Video Chat

[bookgirl]

Using a Windows Laptop (v10) and I use Chrome.

Logged in at 6:10 my time (central). When I clicked the link it brought back up my chat from a few days ago, but no start. I actually had to log out, clear my cache, and begin again. Got the Genie and Start Button then. By the time I did that it was about 6:30.

Got a chat just before 8:00am, put in my dates, resubmitted the form and was asked to make sure I had agreed to the Terms and Conditions. Once I verified that, the chat put me in the que for a video chat. Was told it was approx 1.5 hour wait.

At 9:01am (of course I had walked away from my computer but they had asked if I was still there and I made it in time) They asked for my email so they could look up my MDE and I was connected with a cast member who sent me the link for a video chat.

There was a fair amount of chit chat and Raynette was very friendly, but the actual DAS conversation was legit about 3 minutes. I was very clear on what my issue was with the wait in the actual line and I was approved quickly and a very bad picture of me in all my 'not a morning person' face and hair was taken.

She then gave me the whole speech about what DAS was, how it would work and a few logistics questions.

It's now 9:25 and I'm waiting to be connected with Planning.

Hope everyone else is having a productive Sunday Morning, I'll update after the planning chat.

 

[Dispro1]

Using a Windows Laptop (v10) and I use Chrome.

Logged in at 6:10 my time (central). When I clicked the link it brought back up my chat from a few days ago, but no start. I actually had to log out, clear my cache, and begin again. Got the Genie and Start Button then. By the time I did that it was about 6:30.

Got a chat just before 8:00am, put in my dates, resubmitted the form and was asked to make sure I had agreed to the Terms and Conditions. Once I verified that, the chat put me in the que for a video chat. Was told it was approx 1.5 hour wait.

At 9:01am (of course I had walked away from my computer but they had asked if I was still there and I made it in time) They asked for my email so they could look up my MDE and I was connected with a cast member who sent me the link for a video chat.

There was a fair amount of chit chat and Raynette was very friendly, but the actual DAS conversation was legit about 3 minutes. I was very clear on what my issue was with the wait in the actual line and I was approved quickly and a very bad picture of me in all my 'not a morning person' face and hair was taken.

She then gave me the whole speech about what DAS was, how it would work and a few logistics questions.

It's now 9:25 and I'm waiting to be connected with Planning.

Hope everyone else is having a productive Sunday Morning, I'll update after the planning chat.

My daughter’s laptop did the same thing where it took me back to one of my former chatting attempts, but all I had to do was type in the word start and sent that in the chat window. I then got the same automated response that I had before on former attempts after actually being able to hit the start button so I knew I was in queue for the chat. I did reach an actual person and complete the process that way so this is just an FYI for you or anyone else for future attempts if that happens. I learned A LOT through trial and error unfortunately lol! I hope you’re already done with the process by now!

 

[bookgirl]

Actually still haven't done the planning chat yet

 

[♥ Mandi ♥]

We’ve been logged in for hours and still no chat re: dates yet - is this normal? It says connected.

 

[Catlover77]

We’ve been logged in for hours and still no chat re: dates yet - is this normal? It says connected.

Yes it can be. It took me about 4-5hours. Some have had shorter wait times. Just hang in there.

 

[bookgirl]

We’ve been logged in for hours and still no chat re: dates yet - is this normal? It says connected.

Just got a chat for planning at 11:30 so 5 hours after the initial start and 2 hours after finishing my DAS chat.

Got Times for the 3 regular ticket days that I have, but could not make any selections for the day that I have a AH party ticket but no reg ticket/park reservation. He said it was the park reservation that stopped him able to make pre selections but that I could use it as day of once I entered the park. There is no DAS during the AH events, but there is in the two hour window between early party entry and the start of the party.

Times were scattered on all the days and I had to switch some stuff around, especially on my HS day. I had reservations for other stuff (Olga's. HBD lunch, Savi's Workshop) I finally dumped one of my first choices (Star Tours and switched it to Smugglers Run). It was just a matter of 30 minutes but they would not change the times that they offered.

I'm sure I can get Star Tours on my own day of but it was a bit weird.

I just made sure I had my app open so I could look at my reservations while I was chatting and then set them up with a bit of lead time.

