Cashless Disney and the Mark of the Magic Band

[Jon81uk]

The MagicBands for international guests isn't an issue as only those staying at a Disney resort get them for free anyway. So US guests get them in the mail, everyone else collects at the front desk.

I don't see them giving free magic bands to guests not staying on-property, therefore cashless based around a MagicBand is unlikely. Maybe they will add the ability to add funds to your Disney account and spend either via MagicBand or a barcode in the App similar to Starbucks. But again this means Disney then has to manage everyones electronic wallets and refund at the end of a trip etc. Far easier just to accept credit card payments.

I already use very little cash, as if I lose a bank note it is lost, lose my credit card and I can get it cancelled and get another one, the actual money is safe. Also UK law protects all the money stored in the bank account, so it is far safer than a box of cash.
At a recent visit to Disneyland California I used Apple Pay everywhere, couldn't be bothered with carrying around all the change and coins (except I had some for pressed pennies!).
I think society (particularly in London, UK) is going cashless, contactless bank card use is huge over here now so cash use will keep falling (and checks/cheques are almost never accepted over here now).

 

[wdisney9000]

Yes. But it's getting more and more inconvenient to use cash today. I live in Florida. I could wait 10 minutes at the Turnpike booth to pay my $7 toll. Or I could just tag a credit card to a Sunpass sticker and fly right through.

Or I could spend 20 minutes in line for QS at Disney. But it is more convenient if I mobile order.

Toll booth and mobile order are just two examples of how cashless can be convenient, but there are far more examples of how using cash is much more convenient and save time.

I have witnessed the MB scanners fail and/or malfunction many times. Even when it works, it can take some time for the transaction to process. I use cash. It is fail safe. If the scanners are down or malfunctioning, it doesnt matter. I have even had a few experiences where the register wasnt working properly but they could still take my cash and make change. Cash doesnt malfunction. I dont need a receipt either with cash. At F&W last year, the scanner went out at the booth I was at. People had to stand there and wait while they swapped out scanners. I simply handed them cash and they gave me change. I had my food and beer and was leaving while they were still working on the issue. And furthermore, it can be a hassle to keep up with how much you have spent when scanning your magic band.

I got double billed when I ordered a turkey sandwich on our trip in April this year. I noticed it when I checked my account in the morning then I had to go to front desk and it took about fifteen minutes for them to clear it up. Had I used cash, that could not have happened.

 

[Hayley In Wonderland]

No, for the simple fact that it would be too difficult for international guests. I personally never use my bank cards abroad and will either take cash or a pre-loaded money card (not sure if these can be linked or not). They have to facilitate to everyone, not just US guests.

 

[Hayley In Wonderland]

I think society (particularly in London, UK) is going cashless, contactless bank card use is huge over here now so cash use will keep falling (and checks/cheques are almost never accepted over here now).

Crazy, when I visited the US last year most places still don't even have chip & pin in place, they still have the ol' swipe option! I've only ever swiped my card in the UK once when my pin & contactless wouldn't work.

 

[correcaminos]

It's amazing how many heads this post flew over. It's actually a slight bit concerning.

Or maybe that wasn't the intention. Or maybe, like me, it's not an idea that I'm really familiar with. I wouldn't have thought of it that way if you hadn't posted and made me think about what you were implying. So not concerning to me since it's not relevant to me.

As to the OP, I doubt we'll see Disney ever 100% cashless. Too many reasons why. We're mostly cashless when we go, but still use cash to tip bell services and such. Though we might tip more if we could do it via magic band.

 

[Jon81uk]

Crazy, when I visited the US last year most places still don't even have chip & pin in place, they still have the ol' swipe option! I've only ever swiped my card in the UK once when my pin & contactless wouldn't work.

Yep, Disneyland was one of the few places that consistently accepted Apple Pay or contactless and if I did use chip and PIN it surprised a lot of store staff as they were so used to swipes.

