FYI Disney Manager told me the following: 1. Disney not responsible for Magical Express. This is simply a name licensing to Mears and a contract for luggage service to Mears. 2. Disney not responsible for lost luggage or luggage left at the airport overnight. Luggage is not in Disney's control until it is unloaded at resort.
This is SOOOO incorrect. I'm not doubting it's what you were told, but what you were told is incorrect.
DME is NOT Mears. Repeat: DME is not Mears. This is a common misconception even among some Disney CMs who don't know any better. They hear that Mears is involved and then wrongly assume that Mears runs it. To say that Mears runs DME is like saying that Coca-Cola runs Disney's beverage sales. Coca-Cola is a major supplier of product and materials, but Disney decides how and when and where to sell it and is in charge of doing so, not Coca-Cola; they also sell beverages other than those supplied by Coca-Cola (milk, coffee, etc.). I hope you can understand this analogy.
First of all,
Mears is a subcontractor. Mears supplies buses and drivers.
Mears makes no decisions about where the buses go or how they are dispatched, this is Disney's area. Think of it this way -- in terms of people transportation,
Mears is the muscle but Disney is the brains.
Second,
Mears has nothing to do with baggage, unless you're talking about people whose baggage is taken by the people themselves to the bus for the driver to load under the bus. But in terms of luggage delivery, that has NOTHING to do with Mears.
There is another subcontractor, ARINC (don't know what the initials stand for) that handles logistics, and BAGS Inc. that handles the Resort Airline Check-in desk and the baggage delivery from resort to airport.
Disney absolutely IS responsible for lost luggage. Well, let's put it another way. Once the custody of the luggage changes hands from the airline to Disney, Disney is responsible for it.
Here's how it works (all without a Mears employee in sight):
1. Most of the major airlines drop off DME-tagged luggage at designated drop off points where they are then picked up by a different contractor and taken to a sorting facility. These drop off points are supervised by Disney CM's.
2. Not all airlines use the drop off points. In those cases, Disney stations CMs at the behind-the-scenes conveyor belts to pull the DME-tagged bags off and set them aside (before they make it out onto the baggage claim carousel) to be picked up and taken to the sorting facility.
3. There are Disney CM's assigned to every airline to catch the bags that the airlines missed taking to the drop off point. They also check every unclaimed bag against a manifest to insure that the bags are found even if by chance the guest forgot to put on the tag or it fell off (highly unlikely).
4. All of the bags are scanned when they get to the sorting facility, again after they are put in a cage and again when the cage is put in a truck.
5. The trucks all have GPS devices and their location can be pinpointed at any time.
6. The bags are scanned again when they arrive at the resort and again when taken to a guest's room.
Because of this system, Disney is well aware of where the bags at all times.
If you put DME tags on a bag that doesn't show up, it is Disney's responsibility to track it down for you. They do this without notifying you, so you can just enjoy the start of your vacation. In the few instances when people have waited 8 or 12 or more hours for their luggage to be delivered, many times it wasn't the fault of DME but was because the airline misdirected the luggage (for instance, sending it to MCI instead if MCO) and DME made sure it got reunited with their guest once the airline got the bags to MCO where it belonged.
"simply a name licensing to Mears and a contract for luggage service to Mears" -- so incorrect. Again, I;m sure this is what you were told, but it is simply untrue. You can even look it up on Disney's website, all of the subcontractors to DME and their roles. Mears is one of the subcontractors. The tail does not wag the dog.
I don't know how many of you used the old Mears shuttle system before DME started. Clearly, Mears ran a very inefficient service. Disney, an expert in nearly all it does, created a MUCH MUCH more efficient system, and Mears follows that system's rules regarding the transportation of passengers, nothing more.
