Disability Access Service (DAS) Updates

[Angel Ariel]

I think maybe if they had smallish, soundproof rooms that accommodated one family at a time it might work...but not if they were the only option available, though. My boys would drive us bonkers if we expected them to sit and wait - we're better off being out and about, or even standing in a shorter line with things to look at and other families to talk to.

yeah, being closed in to a small space is not a favorite for DD (she had difficulties with FOP because of this)…and I doubt they could make enough individual rooms to accommodate all the families who may need it at the same time. I can definitely see such rooms as an option, but not the only one.

 

[rct247]

The DAS holder can tap in and then walk the line with the group and then exit at boarding, from what I have seen in the parks

However, the DAS holder is supposed to be accompanying and riding the rides in order for it to be used. While they don't hold it against someone if they truly decided to opt-out at the last moment, if they do discover it is a trend, they will address it as abuse and it could be revoked.

 

[RSoxNo1]

However, the DAS holder is supposed to be accompanying and riding the rides in order for it to be used. While they don't hold it against someone if they truly decided to opt-out at the last moment, if they do discover it is a trend, they will address it as abuse and it could be revoked.

My understanding is that the DAS holder is supposed to participate in the ride which makes sense. I also understand that in the event there is a young child as part of the group that not all group members are required to ride at the same time.

Some things I've learned about the system:

• I've seen anecdotally that the time waiting for the video call has been between 3-7 hours.
• In order to make the two advanced DAS reservations per day you need to be 30 days out from the end of your trip, not the beginning
• The advanced DAS selections are only available for the Genie+ attractions and are not available for any of the Individual Lightning Lane Selections
• Day of DAS selections are available for both Genie+ attractions and Individual Lightning Lane Selections
• Day of DAS selections can be made even if you have not used either of the advanced DAS selections.

 

[Rider]

A follow up to my trip and DAS test. As I mentioned the app worked well for booking DAS times after the first day.

Overall I give the changes to the in park experience an A+. Using the app to book times is a huge improvement.

Some tips:

You can get your first time as soon as everyone in your group enters the park. (And I assume the park opens but we were never that early).
You can get another time as soon as your group taps on the final touch point of the attraction. This means you can start on your next wait even before you get on the current ride.
Using Genie+ with DAS doesn't seem worth it unless you really want to maximize your day (or have party members who want to go off on their own). We tried on Day 1 at MK and while it was nice to step off Haunted Mansion after using G+ and have our DAS time at Peter Pan ready it really felt like it wasn't worth the cost.
Based on the previous posts being able to make 2 advanced bookings doesn't seem worth it (especially not waiting 2-7 hours on hold). You can quickly get times with the app and we had no issues doing everything we wanted (even multiple times).

Occasionally I would have issues like not being able to book a new time because it didn't register us as having ridden our previous attraction. The app allows you to cancel times but it was a bit buggy and didn't always work. When that happened I had to go to a DAS CM at our next attraction and have them override it with a new time. Not a big deal but a bit annoying. Hopefully it will be fixed.

 

[RSoxNo1]

A follow up to my trip and DAS test. As I mentioned the app worked well for booking DAS times after the first day.

Overall I give the changes to the in park experience an A+. Using the app to book times is a huge improvement.

Some tips:

You can get your first time as soon as everyone in your group enters the park. (And I assume the park opens but we were never that early).
You can get another time as soon as your group taps on the final touch point of the attraction. This means you can start on your next wait even before you get on the current ride.
Using Genie+ with DAS doesn't seem worth it unless you really want to maximize your day (or have party members who want to go off on their own). We tried on Day 1 at MK and while it was nice to step off Haunted Mansion after using G+ and have our DAS time at Peter Pan ready it really felt like it wasn't worth the cost.
Based on the previous posts being able to make 2 advanced bookings doesn't seem worth it (especially not waiting 2-7 hours on hold). You can quickly get times with the app and we had no issues doing everything we wanted (even multiple times).

