Eliminate the Park Reservation Requirements

[ChipnDale79]

I think it's a good bet not many people would agree with that. I'm willing to pay more to get more no doubt. I'll pay for FP. I have no issues with an upcharge event or paying for a dessert buffet. I want a better experience and I don't mind paying for it.

What I don't like is paying more to get less. That makes no sense at all to me. I do understand their issues with staffing but they can't claim health reasons for not having shows and parades when they can increase capacity with people standing for long periods of time in indoor lines and crammed in to watch fireworks. What they don't have now is either based on stafffing issues or $$$$.

We just got back, we were there from June 19th-27th. They have staffing issues, but they’ve also been open for about a year now and they shouldn’t be having those issues. It was really interesting to see them claim things are for health reasons, then they herd you into a queue like Jungle Cruise with no dividers. I was really annoyed with a few things in world showcase being closed, or closing early. We hoofed it from Space Ship Earth because my youngest son really wanted to go to the Japan store, we got there at 715, it closed at 7, never mind the fact that EPCOT closed at 10. I also found out why getting some dinning reservations was hard. We had dinning reservations at Via Napoli at 6:50 one night, apparently they close at 7 also. Right around 7, we noticed that they were visibly cleaning and making enough noise to make everyone know they were ready to go home, again, the park didn’t close until 10. These are the places in world showcase that I can remember off the top of my head that were closed, Morocco and Canada pavilions (main parts at least) and some of the stores in London.

I will not pay more to get extras, I will not pay for Fast Passes, if that means its time for us to go somewhere else, then its time for us to go somewhere else. The reason for that, is because it tells Disney that people are willing to pay, and they’ll just cut more and offer more premium experiences. We drove to Animal Kingdom because we had dinner reservations at Sanaa that night, we knew that trams were not working, so we were prepared to walk, but I was annoyed that we had to walk around a near empty “premium parking lot” to get to the front gate. For the first time, I actually saw a line of people at Club 33 in MK, and I cant tell you how many VIP tours we saw this week. It told me that I’m no longer the target audience for Disney.

Lines, they weren’t bad, we waited in hour long lines for some things (Smugglers Run and Flight of Passage), but they moved because of lack of fast passes, but people were visibly upset and you could hear the comments when a VIP tour group walked right passed them.

I would like to see Disney improve upon notification of when the Gondolas are down and alternate transportation when that happens. There really isn’t a reason they cant’ send a push notification on the app to let you know they are down. We had an issue one night where they were closed because of weather (I understand that) but we watched bus after bus go to MK and AK (bus transportation was beyond amazing for the most part) before we finally got one for DHS.

We had fun, but there were glaring issues that really annoyed us, and before anyone says “well Covid”, we were well aware of that going in and were ok with a lot of restrictions, but I felt like there were some were Disney was taking advantage of them.

 

[Weedy]

We just got back, we were there from June 19th-27th. They have staffing issues, but they’ve also been open for about a year now and they shouldn’t be having those issues. It was really interesting to see them claim things are for health reasons, then they herd you into a queue like Jungle Cruise with no dividers. I was really annoyed with a few things in world showcase being closed, or closing early. We hoofed it from Space Ship Earth because my youngest son really wanted to go to the Japan store, we got there at 715, it closed at 7, never mind the fact that EPCOT closed at 10. I also found out why getting some dinning reservations was hard. We had dinning reservations at Via Napoli at 6:50 one night, apparently they close at 7 also. Right around 7, we noticed that they were visibly cleaning and making enough noise to make everyone know they were ready to go home, again, the park didn’t close until 10. These are the places in world showcase that I can remember off the top of my head that were closed, Morocco and Canada pavilions (main parts at least) and some of the stores in London.