The preselected ones are only for that 1 hour window but day of can extend past the window, which I think others had seen as well.

So finished at 12:04.

6 hours spent on a Sunday (though with a laptop I did go make breakfast and just carried it with me LOL.

It will be interesting going forward. I have never used a DAS as I just managed it with FP and time management but it is what it is.

Good luck everyone

 

[rockinrollercoasters]

Just got a chat for planning at 11:30 so 5 hours after the initial start and 2 hours after finishing my DAS chat.

Got Times for the 3 regular ticket days that I have, but could not make any selections for the day that I have a AH party ticket but no reg ticket/park reservation. He said it was the park reservation that stopped him able to make pre selections but that I could use it as day of once I entered the park. There is no DAS during the AH events, but there is in the two hour window between early party entry and the start of the party.

Times were scattered on all the days and I had to switch some stuff around, especially on my HS day. I had reservations for other stuff (Olga's. HBD lunch, Savi's Workshop) I finally dumped one of my first choices (Star Tours and switched it to Smugglers Run). It was just a matter of 30 minutes but they would not change the times that they offered.

I'm sure I can get Star Tours on my own day of but it was a bit weird.

I just made sure I had my app open so I could look at my reservations while I was chatting and then set them up with a bit of lead time.

The preselected ones are only for that 1 hour window but day of can extend past the window, which I think others had seen as well.

So finished at 12:04.

6 hours spent on a Sunday (though with a laptop I did go make breakfast and just carried it with me LOL.

It will be interesting going forward. I have never used a DAS as I just managed it with FP and time management but it is what it is.

Good luck everyone

Our non-park ticket Boo Bash day is our arrival day. We weren't sure if the DAS would be available for the two hours prior to Boo Bash because our park tickets don't officially start until the next day.

 

[bookgirl]

Our non-park ticket Boo Bash day is our arrival day. We weren't sure if the DAS would be available for the two hours prior to Boo Bash because our park tickets don't officially start until the next day.

My AH is in the middle of my tickets but I have no reg ticket or reservation that day but I was told I could use it when I tapped into the park. So in theory yours should work on a non ticket day as long as you have DAS before hand. ??

 

[sarabguerra]

Wondering if anyone has tried getting two DAS during one chat? 15yo and 13yo both need DAS. Not sure if I can handle waiting all day, twice, just to register. 15yo has a random day off school within our window to pre-register, so we'll try for them that day hoping the traffic will be less. But with the 13yo in school and in activities/therapies after school every day, that leave just the weekend. I would keep 13yo home from school if I can do it all in one call.

 

[Weedy]

Wondering if anyone has tried getting two DAS during one chat? 15yo and 13yo both need DAS. Not sure if I can handle waiting all day, twice, just to register. 15yo has a random day off school within our window to pre-register, so we'll try for them that day hoping the traffic will be less. But with the 13yo in school and in activities/therapies after school every day, that leave just the weekend. I would keep 13yo home from school if I can do it all in one call.

The person that is getting the DAS has to be present on the call.
Not sure if they will do both at once.

 

[lanejudy]

Wondering if anyone has tried getting two DAS during one chat?

I haven't read any reports of this situation, but I would think they could do both on the same call. I'd think it might create a challenge if done separately, because a DAS-holder cannot be listed on another person's DAS party and that will also directly impact the Advanced Selections. Please report back how it works for you.

 

[sarabguerra]

The person that is getting the DAS has to be present on the call.
Not sure if they will do both at once.

Yes about the person being present. Which is why if I can accomplish the 2 pre-registrations on one chat, I will keep DS home on that random day DX has the day off. If not, I'll do DX that day and DS on a weekend day.

 

[SueM in MN]

Just got a chat for planning at 11:30 so 5 hours after the initial start and 2 hours after finishing my DAS chat.

Got Times for the 3 regular ticket days that I have, but could not make any selections for the day that I have a AH party ticket but no reg ticket/park reservation. He said it was the park reservation that stopped him able to make pre selections but that I could use it as day of once I entered the park. There is no DAS during the AH events, but there is in the two hour window between early party entry and the start of the party.

