New DAS System at Walt Disney World 2024

[pigglewiggle]

Hopefully with the move to a third-party service Disney also does the following:

1) Do away with unlimited rides, and cap it like Genie+ does
2) Cap ability to experience an ILL attraction to once or twice a day; no reason DAS should get preferential access above other guests
3) Cap how many individuals can be part of the party, or how often they can cycle “family” members in and out of a party
4) DAS holder must experience attraction with the rest of the group

I was surprised when I heard someone talking about using DAS and they were able to include all the members of their traveling party on it. 9 people total - immediately family of user, then aunts/uncles/cousins.
It does seem excessive that everyone in the party gets access and not just the guest who needs it and perhaps their immediate family. Although this person may have been explaining how it works to us incorrectly, was kind of just breezing through the story.

 

[TrainsOfDisney]

there is going to be a long line for attractions no matter what - I’ve never been concerned with people abusing the system and making my wait time a few more minutes. The family up front that asks too many questions so a seat goes empty on a dispatch is probably taking up as much time.

why on earth people are so concerned with this is beyond me.

 

[Brian]

Hopefully with the move to a third-party service Disney also does the following:

1) Do away with unlimited rides, and cap it like Genie+ does

Are non-disabled guests capped on the number of times they can experience an attraction? No, they can get in line for an attraction, experience it, then get right back in line, and repeat until the park closes. DAS guests (with legitimate disabilities) utilize this service in lieu of waiting in line because they cannot do it otherwise, so why should they be limited while the non-disabled guest is not?

3) Cap how many individuals can be part of the party, or how often they can cycle “family” members in and out of a party

The number of guests that can be included as part of a single DAS entitlement (return time) is already capped. The ability to "cycle" members in and out of the DAS selections one would make each day is very similar to how a large party without a disabled guest might choose to split up and experience different things based on personal preferences and other factors.

4) DAS holder must experience attraction with the rest of the group

This is already the requirement.

 

[StarWarsGirl]

Eh, honestly - it shouldn't be that controversial, except to people who can no longer abuse the system, who will just be outing themselves as the reason for this.

First, I think most people who don't have to use DAS, seeing the abuse curtailed is a good thing.

And as I said above, if you do need a DAS, you already have this or can easily get it. If you need accommodations at Disney, then you need them in regular life, Disney is practically the only place that just goes on the "honor system". To get any benefits anywhere - public or private school, government, etc., you need such extensive documentation that a basic doctors note is almost laughable in ease to get, if by some extreme oddity you don't already have one.

So out of the people who use this, the only ones this affects are those who are self-diagnosed, somehow manage to get through everything else in life without any accommodation, or the people who exaggerate or outright lie to get them.

I'm sure that we will see some folks say otherwise, but that's going to take some severe mental gymnastics to explain how you don't get any accommodations anywhere else in life, are under no form of medical care for the disability whatsoever, but somehow your disability only affects you waiting in line at a theme park.

Let me start off by saying that I fully understand why this would be done. Too many people abuse this.

That being said, it is a pain in the rear to get accomodations. In the case of my brother, he has autism, but the school system diagnosed him. He didn't see a regular doctor for it until his teen years when he went on medication.

I've had to get accomodations myself for school/work (I don't use the DAS) and every time, the doctor has to do new documentation. You can't reuse old notes. It's usually back and forth to get it correct. It's not as simple as when you get a sick note from the doctor.

It also takes time. The first time we used the DAS, we got it in the middle of the trip because my brother was having meltdown after meltdown. There's no way we would have been able to quickly get documentation in the middle of the trip.

Like I said, I fully understand why they'd do it as other parks have, but there's still pain points for those who need it. It's a shame that abusers have ruined it for people who need it.

 

[nicb88]

Hopefully with the move to a third-party service Disney also does the following:

1) Do away with unlimited rides, and cap it like Genie+ does
2) Cap ability to experience an ILL attraction to once or twice a day; no reason DAS should get preferential access above other guests
3) Cap how many individuals can be part of the party, or how often they can cycle “family” members in and out of a party
4) DAS holder must experience attraction with the rest of the group

Re points 1 and 2, DAS isn’t just a ‘free’ version of Genie for disabled people.

It’s a way of avoiding physically queuing. You still have to wait the queue time to get on the ride. So in that sense it’s unlimited in the same way as it would be queuing physically.