Whereas in London a lot of store have to put signs on the till stating contactless is NOT available here as everyone is so used to just tapping.

 

[MickeyMan36]

Cashless? Probably not. I'm a season pass holder and I would love it if my magic band had a card associated with it, so I can use my magic band to make purchases like I do when I am staying at a resort.

 

[Goofyernmost]

Crazy, when I visited the US last year most places still don't even have chip & pin in place, they still have the ol' swipe option! I've only ever swiped my card in the UK once when my pin & contactless wouldn't work.

Yes, I noticed that when I went to Europe two years ago. Here we are so smugly thinking of ourselves as so technologically superior and we didn't even have many places using the chip card. We may be thought of as progressive, but, we are as backwards as a 1st world country can get.

 

[carnini]

interesting question, but as someone who never carries cash around I already use the MB for almost everything when I visit.
I cant see it being mandatory to use MB. I figure they are tracking me in some aspect, especially say the buses.

 

[joshwill]

there is no law or statute requiring businesses, public or private, to accept cash as payment

 

[ppet]

As long as my money says "Legal tender for all debts public and private" I shall continue to use cash. I think putting your financial data on a phone is a horrendous risk. They are extremely easy to hack. I will use my magic band for access, but I will continue to carry cash.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

This whole conversation ignores the fact that Disney relies on people going into debt on their vacations. How many people who travel with a budget of $2,000 actually stick to that? I'd imagine the percent is very low, not to mention the people who go without even considering their budget in the first place. By incentivizing you to prepay onto what is essentially a gift card, Disney is inviting you to cap your spending and monitor it, because you're going to know when you run out of funds. Contrast that with people who talk all the time about waiting for that first credit card bill to figure out how much they spent after the fact.

 

[Bpmorley]

They'd know John Q Public had 36 drinks last Saturday at F&W over a three hour period ... and only ate an egg roll. They could in essence look at capping alcohol sales at x per y (x being amount - y being time). Sure there are ways to game that, but it'd be fine tuned over time and morph into some top secret algo. (Yeah, some will say Disney would never give up the opportunity to make money by capping alcohol, but the calculus also need include liability and guest experience - They'll let you get "Happy" but won't let you get "Goofy")

The algo's created by this info would be downright scary.

I can't see them ever turning down $$$$$$$$$. They've done nothing but get greedier over the past 5 years or so.
Also, how do they know I didn't just put a 12 pack down at the pool before I hit EPCOT?

 

[susan mccartney]

So. Got to talking with a fellow Disney-ite and topics ranged all over the place (like they usually do when you talk Disney...the Guinness' didn't hurt either)

The cashless topic came up and it does make a lot of sense. Can anyone see a "World" where cash and credit are no longer accepted, in lieu of "loading" up your magic band with a credit/debit card (thus ALL payments would be made via MB).

Before you arbitrarily dismiss this.....it would solve a lot of issues and it would give Disney a lot more information into guest spending and behavior.

Think of a world where everyone visiting Disney has an MDE account. The data relative to that alone, along with the ability to track guest behavior (tourist and local alike), spending habits, etc., would be mind boggling.

They'd know John Q Public had 36 drinks last Saturday at F&W over a three hour period ... and only ate an egg roll. They could in essence look at capping alcohol sales at x per y (x being amount - y being time). Sure there are ways to game that, but it'd be fine tuned over time and morph into some top secret algo. (Yeah, some will say Disney would never give up the opportunity to make money by capping alcohol, but the calculus also need include liability and guest experience - They'll let you get "Happy" but won't let you get "Goofy")

Get on a bus MB, get on a boat MB, get on a Gondola MB. Today, how do they gauge utilization? I've yet to see a bus driver do a head count. Maybe they do and are just sneaky that way. But the bus driver doesn't know "who" is getting on their bus. Think of the ability to gauge utilization (resort guest and non-resort guest) vs time window. Better planning = cost saving for Disney.