Occasionally I would have issues like not being able to book a new time because it didn't register us as having ridden our previous attraction. The app allows you to cancel times but it was a bit buggy and didn't always work. When that happened I had to go to a DAS CM at our next attraction and have them override it with a new time. Not a big deal but a bit annoying. Hopefully it will be fixed.

Thanks for sharing. Did you try making a DAS reservation for a different park that you weren't yet inside?

 

[Rider]

Thanks for sharing. Did you try making a DAS reservation for a different park that you weren't yet inside?

It only lets you book for the park you are in.

 

[RSoxNo1]

I logged in at 7:37 AM to start the process.
At 10:02 a cast member joined the chat and had me submit information that was already attached to my Disney account (I was logged in). She quoted me 2 hours from this point. I'm posting this at 1:24 PM and have not yet started the video chat. I anticipated a 7 hour process and I'm not yet there. I am however approaching hour 6.

EDIT: at 1:31 a CM checked in to confirm that they are still there and are waiting for the video team. That CM would not commit to a time frame.

I expect this, so this isn't really a surprise or frustrating to me. What is frustrating is language like, "we are experiencing higher wait times than usual". No you're not, you're under staffed for this and this new service always has very long waits. Let's not pretend that sometimes it's substantially shorter.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

Update on our DAS experience… we didn’t get to the park until almost 7pm our first day (flight delays due to weather) and guest services had us set up in less than 10 minutes. Very simple and the CM was fantastic and walked us through the app process.

We didn’t use it at all the first night as we just enjoyed some Food and Wine selections, watched Harmonious, and took a million pictures with the beautifully lit up SSE but set up in person was fast and simple.

The next morning the DAS button appeared about 15 minutes before opening (15 minutes after early entry) and was amazingly simple, so much easier than trekking all over the park looking for a CM to get return times. It worked flawlessly for us the rest of the vacation (we had to reboot the app about a hundred times but the DAS part itself was perfect).

We didn’t bother with Genie+ or LL because the crowds were relatively light, so light we only used DAS probably 2 times a day on average, it was an amazing trip and I thought the DAS was a serious improvement over the previous system. As Rider said above... A+.

 

[RSoxNo1]

2:32 PM, I started the video chat, 6 hours and 55 minutes in. I'm now working with someone to book DAS advanced reservations.

 

[RSoxNo1]

Beginning at 2:45 I started talking with a CM to book the advanced selections. This part is far and away the most painful because the CM isn't actively responding to questions about the advanced selections.

I have 8 total park days and despite my giving her the attractions I want for each day we have yet to finalize anything.

 

[RSoxNo1]

3:35 PM I have my first day booked (took 7 hours 58 minutes), she booked day 2 within a few minutes of that, but then just messaged me that she is stepping away from her desk

 

[RSoxNo1]

Some things that I've learned today...

• There is now a hard cap of 6 guests on a DAS reservation either advanced or in the park that day. You can have more than 6 total guests approved, but any given reservation can only have 6 guests. At the attraction entrance, it is up to the discretion of the CM to allow an additional guest if the group is larger than 6.
• You do a bit of pre-screening ahead of the video portion of the experience. Once the video call takes place (that took 10 minutes), they take a photo with the guest requiring the DAS.
• For each advanced selection, they give up to 3 different time options, morning, early afternoon, and evening.
• Advanced DAS selections can overlap each other

 

[correcaminos]

Some things that I've learned today...

• There is now a hard cap of 6 guests on a DAS reservation either advanced or in the park that day. You can have more than 6 total guests approved, but any given reservation can only have 6 guests. At the attraction entrance, it is up to the discretion of the CM to allow an additional guest if the group is larger than 6.
• You do a bit of pre-screening ahead of the video portion of the experience. Once the video call takes place (that took 10 minutes), they take a photo with the guest requiring the DAS.
• For each advanced selection, they give up to 3 different time options, morning, early afternoon, and evening.
• Advanced DAS selections can overlap each other

Interesting. I say that because they said no overlapping of selections in advance. I was not asked my preference for time either. Guess that's a learning curve for them.

