I really blew it - Park passes!!! Help, advice needed!

[wdw&sonny]

Just wanted to share in case in makes you feel better, OP- lots of people are making mistakes/not paying attention to park reservations. I was there last week at a AKV-Kidani bus stop and a woman (who had paid for a whole week at Kidani!) was shocked to hear she needed to make reservations. She had none, and was convinced they wouldn’t turn her away as long as she had a ticket. That’s the hard way to learn!

This is horrible. Unacceptable. How can this happen?
The system should be that you select your park reservations first. Then buy the ticket. There is no way you should be able to have an admission ticket and not be admitted.
If park capacity isn’t available, you should not be able to buy a ticket.
Bad job by Disney.

 

[luv2cheer92]

This is horrible. Unacceptable. How can this happen?
The system should be that you select your park reservations first. Then buy the ticket. There is no way you should be able to have an admission ticket and not be admitted.
If park capacity isn’t available, you should not be able to buy a ticket.
Bad job by Disney.

If you wait to buy a ticket when there is no more availability, the system will not let you buy that ticket. If you buy your ticket when there is availability, but then do not make a park reservation for whatever reason, then it's on you if the parks later become unavailable. I feel like Disney is doing what they can there.

 

[scrappinginontario]

This is horrible. Unacceptable. How can this happen?
The system should be that you select your park reservations first. Then buy the ticket. There is no way you should be able to have an admission ticket and not be admitted.
If park capacity isn’t available, you should not be able to buy a ticket.
Bad job by Disney.

The flip side of this is that people would book up the parks with little/no intention of going and zero financial commitment. Park reservations would still be full and fewer people would actually go to the parks and even more people would be locked out of the parks.

I really can't see it working to book park reservations prior to purchasing tickets.

You also mention that if park capacity isn't available, you should not be able to buy a ticket and that's how the system works now. If all parks are full, you cannot purchase a ticket.

 

[subtchr]

This is horrible. Unacceptable. How can this happen?
The system should be that you select your park reservations first. Then buy the ticket. There is no way you should be able to have an admission ticket and not be admitted.
If park capacity isn’t available, you should not be able to buy a ticket.
Bad job by Disney.

How is this Disney’s fault??

Every step of the way during the ticket purchase process, Disney makes it very clear that park reservations are needed after you purchase tickets, and gives you the opportunity to check availability before purchase.

Every section of the website pertaining to “know before you go” information lays it all out very clearly.

I don’t know what else Disney can do to make it clear what is required. If people are not willing to read the details about booking a vacation that costs thousands of dollars, that’s on them, not Disney.

 

[Grumpy Mouse]

I don’t know what else Disney can do

Plenty. It's a relatively simple software change to force a ticket purchaser (thru their system) to either chose among the available parks or assign a default park (say Epcot since it has the most capacity) at the time of purchase.

I always thought it was incredibly odd that Disney introduced this new park pass requirement but the booking system was completely uncoupled from the ticketing system. And because it was uncoupled, they had to spend all this time warning purchasers to "know before you go" - sorry, that was just, well, stupid. Just about as stupid as the Park Pass system itself.

Furthermore, the idea that I had to completely cancel an existing park pass if I wanted to maybe change to another park was just as boneheaded. This kind of software is not rocket science folks.

Either Disney has about the worst IT group in corporate America (a distinct possibility since they offshored most of their IT a few years ago) - or the possibility of a customer with a purchased ticket but no place to use it was good for... well, you know who.

 

[zemmer]

Plenty. It's a relatively simple software change to force a ticket purchaser (thru their system) to either chose among the available parks or assign a default park (say Epcot since it has the most capacity) at the time of purchase.

I always thought it was incredibly odd that Disney introduced this new park pass requirement but the booking system was completely uncoupled from the ticketing system. And because it was uncoupled, they had to spend all this time warning purchasers to "know before you go" - sorry, that was just, well, stupid. Just about as stupid as the Park Pass system itself.

Furthermore, the idea that I had to completely cancel an existing park pass if I wanted to maybe change to another park was just as boneheaded. This kind of software is not rocket science folks.

Either Disney has about the worst IT group in corporate America (a distinct possibility since they offshored most of their IT a few years ago) - or the possibility of a customer with a purchased ticket but no place to use it was good for... well, you know who.

Many people buy tickets from non-Disney companies. My Military Salute tickets are not date based, they just have an expiration days. Ultimately, it’s up to the consumer to check all requirements of entry.

I do wish they’d change the park reservation system to allow changes like FP and dining. Having to cancel first is risky

 

[focusondisney]

Either Disney has about the worst IT group in corporate America (a distinct possibility since they offshored most of their IT a few years ago)

Yea, they pretty much do. All you have to do is read people’s posts here to know that. The website & app glitch All. The. Time.

 

[HopperFan]

You booked 10 days at HS? No wonder that park fills up so fast. They’ve been releasing more availability so hopefully you can change but the system is pretty black and white. Not to be mean but it was a little unfair to book that many HS days knowing reservations are limited so not sure why/what Disney could do to fix it for you now. Just keep checking.