I will not pay more to get extras, I will not pay for Fast Passes, if that means its time for us to go somewhere else, then its time for us to go somewhere else. The reason for that, is because it tells Disney that people are willing to pay, and they’ll just cut more and offer more premium experiences. We drove to Animal Kingdom because we had dinner reservations at Sanaa that night, we knew that trams were not working, so we were prepared to walk, but I was annoyed that we had to walk around a near empty “premium parking lot” to get to the front gate. For the first time, I actually saw a line of people at Club 33 in MK, and I cant tell you how many VIP tours we saw this week. It told me that I’m no longer the target audience for Disney.

Lines, they weren’t bad, we waited in hour long lines for some things (Smugglers Run and Flight of Passage), but they moved because of lack of fast passes, but people were visibly upset and you could hear the comments when a VIP tour group walked right passed them.

I would like to see Disney improve upon notification of when the Gondolas are down and alternate transportation when that happens. There really isn’t a reason they cant’ send a push notification on the app to let you know they are down. We had an issue one night where they were closed because of weather (I understand that) but we watched bus after bus go to MK and AK (bus transportation was beyond amazing for the most part) before we finally got one for DHS.

We had fun, but there were glaring issues that really annoyed us, and before anyone says “well Covid”, we were well aware of that going in and were ok with a lot of restrictions, but I felt like there were some were Disney was taking advantage of them.

Staffing shortage will continue until the World Fellowship Students are allowed to return.
Also the College Program is just re starting.
Both of these supply a lot of employees.

 

[TiggerBouncy]

Staffing shortage will continue until the World Fellowship Students are allowed to return.
Also the College Program is just re starting.
Both of these supply a lot of employees.

This is perhaps felt most in EPCOT and AK in particular. I had mentioned some time ago that one of my biggest frustrations with EPCOT in the covid era is that I love to meet people from the host country, talk to them, learn about them. I found it sub-optimal when my food from Via Napoli was being made by an American chef with American ingredients. Having said that, I GET IT. My waiter at Le Cellier was a manager from Mouse Gears (this was almost a year ago). He was doing his best, but it really wasn't his bag. He didn't know a thing about Canadian foods, or about Canada. He was up front about that. I didn't blame him - after all, he pointed out that no one was allowed to enter the US, so there was not much Disney could do at that time.

Point being, you are 100% correct. The World Fellowship Students play a large part of cast in some areas of the park and staffing will definitely not be up to normal levels until some of these programs are fully back in place.

 

[sheilafri]

Staffing shortage will continue until the World Fellowship Students are allowed to return.
Also the College Program is just re starting.
Both of these supply a lot of employees.

If these programs are shut down due to Covid maybe Disney should be looking for workers elsewhere instead of making the guest experience worse.

 

[JenSop]

This is perhaps felt most in EPCOT and AK in particular. I had mentioned some time ago that one of my biggest frustrations with EPCOT in the covid era is that I love to meet people from the host country, talk to them, learn about them. I found it sub-optimal when my food from Via Napoli was being made by an American chef with American ingredients. Having said that, I GET IT. My waiter at Le Cellier was a manager from Mouse Gears (this was almost a year ago). He was doing his best, but it really wasn't his bag. He didn't know a thing about Canadian foods, or about Canada. He was up front about that. I didn't blame him - after all, he pointed out that no one was allowed to enter the US, so there was not much Disney could do at that time.

Point being, you are 100% correct. The World Fellowship Students play a large part of cast in some areas of the park and staffing will definitely not be up to normal levels until some of these programs are fully back in place.

I hear ya - part of the Epcot experience is interacting with the CMs from the various countries. We canceled our annual trip this year - hoping things are more "normal" in this regard come January!

 

[JenSop]

I also can't wait for park reservations to be gone. Ugh. And I'm a PLANNER. I make my charts and color-coordinated tables before my Disney trips, but the park reservations are just too much.
Plus, as a TA, I don't know when I'll be able to buy my ticket for my January trip. (I know, I know, what a problem to have) but it was bad enough that I had to go years without being able to get fastpasses because of how they did TA tickets. Now I don't know if I'll get into the parks I want.

 

[corpcomp]

What about AP holders? I have a platinum pass which has no blockout dates. If I want to go on a day when a park is full, I should still be able to go. That’s the reason I bought that specific pass.

