However ... if that was the case, then the Maintenance operator should have relayed that information so that the Guest was not expecting someone to show up immediately.


No ... they can't. Nothing can compensate a guest for two days of aggravation -- two days of lost vacation time. Thankfully, however, Disney doesn't use that as a reason to not offer anything. (Some places would ...)

Really? Which places? Even Days Inns have moved people when the air conditioner is broken.

That is horrible, I would ask for manager right there. First 4PM is not acceptable, second, attitude is horrible. If they do not have enough people to clean then hire more or do not let everyone to have late check out.

No one knows if it was due to someone checking out late. 4pm is more than acceptable when the checkin time is 3pm. Stuff happens. Maybe some of the staff was out sick and the poor CM was stressed.

 

[Albytaps]

It'll be our first stay at BLT in Nov. We are supposed to arrive early enough to enjoy the day at the parks so... I hope our room is ready early.

 

[maxiesmom]

Wow, we had a similar experience at WL minus the rudeness. We checked in early and our room wasn't ready until 5 p.m. They were apologetic about it, but also gave me a line about it not being possible to have EVERY room ready by 3 p.m.

Yep, it does happen. At least in the 16 years I have been going to WDW it has happened to us more than once. No big deal. After all, if we all want Disney to abide by the 3pm rule, that would mean no checking in early and dumping your stuff off either. They let you do that to be nice. Would you really want them to follow the rule that says 3pm check in exactly?

 

[disneyfan55]

I scanned but didn't read it all. Did the OP ever come back and say what happened? Thanks!

 

[PIRATEGIRL007]

I scanned but didn't read it all. Did the OP ever come back and say what happened? Thanks!

Page 4 post post 55

I guess i should have just googled the questions.... but here are a few details of what took place...

10 nights 9/2 All Star Sports

Arrived 9/2 @10pm

Room temp was 83 and it seems the AC was not working.... call and said they will send someone out... midnight came and no one arrived... call them back to have someone come out in the morning because i need to get 2 tear old son to sleep....

called the next morning -- said they would send someone out... heading out to pickup some items we forgot and came back to the room about 5 hours later... room temp now at 87.... called and they said someone would be right out.... called front desk asked for manager... she said she will work on it as well.... 2 hours went by and no one shows up.... headed to the front desk to speak with the manager --- she said someone is just minutes away and she would call the room in 30 mins to see if everything was taken care of.... 1.5 hours later i head back to the desk -- no one had showed up.... and it was now 89 in the room and i insisted she come to the room... she enters the room and says "o my.... it is very hot in here" only just then someone arrived... she stays behind... -- The Filter of the AC unit had about 5 inches of dust and the motor was clogged with dust.... they had to replace the motor and things were solved.....

With the temp coming down in the room ---we headed to MK.... to our surprise they did not add our tickets on our room at check-in..... so here we are with a 2 year old crying at the gates because we wanted it and we had no tickets.... customer relations could not assist -- they called the all star and we were told we had to head back to the resort to have it fixed.....

They fixed that issue -- we heading back to the room only to find out the the room keys did not work...... heading back to the front desk....

After we got that fixed we heading back to the park -- tickets worked --- but they never added the meal plan on out tickets.... you would have thought they would have looked at that after the tickets were not placed on the card.....

I called the manager from my cell phone with still in the park ---- I wanted her to fix everything ----- she called me back 10 mins later and said she wanted to fix everything much better for us and they had a 2 bedroom villa for us at SSR.....

She said they wanted to make this a good time and nice villa.... she said she knew they messed up several time over and wanted to make it right....

So -- Why i wanted the address was to try and inform management what took place on our vacation and have it and use it as a case study.

We will be back -- been several time --- Just not at the All Star Sports

But i guess you get what you pay for

 

[MickeyMinnieMom]

After all, if we all want Disney to abide by the 3pm rule, that would mean no checking in early and dumping your stuff off either. They let you do that to be nice. Would you really want them to follow the rule that says 3pm check in exactly?

Maybe others have a different experience, but I have never heard of a hotel that didn't let you leave your bags early as a convenience to their guests. In Disney's case, especially, I think it is a matter of good business sense. If you arrive early and drop off your bags, chances are that you are off spending your money in one of their restaurants or stores... sounds smart to me!

 

[doconeill]

No matter what time I've checked in, at any location, have I actually had to wait, except for the one time at AK I mentioned before. Now, at other places in most cases a room is a room, so they just give you whatever one is available next. Disney of course has different classes of rooms, requests, etc. to try to deal with so they pre-assign rooms.

Now, it is NOT IMPOSSIBLE to have every room ready at 3pm. Disney just chooses not to. They'd have to pay more mousekeeping staff to do it. Although they could perhaps offset that with "fines" for people who aren't vacating on time.

