On Christmas Eve, my dad and I decided to take a quick trip down to our second home. We made reservations that night, and left around 3am Christmas morning. Upon our arrival at Old Key West around 1pm, we were greeted and taken to the online check in desk. Our grey MagicBands were not immediately ready (apparently because we also have reservations for March, and have already submitted our MagicBand order, those were linked to this reservation and somehow the CM who put together our materials overlooked it). However, it was super quick for the very helpful CM who was assisting us to grab two and link them to our MDE accounts. Check in was otherwise simple, and our room was ready immediately. Both of our bands worked flawlessly unlocking the door on the first and all subsequent tries.
We made our FastPass+ selections the night before and on the drive down, and as AP holders the system also worked very well. We dropped our luggage off at our room, and headed to DHS. Entering the park with bands was super simple, no problems there. I even noticed less confusion among other guests on this trip, as well. First FP+ was for TSM, then Tower, then Star Tours. We used Single Rider for Rock n Rollercoaster several times that night. All interactions worked great, and my dad was surprised when a CM told him Happy Birthday as we entered ToT (his Bday is in early January).
FP+ continued to work great for us, even adjusting times and changing things around. The cellular upgrades from AT&T make using MDE in the parks a breeze - I had near full LTE the entire trip.
What really impressed us was how MyMagic+ handled something that usually only DVC members and other hardcore Guests do - switching resorts mid trip. When we first made our reservations, we couldn't secure a fourth night with DVC at any resort. So, we waited. On the day before our Checkout Date at Old Key West, we called and made reservations at Pop Century for one night. We packed our stuff and headed to Pop Century the next day, and as we drove up the CM at the security gate asked to scan my MagicBand. She then greeted me by name and confirmed our reservation details, then sent us to the check in parking lot. At the check in desk, we were approached by a CM with an iPad who scanned my MagicBand and then told me our room number. That was it. Nothing else. All information about charging, everything, was already done. It literally took 30 seconds to do something that has taken us 10-15 minutes or longer in the past. We never took our bands off from the time we left OKW to the time we walked in our room at Pop, where the bands also worked flawlessly to unlock our room each time.
Yes, this is a big change. Yes, it had it's issues initially and was very expensive. From my perspective though, at least from this trip that was so last minute I was expecting tons of issues (we've had problems every time we took a trip like this), this new way of doing things is a huge benefit to guests.
We made our FastPass+ selections the night before and on the drive down, and as AP holders the system also worked very well. We dropped our luggage off at our room, and headed to DHS. Entering the park with bands was super simple, no problems there. I even noticed less confusion among other guests on this trip, as well. First FP+ was for TSM, then Tower, then Star Tours. We used Single Rider for Rock n Rollercoaster several times that night. All interactions worked great, and my dad was surprised when a CM told him Happy Birthday as we entered ToT (his Bday is in early January).
FP+ continued to work great for us, even adjusting times and changing things around. The cellular upgrades from AT&T make using MDE in the parks a breeze - I had near full LTE the entire trip.
What really impressed us was how MyMagic+ handled something that usually only DVC members and other hardcore Guests do - switching resorts mid trip. When we first made our reservations, we couldn't secure a fourth night with DVC at any resort. So, we waited. On the day before our Checkout Date at Old Key West, we called and made reservations at Pop Century for one night. We packed our stuff and headed to Pop Century the next day, and as we drove up the CM at the security gate asked to scan my MagicBand. She then greeted me by name and confirmed our reservation details, then sent us to the check in parking lot. At the check in desk, we were approached by a CM with an iPad who scanned my MagicBand and then told me our room number. That was it. Nothing else. All information about charging, everything, was already done. It literally took 30 seconds to do something that has taken us 10-15 minutes or longer in the past. We never took our bands off from the time we left OKW to the time we walked in our room at Pop, where the bands also worked flawlessly to unlock our room each time.
Yes, this is a big change. Yes, it had it's issues initially and was very expensive. From my perspective though, at least from this trip that was so last minute I was expecting tons of issues (we've had problems every time we took a trip like this), this new way of doing things is a huge benefit to guests.
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