The DAS Advance Selections appear to need to be ‘hooked’ to a park reservation, so it makes sense that he couldn’t make any for the day you have an After Hours (AH) party. The AH parties generally have shorter wait times for most attractions, so there are sometimes many with waits of less than 15 minutes. The rides with height restrictions are usually the more in demand with longer wait periods. People have reported getting using DAS on those - especially since they will have Rider Swap that will be using the Lightning Lane.

Times were scattered on all the days and I had to switch some stuff around, especially on my HS day. I had reservations for other stuff (Olga's. HBD lunch, Savi's Workshop) I finally dumped one of my first choices (Star Tours and switched it to Smugglers Run). It was just a matter of 30 minutes but they would not change the times that they offered.

I'm sure I can get Star Tours on my own day of but it was a bit weird.

I have read the times availability just comes up for the CM; they can only offer what comes up. So, it does make sense that he could not change the time.

I just made sure I had my app open so I could look at my reservations while I was chatting and then set them up with a bit of lead time.

The preselected ones are only for that 1 hour window but day of can extend past the window, which I think others had seen as well.

So finished at 12:04.

6 hours spent on a Sunday (though with a laptop I did go make breakfast and just carried it with me LOL.

It will be interesting going forward. I have never used a DAS as I just managed it with FP and time management but it is what it is.

Good luck everyone

Since you indicated you haven’t used DAS before, I’ll add a little explanation for you.

The DAS Advance Selections are new and available only for people doing the advance video registration for DAS 2-30 days before the park visit. As you found out, those have a beginning time and a one hour window for use. If not used during that window, they expire.
Guests don’t need to use DAS Advance Selections before getting or using DAS Return Times.

DAS Return Times have been around since DAS began in October of 2013. Those can only be made the day of the visit to the park and only in the park you are in. They have a beginning time that is based on the current wait time in the Standby Line and do not have an end time. They remain active until used, modified or cancelled by the user or until the park/attraction closes for the day.
Guests can only have one active DAS Return Time. Any member of the party linked to the DAS can make a DAS Return Time, but the DAS holder does need to go on the attraction.
Previously, DAS Return Times could only be obtained by actually going to the attraction or the blue Guest Services umbrellas in the park. The change with the Genie roll out is that guests are now also able to make/manage DAS Return Times on the My Disney Experience app. When in the park, the app shows the attractions that are available for DAS Return Times.
Guests can make a DAS Return Time for the Individual Lightning Lane (ILL) attractions which have a Standby Line. Guests must obtain a Virtual queue/Boarding group in order to use DAS if the attraction is currently using Virtual queue. At this point, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure is the only attraction using Virtual queue, but Disney has indicated Virtual queues can be added or discontinued based a how busy those ILL attractions are.

My AH is in the middle of my tickets but I have no reg ticket or reservation that day but I was told I could use it when I tapped into the park. So in theory yours should work on a non ticket day as long as you have DAS before hand. ??

In past parties, guests were able to enter the park 2 hours before the start of the party (that spreads out the guests so it’s not so crowded getting in). Once a guest has entered a park, their DAS will be available to make DAS Return Times in that park.

 

[airplane]

Thanks for this tip, trying it out today as we want to make some changes if possible! Link for anyone looking.

ETA: took about two hours, CM who answered was able to make the changes we wanted

Thank you so much for posting this link! I used it this morning and had my ride reservations in less than a half hour! Thank you thank you thank you!

 

[HopperFan]

I keep checking in here to see if Disney has gotten their ..... together, and if wait times have normalized. I see they have not. There is no way for me to commit 4-6-8-12 hours with my son to getting his DAS - when in person it takes 5 minutes. It would be one thing if it would last 6 months (we have AP), but it literally will be expired before our next trip and I'd have to do it all over again. The two per day could be day savers for us, but with me only allowed to book 3 days of park reservations anyway, I give up.

I just wish they had some kind of real system in place where you could make ONE call efficiently and timely OR use a third party service like other parks do ... instead of this embarrassment, or it is on purpose.

