Ok, I just got through to someone that cleared this up.
AP vouchers are now only good for 1 year and if you do not activate the AP before that year you can use the value of the voucher and put it towards a new AP voucher.
Looks like they are doing this to keep people from purchasing vouchers and getting “discounted” APs in the future. This way they can collect any up charge they make to the APs.
Luckily I was going to take a short trip in the spring next year so I’ll just be activating my AP then and not have to worry about the voucher expiration.
Any new annual pass holders after today? Curious of any reports for people that had existing ticket and park reservations. Are the park reservations staying or do they need to be reselected after calling for the upgrade?
I had a 10 day ticket, could not even get through on the phone all day. Like, “all circuits are busy, try your call again later”.
Went ahead and purchased the AP’s online anyway because my trip has some high volume days and I wanted to lock in my PR’s. I then spent the morning locking in those high CL days. I just looked and, I still have the existing PR’s, and are currently holding 2 different PR’s for the same park on the same day. That won’t be the same for you unless you are impatient like me.
I plan on calling passholder line again when things slow down and I can get the 10 day figured out.
For anyone wondering, my new Incredi-pass has memory maker and the sport added on for additional cost, no DVC discount available.
I should add I fully expect them to not to refund my 10-day tickets. I went ahead and bought the AP’s with the sole purpose of alleviating stress about my high CL days.
Worst case, I end up using my 10 days before I activate my AP’s or I give 2 of them to DS22 and his gf to come spend a few days with us.
Also, interesting side note. It’s probably a glitch, but as of right now, my reservations for Dolphin ARE NOT showing up as a possibility to book onsite stay PR’s.
Luckily, I have a few reservations open until I know for sure what my budget will allow me to stay in. Come to think of it, I don’t remember seeing my ADR throw away reservation at Movies as an option to book reservations either. Interesting.
Bought 2 APs today so we could be ready for next year. I have 2 Platinum Pass Pluss vouchers in my account which, as of today, are still Platinum Pluss vouchers. They still show a 2030 expiration… the new ones show an expiration of next year, as previously discussed.
FWIW, I called the AP VIP number, and was on hold for about 15 minutes around noon. So, not too long.
OH… it didn’t connect… I had to abusively redial about 30 times or 40 times in a row to avoid the “All Circuits are Busy” but once I connected, the wait was only about 15 minutes…
Took me about 4 minutes of dialing to connect… another 2-3 minutes of menu hopping, and then about 15 minutes on hold
Hmmm. I have a voucher for an AP that doesn’t expire until 2099…I wonder if I should hold onto it for a bit and buy one for the 2022/23 trips I’m planning.
(And yes, I’m fully aware that 2099 isn’t a typical expiry for a voucher. I bought it when they started letting people who cancelled their APs during the closure buy and it’s always had that expiration.)
I poked at the phone line a few times today but it was always “all circuits busy”. And DVC Member Services had a 50+ minute wait and I wasn’t 100% sure they could do what I need.
But … I don’t think I need to be in a rush. I’ll be upgrading 9-day hoppers to Sorcerer APs when I get a chance, but I should be able to do that even when we get to the parks in December. I’m really only calling ahead to be sure. There was the mildly ominous note of “limited availability” in the announcements.
Well, I finally got through…to resorts. They shut down the AP queue once it hit a 7 HOUR WAIT!
The nice CM told me to call back tomorrow morning to try to talk to a representative again. She did tell me that there was a “nasty rumor online” that the tickets would sell out and that that was absolutely not true.
Here are some interesting and hopefully useful pieces of information.
You now get one year to activate an AP. You don’t have until 2030. That is why the expiration date of a new AP will show a year from the date of purchase - that is the date you must activate it by. If you don’t activate it by then, you can use the price you paid towards the cost of a new AP.
But if you are upgrading an existing ticket, you get 365 days from the date of the original ticket purchase. Someone who bought their park hopper on 2/6/21 must activate the pass by 2/5/22.
It seems there is a bug whereby people aren’t able to book parks on an unactivated AP. The calendar will grey out after the expiry of an existing AP.
However Guest Services are able to bypass this and book park reservations. Just be prepared to wait a few days and then try calling.
If you are an AP holder and have an onsite resort stay, when booking park eservations you can now choose whether you are booking a reservation as just an AP holder or one linked to a resort stay.
And one unconfirmed point. …
Some people have also been told if you call and upgrade existing tickets to an AP, then your existing park reservations will be cancelled and you’ll need to rebook from the AP pool.
As yet, I haven’t found confirmation that that is the case, but some have decided to cancel and rebook them anyway.
I had posted this in the Park Pass Reservation thread I made with apparently a bad title but I had an existing AP Voucher (recovery pass) with 3 reservations attached. I was able to make 5 NEW reservations today with the new reservations system. All 8 reservations appear in MDE. (Only the 5 I made today appear in the new system with the modify option)
Which would tally with the advice that some people have been given that if you upgrade a ticket to an AP over the phone you will lose your park reservations.
but I had an existing AP Voucher (recovery pass) with 3 reservations attached. I was able to make 5 NEW reservations today with the new reservations system. All 8 reservations appear in MDE. (Only the 5 I made today appear in the new system with the modify option)