 

[Pi on my Cake]

Hopefully with the move to a third-party service Disney also does the following:

1) Do away with unlimited rides, and cap it like Genie+ does
2) Cap ability to experience an ILL attraction to once or twice a day; no reason DAS should get preferential access above other guests
3) Cap how many individuals can be part of the party, or how often they can cycle “family” members in and out of a party
4) DAS holder must experience attraction with the rest of the group

1) regular guests aren't capped in how many lines they can enter. All DAS does is let people who can't wait in regular lines for a long time wait elsewhere. Capping that would be like limiting how far people who rent wheelchairs can ride around before they have to walk the rest of the day
2) Again, regular guests aren't capped in how many lines they can enter. All DAS does is let people who can't wait in regular lines for a long time wait elsewhere.
3) there is a cap, I don't remember how many people it is, but it is not unlimited and every party member has to be registered at guest relations
4) that already is the rule

Not saying people aren't faking needing DAS or finding loopholes, but we shouldn't be so quick to punish those who actually need help just because other abuse the system

 

[Brian]

3) there is a cap, I don't remember how many people it is but it is not unlimited and every party member has to be registered at guest relations

Six is the maximum per DAS entitlement (return time), including the disabled guest.

 

[Pi on my Cake]

Let me start off by saying that I fully understand why this would be done. Too many people abuse this.

That being said, it is a pain in the rear to get accomodations. In the case of my brother, he has autism, but the school system diagnosed him. He didn't see a regular doctor for it until his teen years when he went on medication.

I've had to get accomodations myself for school/work (I don't use the DAS) and every time, the doctor has to do new documentation. You can't reuse old notes. It's usually back and forth to get it correct. It's not as simple as when you get a sick note from the doctor.

It also takes time. The first time we used the DAS, we got it in the middle of the trip because my brother was having meltdown after meltdown. There's no way we would have been able to quickly get documentation in the middle of the trip.

Like I said, I fully understand why they'd do it as other parks have, but there's still pain points for those who need it. It's a shame that abusers have ruined it for people who need it.

All of this is without even mentioning how expensive Healthcare is in America and how insurance is generally tied to employment and offered mostly by the types of jobs that people with these disabilities have difficulties doing.

Granted, if you can afford a Disney trip you can probably afford an occasional doctor visit. And self diagnoses without visiting a professional can be a very slippery slope (there can be a thin line between "Seeking help online for free is my only practical option right now and this has made my life better since I better understand my body/mind now and can find ways to help" vs "TikTok said I have every issue anyone has ever had so now I'm certified quirky I'm so OCD that I like my socks to match"). But this is still another way of making Disney less accessible to lower income people who are already struggling

 

[pigglewiggle]

Six is the maximum per DAS entitlement (return time), including the disabled guest.

Oh. So then the person talking to us was fibbing.

 

[DisneyHead123]

I said in another thread, I don’t see how this weeds out people abusing the system. Right now I will occasionally see angry posts from people denied DAS because the CM in question didn’t believe them. Once that person has medical documentation (which is often very subjective and for some diagnoses based largely on patient report), not likely Disney wants to be in the position of disagreeing with a doctor.

(Edited to add - not saying people who are denied DAS are the ones abusing the system. Just saying that the rejection rate seems likely to go way down overall once medical documentation is involved, because at that point you’re disagreeing with a medical professional.)

 

[bmr1591]

Disney excited to sell more Genie+ as DAS users drop, opening spots in the system for money, I mean people.

 

[SaucyBoy]

Let me start off by saying that I fully understand why this would be done. Too many people abuse this.

That being said, it is a pain in the rear to get accomodations. In the case of my brother, he has autism, but the school system diagnosed him. He didn't see a regular doctor for it until his teen years when he went on medication.

As a public school teacher, let me go on record to say how sorry I am that your brother had the misfortune of having a disability as a public school student. The way that most (not all) systems treat students with disabilities is horrendous. I've been on many a "blacklist" because of my advocacy for students like your brother.

 

[TTA94]

I think the majority of those people who do not really need DAS but were successful getting approved with the current system will easily be able to obtain doctors notes. An annoyance yes but many of “those people” will just say challenge accepted and start making doctor appointments to get the needed documentation.