I am so sorry yours was so long as well. A part of me wonders if they hope this will discourage some from using DAS.

 

[RSoxNo1]

All in, the entire process took just shy of 9 hours. Post video portion it was another hour and 40 minutes. I'm glad we did it, but there's a couple of unknowns that still remain. Mainly the first two days of our trip we will have 7 adults and may face some issues with the DAS pass. It sounds like the 6 person cap can be bent in the park, but not over the video call.

 

[Dave B]

Why would anyone spend 7 hours on the phones when it can be taken care of in the parks within 10-15 minutes, I am very confused

 

[DryerLintFan]

Why would anyone spend 7 hours on the phones when it can be taken care of in the parks within 10-15 minutes, I am very confused

We've never had any issues in the park getting DAS, but I'd sit on hold for hours for the chance to show up in MK and just walk up main Street without having to stop at guest services. It's not like you can't do anything else while the hold music plays.

Plus it would be nice to have it buttoned up before getting there so there's one less task on the to do list

 

[Dave B]

I hear you, I do like me some Disney music, but it does not have to be the first thing you do, we usually don't get it added until we are leaving around 1130- noon on our first day, don't really need first thing as there are typically no lines in the mornings, then we add it on our way back for pool and resort time, then we have it for the rest of the trip

 

[RSoxNo1]

Why would anyone spend 7 hours on the phones when it can be taken care of in the parks within 10-15 minutes, I am very confused

The primary benefit would be the advanced bookings. I have heard conflicting reports on whether or not Guest Services in the park can make those advanced bookings for you. Even if they could, I would anticipate them being unable to get the first two days of your trip because the language on the website says advanced bookings must be made 2-30 days in advance.

Having said that, when combined with Lightning Lane, a traditional DAS should allow most groups to be incredibly efficient. I expect what we've done in preparation of this trip to be completely transparent to my brother (the person who requires the DAS). I waited for the advanced bookings at least in part, to understand the process. If we go on another trip next year and the process hasn't improved, I imagine we probably won't bother with the advanced reservations.

 

[correcaminos]

The primary benefit would be the advanced bookings. I have heard conflicting reports on whether or not Guest Services in the park can make those advanced bookings for you. Even if they could, I would anticipate them being unable to get the first two days of your trip because the language on the website says advanced bookings must be made 2-30 days in advance.

Having said that, when combined with Lightning Lane, a traditional DAS should allow most groups to be incredibly efficient. I expect what we've done in preparation of this trip to be completely transparent to my brother (the person who requires the DAS). I waited for the advanced bookings at least in part, to understand the process. If we go on another trip next year and the process hasn't improved, I imagine we probably won't bother with the advanced reservations.

This is how I feel. I have a few trips coming up next year, and honestly if this system doesn't improve or I find the advanced bookings not worth it, I'll just do it in person. Often I have to activate an AP one trip anyway so those won't really be worth doing in advance if it remains this convoluted

 

[JoeCamel]

The primary benefit would be the advanced bookings. I have heard conflicting reports on whether or not Guest Services in the park can make those advanced bookings for you. Even if they could, I would anticipate them being unable to get the first two days of your trip because the language on the website says advanced bookings must be made 2-30 days in advance.

Having said that, when combined with Lightning Lane, a traditional DAS should allow most groups to be incredibly efficient. I expect what we've done in preparation of this trip to be completely transparent to my brother (the person who requires the DAS). I waited for the advanced bookings at least in part, to understand the process. If we go on another trip next year and the process hasn't improved, I imagine we probably won't bother with the advanced reservations.

So the person needing DAS has to be available the entire call on the off chance they might get around to the video portion? Sounds like they need to set call back times when they know how long each call takes.