RFID is watching...it's always watching. If you're wearing a MB they know when you got there, know when you left, know where you went. But in a lot of cases they don't know what you did. They can tell you were in the Emporium last Wednesday at 2:45pm - but they don't know if you made a purchase (unless you voluntarily used a MB - a lot of locals and guest still use CC's, GC's, and cash). Forcing you to use the MB for purchase is a goldmine of data and information.

It would also aid in identifying ways being used to try to game the system. They'd quickly be able to identify that an inordinate amount of locals were catching the bus from DS to the Contemporary or Beach Club and stayed there for 9 hours before they caught the bus back to Disney Springs.

The algo's created by this info would be downright scary.

I prefer Disney or anyone NOT to know everything about me and my spending habits. Next they will want to know how many times I go to the bathroom in a day.

 

[rio]

I used to always want to carry and spend in cash. Now, I rarely have over $20 if I have cash at all, and that’s only for small purchases, machines that don’t take cards, or special events. When I went overseas, I didn’t use cash at all. It really isn’t convenient anymore. Come to think of it, even when I withdrew hundred of dollars from my bank, they didn’t give me hundreds or fifties, I got twenties.

Cash really isn’t as convenient as cards anymore. Plus, if someone manages to steal my card/card into, I can dispute any charges they make, and I don’t lose anything compared to it they took cash. I really would not be surprised to see Disney fade out cash, or set up “cash deposit and withdrawal” areas at their parks.

And a business not accepting cash in the US is legal, if they explicitly specify so before hand. State law can be more specific, but I’m not sure if Florida has a law that is. If Disney wants, I see no reason for them to do it.

 

[donsullivan]

As long as my money says "Legal tender for all debts public and private" I shall continue to use cash. I think putting your financial data on a phone is a horrendous risk. They are extremely easy to hack. I will use my magic band for access, but I will continue to carry cash.

Wow! There is a whole lot of misinformation to unpack in there.
1) Contactless payments with a phone or watch (ApplePay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay) are actually much, much more secure and safe than using your physical card. Every single time you use it for payment a new, unique number is generated for the transaction that gets approved by your bank and then is discarded immediately and can never be used again. As a result, no card skimmer can even get your number, no merchant can track your transactions with the number, it's never stored in a merchants database that gets hacked (Home Depot, Target, etc..) and even if it is, it's useless because it was only good for that one transaction. As a result, the whole process is MUCH more secure than using your physical card for payment.
2) Please show me some proof that the contactless payment information on any mobile phone has been hacked and used to generate a fraudulent payment transaction anywhere. The banks required a very significant level of encryption on the phones that has not been hacked on any manufacturer. Just because you heard someone hacked into a phone has nothing whatsoever to do with contactless payment.

If you choose to continue using cash for your transactions that is totally within your rights and I cannot think of a single merchant that would/should turn it away, except for a large dollar value transaction maybe. But to blindly suggest that contactless payment used around the globe is insecure is simply not a true statement.

 

[ppet]

Wow! There is a whole lot of misinformation to unpack in there.
1) Contactless payments with a phone or watch (ApplePay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay) are actually much, much more secure and safe than using your physical card. Every single time you use it for payment a new, unique number is generated for the transaction that gets approved by your bank and then is discarded immediately and can never be used again. As a result, no card skimmer can even get your number, no merchant can track your transactions with the number, it's never stored in a merchants database that gets hacked (Home Depot, Target, etc..) and even if it is, it's useless because it was only good for that one transaction. As a result, the whole process is MUCH more secure than using your physical card for payment.
2) Please show me some proof that the contactless payment information on any mobile phone has been hacked and used to generate a fraudulent payment transaction anywhere. The banks required a very significant level of encryption on the phones that has not been hacked on any manufacturer. Just because you heard someone hacked into a phone has nothing whatsoever to do with contactless payment.