 

[airplane]

My overall experience pre-registering for DAS.
Starting October 12. I logged on every day around 4 o’clock which is when my son gets home from school. Most days I got through to the first form within 15 minutes. The days that I didn’t get through to the first form quickly I am pretty sure there were connectivity issues so I’m wondering if you don’t get through to the first form rather quickly then maybe you should give up and try it again later. Out of the eight days I got through to the video chat once. Unfortunately I couldn’t open it using Safari. I had lots of connectivity issues with Safari. Every night my session timed out on me and I would get the message saying try again in the morning.
Saturday morning I logged on at 7 o’clock. Filled out the first form by 720, and two hours later I was on the video chat. I used Chrome on my iPhone 8. I went to the display in my settings and made sure my screen never turned off. Every 20 or so minutes I would type in the chat box “ just to keep active“ . After my video chat I was not able to make my ride selections because I was disconnected. Luckily I came to this page and the link was posted to bypass the video chat since I was already approved. I logged on this morning around 830 and had all of my rides picked by 9 o’clock. My ride time selections were awesome. I was able to choose two rides per day and the time slots that I wanted which were mostly morning. This part of the chat is all done via text and not video chat. I told the person which two rides I wanted and she came back with several times for each ride and I was able to choose the times I wanted. I really didn’t feel like I wasted too much time throughout this whole process because I was usually cooking dinner, folding laundry doing housework (my house is now spotless) so at least I was productive while on the call. I did check my screen every 15 minutes or so. We leave November 3 and I am so excited! Plus it’s really fun to see the two additional DAS advance selections on the app. Also I made sure they were in there before I left the chat. Just in case! If you are looking for your DAS advance selections they are located under “my future plans” which I typed in the search area on the Disney genie. I also want to mention that it’s the DAS holder +5 people. We are a party of seven so one person might have to sit out each ride.
I wonder if I’m going to miss my sons annual tantrum in the middle of guest services waiting for the DAS pass. He likes to go on it’s a small World as soon as we get in the park 3 times
Good luck everyone!

 

[mzozzietj]

I needed to post an update. After waiting over 6 hours on Friday then another 10.5 hours on Saturday (only to get disconnected at that point) I had a huge success on Sunday morning. I completed from my laptop with network cable plugged in, using google chrome web browser. previous days i tried from a phone and chromebook. On Sunday, I didn't wait a single minute for each of the CMs!

I had a second browser window open for the time.gov site (I meant business)

07:00 clicked start
07:01 joined by CM
07:02 Submitted form
07:06 transferred to video chat queue answered immediately
07:16 finished video chat transferred to Advanced planning team
07:17 started chat
07:21 submit form again so they could access account info to see park reservations
07:26 - 07:41 selected advance selections going back and forth via chat
07:43 finished

If anyone else is having extremely long waits, maybe changing things up, try using a computer instead of a phone or plugging into a network, etc. (If you can!)

 

[sandrews0608]

Couple of questions:

Can you pick a time for you 2 pre selected rides (based on availability of course)? I have read conflicting answers on that.

I have also read that you can only get a pass for a ride once. Is that true with DAS? If I purchase Genie+ as well can a pass be held for the same ride under both DAS and Genie+. For example my daughter LOVES the safari ride in AK. Can we ride once by standby at open, once with DAS and once with Genie+. Seems odd to do it so many times, but she loves it. We did it 5 times once in a day!

 

[airplane]

Couple of questions:

Can you pick a time for you 2 pre selected rides (based on availability of course)? I have read conflicting answers on that.

I have also read that you can only get a pass for a ride once. Is that true with DAS? If I purchase Genie+ as well can a pass be held for the same ride under both DAS and Genie+. For example my daughter LOVES the safari ride in AK. Can we ride once by standby at open, once with DAS and once with Genie+. Seems odd to do it so many times, but she loves it. We did it 5 times once in a day!

I was given three time options for each ride that I chose. Keep in mind where the ride is located in the park when you are choosing your times. I was able to get splash Mountain at 10 o’clock and big thunder mountain at 11 o’clock.

 

[gottalovepluto]

Couple of questions:

Can you pick a time for you 2 pre selected rides (based on availability of course)? I have read conflicting answers on that.

yes but your selections of time might be limited. I had a few days I wanted rides earlier in the day but they said these were the first available times (test track on day one, first time 7:30pm and SDD mid-trip first time was 3pm). Days at the end of my trip I got exactly what I wanted early in the day, so my theory is there are X number of openings for DAS per ride per day.

We later decided the times were impractical for us so we chatted to change to other rides and the chat team was happy to help.