 

[Fabooliss]

OK...I guess I could share one of my few nightmare stories from Disney:

One trip went very badly...first, the entire trip I never got a towel animal, someone in an electric cart ran into my foot, I had to walk through a smoking spot and couldn't breathe, someone cut in line on a ride way up in front of me, someone tried to hold a spot on the ropes for the parade, I got something from the counter service that wasn't up to Michelin guide standards, some people near me weren't wearing deodorant, a ride was closed for refurb that I wanted to go on, there were some screaming kids not being controlled by their parents. It was crazy!

(Sorry about your foot!)

 

[BigGreen73]

no need to be snarky, I was kind of just making a joke.

 

[MickeyMinnieMom]

No matter what time I've checked in, at any location, have I actually had to wait, except for the one time at AK I mentioned before. Now, at other places in most cases a room is a room, so they just give you whatever one is available next. Disney of course has different classes of rooms, requests, etc. to try to deal with so they pre-assign rooms.

Now, it is NOT IMPOSSIBLE to have every room ready at 3pm. Disney just chooses not to. They'd have to pay more mousekeeping staff to do it. Although they could perhaps offset that with "fines" for people who aren't vacating on time.

They do this... or at least have/had a policy in place to (as do many other hotels).

OK... it's a LONG story that I won't bore everyone with, but on one of our Disney trips (staying at the Contemporary) we were 30min late checking out of the room. We received a call saying that if we were not out in the next 30min we would be charged another night's stay.

I have no issues with this policy -- being less abrupt about it would have been nice, but I understand the jobs they have to do. In our case, when we explained the medical issue we were having (diabetic with extremely high blood sugar levels, and her misplaced insulin -- eesh what a day!) -- they exempted us from the fee. And we were out w/i 30min in any case.

All that to say that they do charge sometimes... or at least have a policy in place to do so. I suspect it rarely is used in practice (as was my experience working in hotel management a while).

 

[heatherwillmom]

First, not 2 days but less then 24 hours, they checked in at 10 PM and by next evening they were already upgraded and everything was fixed. They only lost few hours of park time, not 2 days, so no, Disney does not have a Time Machine to go back and fix situation but 8 nights in Deluxe resort for inconvenience, not a nightmare, sounds fair to me.
Second, who said OP should not feel bad about those 24 hours? But compensation definitely should overcome bad feelings.

Most people would take less tha 24 hours of problems to receive a great upgrade

 

[brunette8706]

It is not horrible, check in STARTS at 3:00. It IS impossible to check every single guest in at 3:00. Can you not imagine the line if a few hundred guests all wanted to check in right at 3:00? Also, the Value resort check in time is 4:00.

The CMs attitude sounds bad, but he was right.

*
You're kidding me right? You're saying the CM is allowed to tell a paying guest that, "not all the rooms can possibly be made up by 3." This is the last thing a PAYING guest wants to hear! Sorry, but I totally disagree with your assessment.

 

[WDSearcher]

Really? Which places? Even Days Inns have moved people when the air conditioner is broken.

I do wonder why the OP didn't just ask for another room when they found out they had no A/C. And I wonder why Disney didn't just offer one?

There are many places where you can be totally inconvenienced and given no offer of anything additional. There are a couple of International Drive places near Universal that I would never go to again based on one of them charging me for a rollaway they never provided and another one cancelling my reservation because I arrived at 9:30pm.

In the rollaway case, they told me that the charge was for the 'request'. When I told them that the bed never arrived, even after multiple requests, the manager told me that 'we never have enough beds to accommodate all the requests ... it's first come, first served until we run out'.

With the late arrival, I noted to the manager that the confirmation I was holding in my hand stated that my room was "Confirmed for late arrival". The manager said that they were booked solid and needed the room. I asked for a refund and help in getting a room elsewhere and got neither. They wouldn't give me a refund because I hadn't cancelled within the window , and they 'had no idea' if anyone else had rooms available.

In both cases, I took the complaint as far up the chain as I could. The rollaway thing never got addressed by anyone; the late reservation thing finally netted me a full refund, but I had to literally contact the CEO. So ... no. Not all accommodations are so ... accommodating.

 

[brunette8706]

When we were at WL last month, our room was not ready until 4pm on the day of our arrival. We had "checked in" at the front desk at 7am, and had made no special requests. In fact, when it got to be 3:00 we asked at the front desk why our room wasn't ready and the guy was TOTALLY rude: "It is not HUMANLY POSSIBLE to have all the rooms ready by 3!"

Hey Siam!

This was not a good business practice from Disney. I feel your pain. Further, you're not asking for "ALL" rooms to be ready by 3, just your room, since you arrived at 7 a.m. you should have had a room ready and available at least no later than 1 or 2.

brunette