If you choose to continue using cash for your transactions that is totally within your rights and I cannot think of a single merchant that would/should turn it away, except for a large dollar value transaction maybe. But to blindly suggest that contactless payment used around the globe is insecure is simply not a true statement.

My two biggest fears with mobile pay apps is the amount and rapid advancement of malware. Also I watch too many people who connect to every open wifi hotspot. The ability to "spoof" your phone and virtual wallet does exist. I understand the convenience of cashless payments, but I'm old enough to have both nostalgia for the old ways and a healthy distrust of governments and authorities in power. Finally ( and this is just a belief also) people seem to part with their money quicker when it is only electrons versus cold hard cash.

Lastly I swore off of Apple in the early 1980s after working with and Apple 2e system. I haven't touched one since and I won't. Sorry for rambling.

 

[David copperfield]

7

So. Got to talking with a fellow Disney-ite and topics ranged all over the place (like they usually do when you talk Disney...the Guinness' didn't hurt either)

The cashless topic came up and it does make a lot of sense. Can anyone see a "World" where cash and credit are no longer accepted, in lieu of "loading" up your magic band with a credit/debit card (thus ALL payments would be made via MB).

Before you arbitrarily dismiss this.....it would solve a lot of issues and it would give Disney a lot more information into guest spending and behavior.

Think of a world where everyone visiting Disney has an MDE account. The data relative to that alone, along with the ability to track guest behavior (tourist and local alike), spending habits, etc., would be mind boggling.

They'd know John Q Public had 36 drinks last Saturday at F&W over a three hour period ... and only ate an egg roll. They could in essence look at capping alcohol sales at x per y (x being amount - y being time). Sure there are ways to game that, but it'd be fine tuned over time and morph into some top secret algo. (Yeah, some will say Disney would never give up the opportunity to make money by capping alcohol, but the calculus also need include liability and guest experience - They'll let you get "Happy" but won't let you get "Goofy")


Sorry if i am off topic bit i can not find anything more recent than 2015 in search. Are key to the kingdom cards still an option when checking in? I saw on 'momspanel' a flat 'kttw cards are no longer available' dated 2017 but ronannarbor 2014 post here had 'cards will always be available' straight from disney.

 

[donsullivan]

My two biggest fears with mobile pay apps is the amount and rapid advancement of malware. Also I watch too many people who connect to every open wifi hotspot. The ability to "spoof" your phone and virtual wallet does exist. I understand the convenience of cashless payments, but I'm old enough to have both nostalgia for the old ways and a healthy distrust of governments and authorities in power. Finally ( and this is just a belief also) people seem to part with their money quicker when it is only electrons versus cold hard cash.

Lastly I swore off of Apple in the early 1980s after working with and Apple 2e system. I haven't touched one since and I won't. Sorry for rambling.

I would love to see actual evidence that digital wallets like ApplePay, GooglePay and/or SamsungPay have actually been compromised in the wild vs. just speculation on the topic. Since I use ApplePay every single day it would be very important to me to be aware if something like that had actually happened. As someone who watches that industry space quite closely I'm reasonably confident that I would have heard/read about such an event had it happened and I do not recall ever seeing anything like that actually happening vs just speculated. I'm really hoping I haven't missed any factual reporting that such an event has actually happened.

 

[Astro_Digital]

At home which is Canada I never carry cash, there are limits on Google Pay spend more that $100 you need to use the card's chip.
I know many people that visit WDW do not come from the US, many do not stay at Disney Hotels, and many do not spend all their time in WDW. For these people if WDW said you need Magic Bands !!!

Cashless maybe in 10 or 15 years but by then "hard" cash will be obsolete just about everywhere.
Magic Bands.... even then I can not see WDW forcing you to use them; if you have Google Pay or Apple Pay if would be good enough and for large purchases chips will work for WDW.

For the people that never used Google Pay IT IS SAFE, if it was not safe banks that are liable would be on the hook, also every time you make a purchase you get a digital confirmation.