The fact this is even a concern is mind boggling on a forum where stories of excess guest recovery fall from trees. People are this concerned about their $20 while they pay disney $80 for stupid prixe menus? The angst over trivial amounts is hysterical
Maybe because some of us have seen situations that *if* Disney’s vaunted Guest Services and recovery were that great, something should have been offered but wasn’t.
In May, a friend purchased a 4 day ticket to avoid using her old 2 non-expiring days on MDE. She knew she had to have the ticket priority set in advance, so she called IT prior to her trip, and was in a 2 hr queue and the phone call lasted an hour. Got to AK on Day 1, and before we left the park noticed it pulled the 1st non-expiring day, not the 4-day. So she spent over an hour at AK GS to get the ticket restored and was assured that tomorrow it would pull the right one. Next day, at DHS she enters the park, and it pulled the 2nd non-expiring day. Another hour at DHS guest services to get the 2nd day restored. This time the CM was clever enough to put the replacement tickets on a separate MDE profile. But the only thing Disney said was, “There is an old and new ticketing computer and they aren’t talking well.” Not an apology for the mistake or for how much time she spent on this…5 hrs at this point. And certainly no recovery offered such as a free anytime FP. To follow up on this, a couple days ago, I saw on the DIS a thread of people who were in a similar situation who noticed that in one of these updates leading up to Genie+ that their replacement complimentary tickets were no longer showing in MDE at all. I was meaning to ask my friend to double check hers to make sure they were still there, but haven't yet. I just wonder how many people DIDN’T know about the priority process and attempted to get it set right in advance so they don't notice that their non-expiring tickets got zapped until they go to use them. Which I'm sure at that point people will just give up, because how do your prove what you have months or even a year or two after they were zapped?
The actual cost is irrelevant. It’s the principle that when the business screws up, guests shouldn’t have to jump through hoops to get remediation. That is never trivial. Worse now, that phone attempts at contacting GS results in hours on hold. A month or so ago we ordered Jersey Mike’s on mobile order and apparently they were out of brownies. The employee didn’t say a word, but DH noticed. He said, "So you were going to let us pay for brownies that we didn’t receive?" He shrugged and gave him cookies, which cost less. DH filled out a complaint online asking to be credited for the brownies or at least the difference in cookies vs brownies. Yes, it's only like a dollar, but people should never be charged for something they don't receive. The next day the owner called refunded our money for the whole order and gave us a gift card for future use. That’s how you really do recovery.
I’m sure if you cry or make a scene, or they think someone will post on Social Media like a Skyliner incident (which friend had for the 50th and GS was proactively with iPads, giving everyone who exited a FP)... then you get offered recovery. But if you are just there with a big problem and try to be nice and patient, otherwise known as a reasonable customer... I have to wonder how often it really is initiated by Disney based on my friend's situation, which extended to GS in *two* different parks... so no, guest recovery does NOT fall from trees, and they do not fall over backwards even to fix problems their systems created.