 

[DisneyHead123]

I think the majority of those people who do not really need DAS but were successful getting approved with the current system will easily be able to obtain doctors notes. An annoyance yes but many of “those people” will just say challenge accepted and start making doctor appointments to get the needed documentation.

I agree and as an aside, I’m sometimes surprised by how freewheeling doctors are with giving diagnoses. It seems like if you mention any kind of concern you end up with a new ICD.10 code (I recall being very surprised when I told our pediatrician that my son wasn’t sleeping through the night at 8 or 9 months old, and seeing he had been diagnosed with a sleep disorder in the visit summary.) Not sure if it’s an insurance thing or what, but it seems like you should at least fill out a rating scale and get a heads up from the doctor before they throw a new diagnosis in your chart. The school system is the polar opposite - for a child to be “classified” with anything there, there is lengthy documentation and a need for consent every step of the way.

 

[haveyoumetmark]

I agree that CMs should not be burdened with determining eligibility so a standardized third party makes sense in this case. However, if you really think this will reduce LL lines, you’re kidding yourself. Disney has created a monster and those lines will continue to spill out into the parks blocking main throughways.

 

[AEfx]

I said in another thread, I don’t see how this weeds out people abusing the system. Right now I will occasionally see angry posts from people denied DAS because the CM in question didn’t believe them. Once that person has medical documentation (which is often very subjective and for some diagnoses based largely on patient report), not likely Disney wants to be in the position of disagreeing with a doctor.

(Edited to add - not saying people who are denied DAS are the ones abusing the system. Just saying that the rejection rate seems likely to go way down overall once medical documentation is involved, because at that point you’re disagreeing with a medical professional.)

Right, there is only so much they can do if someone decides to go to a doctor, say what they need to say to get a diagnosis, etc. if someone is really that heck bent on abusing the system.

What this does is cut out the casual abuse, which is reportedly rampant. It's way easier for people to justify it as a "little fib" than to actually go through all that. I think there are way more people out there than you realize that after paying for an expensive WDW vacation feel entitled, and have no problem saying "yeah, my kid can't wait in lines because they get unmanageable and disruptive" since Disney didn't actually make you give them a diagnosis, just the accommodation you are asking for.

It's like the 3-year-old question - many people have much less problem "fibbing" that their 3 1/2 year old kid is only 3 to get them free admission/food at WDW than they would coming to the park with a fake birth certificate, if Disney required such a thing. If people are willing to go that far, and there certainly are, it is a much bigger step for most non-sociopath people in the world than something they are just justifying as a "little fib" they have to tell once.

 

[TTA94]

I agree that CMs should not be burdened with determining eligibility so a standardized third party makes sense in this case. However, if you really think this will reduce LL lines, you’re kidding yourself. Disney has created a monster and those lines will continue to spill out into the parks blocking main throughways.

I agree. This new system will not change the way things currently are. I do not remember but when free FPs existed, was there still a DAS issue?

 

[Communicora]

I agree. This new system will not change the way things currently are. I do not remember but when free FPs existed, was there still a DAS issue?

Yes, that is why they switched from the Guest Assistance Card to the DAS system.

 

[AEfx]

I agree and as an aside, I’m sometimes surprised by how freewheeling doctors are with giving diagnoses.

Again, this is true - and a much broader scope of discussion. That said - it all depends on how a third party handles it, as they can do much more than the CM's at Disney ever could. Example, they could easily track doctors - if suddenly there is one rogue doctor who is writing a huge amount of these, to people who live in other states, etc. - they can see those red flags and investigate more.

In the end, this is no perfect solution - and true scammers will always find a way to scam. But it doesn't mean that this won't enormously help the issue of people "fibbing" or exaggerating because normally rule-abiding folks that just can't resist the urge to do something to enhance their experience by just saying a few words aren't going to go the extra mile to actually get fake doctors notes.

 

[AEfx]

As a disabled person, I honestly don't trust the third party in question to keep my data safe

On that account, any third party who handles this is going to have to be a completely HIPAA compliant outfit, as anyone who has any medical data is. The same legally mandated safeguards like the insurance company, third-party medical billing, pharmacy, clinic, private practice, etc. has to have.

Like any system, nothing is infallible, but it's certainly a lot more safe and legally protected than the notes Disney keeps on your file.