We bought our tickets and then the next day booked our reservations ... DHS was booked the entire week we are there so we booked extra MK days. When people scoop up DHS reservations then other folks have to book elsewhere because we already committed # of days when we bought our tickets. We then book dining based on our reservations so not likely to change them. SO there is a direct correlation between scooping up reservations at one park and not being able to now get reservations at another park. Always best to book the parks you want to go to the actual number of times you want to go there. It makes no sense to book all your days at one park in this reservation structure, none.

 

[subtchr]

Plenty. It's a relatively simple software change to force a ticket purchaser (thru their system) to either chose among the available parks or assign a default park (say Epcot since it has the most capacity) at the time of purchase.

I always thought it was incredibly odd that Disney introduced this new park pass requirement but the booking system was completely uncoupled from the ticketing system. And because it was uncoupled, they had to spend all this time warning purchasers to "know before you go" - sorry, that was just, well, stupid. Just about as stupid as the Park Pass system itself.

Furthermore, the idea that I had to completely cancel an existing park pass if I wanted to maybe change to another park was just as boneheaded. This kind of software is not rocket science folks.

Either Disney has about the worst IT group in corporate America (a distinct possibility since they offshored most of their IT a few years ago) - or the possibility of a customer with a purchased ticket but no place to use it was good for... well, you know who.

You distorted the intent of my sentence by cutting it off. I wrote, "I don’t know what else Disney can do to make it clear what is required."

Not everyone buys their tickets from Disney. We buy ours from Shades of Green (Disney doesn't sell salute tickets). Others buy from third party websites.

Why is it too much to ask people to read and follow instructions?

I do agree that there should be a modify option that does not require cancellation and rebooking.

 

[Bree]

OP, I had three HS days booked for mid June with intentions of only using two. I needed a specific restaurant on a HS day and finally reserved it last week. I dropped one of the HS days and was able to book some of us for MK using the AP bucket. I was able to grab MK the next day for all but one guest with regular tickets. I just got that last MK reservation I needed this morning. It’s tedious to keep checking, but I’ve always had luck changing days around.

 

[RoseGold]

They just released all the availability! Go change it now!!!

 

[ninafeliz]

		They just released all the availability! Go change it now!!! I don’t see anything different?

 

[MomOTwins]

They just released all the availability! Go change it now!!!

		I don’t see anything different?

It isn’t different when I look either. Wondering if the pp looked at the AP calendar instead?

 

[ninafeliz]

It isn’t different when I look either. Wondering if the pp looked at the AP calendar instead?

Maybe that’s it. I was excited for a couple of minutes until I checked

I was able to change the 6 of us to the MK on July 12th today. I’ve tried refreshing for the MK for the other three for quite a while three separate times, but nothing but deja vu there.

 

[Heather07438]

MK is showing available most days from the 17th and on in July

 

[ninafeliz]

MK is showing available most days from the 17th and on in July

I know, we leave the 17th .

I think I procrastinated/forgot/whatever dumb reason about 1 week too long to just book it the correct way.

 

[FRANKTSJR]

This is poor advice and unfair to GS. What if everyone did this? OP made mistake not Disney.

What? This is supposed to be the "Hospitality Industry". Why is it unfair to call and ask a question? The OP is spending good money for this trip and has every right to call GS.

 

[zoo2tycoon]

What? This is supposed to be the "Hospitality Industry". Why is it unfair to call and ask a question? The OP is spending good money for this trip and has every right to call GS.

Everyone pays good money to go to Disney. OP chose to book all their days at Hollywood Studio- nobody forced them to. OP then discovers after finalizing plans that oops there is no availability at the other parks, when they decide they don't want all those days at Hollywood Studios. HOW IS THIS THE FAULT OF DISNEY? OP made the choice to book all days at Hollywood Studios in order to get a boarding group for ROTR- the OP taking all those days eliminated some group from being able to get a reservation into Hollywood Studios on any certain day that OP hoarded the reservations. Why should Disney make right because of OP's hoarding reservations only to discover OOPS there is no more park availability? Disney doesn't owe OP anything, they did nothing wrong. OP needs to watch for park availability and rectify their error on their own. What if everyone did this?

Disney does say no. People go and say they didn't get a boarding group for ROTR and Disney will not give them one. Disney can't pixie dust everyone's error. This is totally on OP, and to say Disney is in the hospitality business and should correct this- I totally disagree as OP made this problem themselves. NOT DISNEY.

 

[ENJDisneyFan]

What? This is supposed to be the "Hospitality Industry". Why is it unfair to call and ask a question? The OP is spending good money for this trip and has every right to call GS.

There’s a difference between calling GS for help (as in, there may be availability that isn’t shown online and GS can help make the change) versus calling GS and expecting pixie dust (as in, expecting availability to magically appear). IMO the former is acceptable but the latter is not.

 

[Lugan]

The big problem is two-fold: 1) You have to release park reservations to attempt to make new ones at a different park, and only during that step do you know if there is actual availability or not and 2) Epcot, the largest park, capacity-wise, continues to open at 11am everyday.

Nobody wants to "settle" for an Epcot day after dropping their park reservation, and park-hop @ 2pm. If Epcot opened at the normal 9am time, as it has in the past, then people might be more willing to settle for an Epcot reservation and then park hop in the afternoon.

But worse is that you can't change your reservation, you have to cancel and re-reserve. This was fine when availability was far more fluid late last year, but now it's ridiculous that this is the system Disney has hitched themselves to for the next year.