I just got my Gold AP recovery pass and was told I had to make a reservation each day but at 2pm I could visit any other park assuming they have room. Same for Platinum. Even 5 months in advance I started seeing dates fill up so if you are going, make the reservations as far in advance as possible.

 

[cccory]

I am hoping they get rid of the park reservation. I like to be able to change my mind on which park we want to go to.

 

[pasta]

I am hoping they get rid of the park reservation. I like to be able to change my mind on which park we want to go to.

I agree. I just added the park hopper for that reason. It’s almost ridiculous I’m planning this way. I need to stay away from the Kool-Aid this time around.

 

[corpcomp]

Re the reservation system, what is the current occupancy % that WDW is allowing for their parks?

 

[lovethesun12]

I’m hoping the reservations will be gone soon. It would have worked better if FP+ went with it.

 

[cakebaker]

What about AP holders? I have a platinum pass which has no blockout dates. If I want to go on a day when a park is full, I should still be able to go. That’s the reason I bought that specific pass.

The difficulty in getting park reservations is because of the lower capacity limits. Once they move to full capacity, or even anything around 65%, that problem should go away. Luckily, they rarely hit full capacity and really only at the MK. You can't get in to a park that has hit capacity. No one can. It would be breaking the law to exceed legal capacity limits and you were never guaranteed park entry in the terms you agreed to.

 

[wgeo]

I was annoyed at the park reservation system this weekend. We were reserved into Epcot and yet everyone woke up really early but we weren't allowed to go to DHS when it opened at 8 so we sat around and did nothing for hours because we were locked into going to Epcot first. I really don't like how inflexible the system is.

 

[cakebaker]

I was annoyed at the park reservation system this weekend. We were reserved into Epcot and yet everyone woke up really early but we weren't allowed to go to DHS when it opened at 8 so we sat around and did nothing for hours because we were locked into going to Epcot first. I really don't like how inflexible the system is.

Right now, I would never make Epcot a park day. It's much better to schedule a different park, then hop to Epcot. With the late opening, making a park reservation for it is a waste of valuable hours.

 

[Meglen]

I was annoyed at the park reservation system this weekend. We were reserved into Epcot and yet everyone woke up really early but we weren't allowed to go to DHS when it opened at 8 so we sat around and did nothing for hours because we were locked into going to Epcot first. I really don't like how inflexible the system is.

Why didn't you just go to Epcot? you can get in before the 11 open time

 

[wgeo]

Why didn't you just go to Epcot? you can get in before the 11 open time

We did go early of course, but its not the same as going to an 8am opening time. And if we hadn't gone early we would have been stuck in a crazy long Test Track line, so we had to rope drop this park and not just head over as a hopper since the kids love Test Track. I just hate how complicated and unflexible Disney has made this. This weekend was fine I guess, but it certainly was not the fun relaxed vacation that we are used to at all.

 

[Q-man]

I’m hoping the reservations will be gone soon. It would have worked better if FP+ went with it.

Disney has a new tool to manage park loads and staffing and to force guests to buy tickets at least 60 days before arrival. They aren't going to give it up willingly.

 

[Deeleebaker]

What bothers me is that park hopper seems an obscene waste of money with this. I can’t go to the second park for lunch, and really that means I’ll only hop on days I’m at DHS or AK when they close earlier.
What time can I get into Epcot on those days? I figured I’d do resort mornings or Disney Springs.

 

[shawthorne44]

Well, there will probably be a couple of parks closing early every week for the Deluxe Evening Hours. So, you'll want to hop away from those.

 

[cakebaker]

Well, there will probably be a couple of parks closing early every week for the Deluxe Evening Hours. So, you'll want to hop away from those.

They’ve never closed early for evening EMH’s. I see no reason why they’d do it now. They’re extra hours in the park. Closing earlier than normal would negate that.
That said, I would stay away from evening hours parks entirely. They’re always more crowded. When we used to do emh’s, we hopped to that park for just the EMH’s.