Fast Passes I am all confused

Just because someone doesn’t like the system it does not mean they’re not investing time etc in planning. How do you pay more money to help with getting ?. I have no objection to fast passes as a means to balance the queuing, I think having to book them 60 days ahead is ridiculous and for those who are not staying onsite it’s only 30 days. Disney is expensive enough and needs planning this adds another dimension. Personally, if I don’t do a ride I’m really not that bothered, I’m not going to die! But for some doing everything is important.

In EP I would do Soarin first, then figment and nemo, and then use your FPP on Spaceship earth, another Tier 1, and something else. In AK you don’t need a FPP for a bugs life at 8:45am. I like your plan of using your FPP in the morning with a lunch ADR

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Thank you. I’ll take a look at that route. With a four year old I am planning every other morning in a park with either resort pool or typhoon lagoon on rest days. Park days ADR at lunchtime. Rest days ADR in the evening. I’m sensible enough to realise we won’t get everything done but I’m sure well have a brilliant trip

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My issue with it is that it is smoke and mirrors. It makes the consumer think they are benefiting. But they aren’t. (I’ve detailed this all out in past threads.) Basically, though, all it does is shift the wait around…making your waits longer in other areas in exchange for shorter waits in other. The ONLY advantage it now offers (other than to Disney) is in those who take the time to pre-plan their Fast Passes (or those who learn to obtain the fourth and beyond in a day) over those who don’t. But since it is becoming more and more the norm, again, there is little TRUE benefit. It is just PERCEIVED benefit. Instead, it is a case where if you DON’T use them, you are losing out, rather than if you DO use them you are gaining something.

So, do I plan then and use them? Yep. But only because we HAVE to, not because it is a benefit.

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Totally agree with this. It’s just a shuffling around of wait times (with the exception that those understand the system benefit with a few shorter wait times at the expense of those that don’t understand the system).

I have been to WDW about 10 times, but this is my first time since they instituted FP+. And while I spent the time, learned the system, and did the planning … I don’t like it. All my past WDW vacations were pure fun (even the planning). This time the planning has felt more like work than fun. If it wasn’t for the fact that I have young kids, I would be going to Universal for most of my Orlando vacation time instead of WDW because of the ease of planning.

It depends what you value.

I like knowing that no matter what, we will be able to ride everyone’s favourite rides. With the old system, unless you were at rope drop you’d have no chance at all to get FoP. I remember when we first went to Epcot after Soarin opened, we arrived at the park by 10am. The earliest FPs were for 8:30 that evening. There was no way we knew if the boys would last that long, so we just didn’t ride it that time.

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My issue is with the Fast Pass system in general, not just FP+. I didn’t like the paper version either. At all.

The standby lines for things like FoP, and FEA, etc., are so bad BECAUSE OF the Fast Pass system. Anyhow, all it means is that while you aren’t waiting in a long line for FoP, you are waiting in all the other standby lines MUCH LONGER. So, while you might save 2 hours in FoP, the total time that the other standby lines are for the day will likely add up to that additional 2 hours (or more). So, your total time in line ends up the same.

(Granted, I GET that if you are SUPER on top of things, particularly with getting Fast Passes beyond the initial three, you are FINALLY at an advantage.)

In the meantime, it forces everyone to have to figure out EXACTLY what parks on what days way ahead of time. But then Disney has the right to mess up your entire plan by changing hours/etc.

Anyhow, it is the system we have. And I’ll make the best use of it I can. But I was MUCH MUCH happier with Disney when they didn’t have Fast Passes at all.

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Tell me if this is doable. Our group is 2 adult parents and 2 kids age 5-7 and 1 child age 2.5. Would we be able to book a FPP on a ride for 1 adult and 1 kid, then use the Rider Switch to get the other adult and child on the same ride through the FP line immediately after? So basically we book 6 FPP ahead of time for the day at the park and get the whole family on all 6 rides?

I don’t believe you can combine FP and Rider Switch. Since you presumably both have a FP, then there is no need for Rider Switch. You take your kids on the ride with your FP, and when you get off, your spouse uses their FP.

Interesting. I thought you had to have a FPP to get a rider switch.

No.

You go to the line entrance. Tell them you want to do Rider swap. One of the ways they do it is they give you a Rider Swap pass, and the first “set” of people get in line. After they ride the ride and get off, they give the pass to the next parent and then they can enter through the Fast Pass entrance (usually allowed to take one or two others with them).

With 2 adults and 2 kids over 3 and one child under age 3, you can absolutely split up your FPP like that and get 2 times the FPP. The drawback is that on each ride, one kid gets to ride 2 times and the other only 1 time.

There have been reports of some CMs requiring FPP for everyone in the party, but they shouldn’t be doing that and my experience last month was that they did not even ask. All they did when we asked for Rider Switch was to ask if the first group was using FPP or Standby (to determine return time for RS) and then ask which 3 people were riding in the 2nd group. Then they scanned the 2nd group’s FPP to add the RS.

In my experience with rider switch, we have always been able to combine FPs and rider switch (on both coasts) however, we also usually have FPs for all members of the party who will ride (which historically has been both parents and one or 2 of our (now 3) kids). In this case, the rider switch allows the adult who stays behind with the non-rider(s) to have up to 2 people accompany them so they are not solo for their ride (and it can be people who were already in the first group).

Before the rider system switch was digital, I found it was relatively easy to obtain a rider switch even if we only had FPs for one parent & the kid(s) that would ride & then the rider switch would work for the other parent to ride for the first time & the kids(s) to accompany the parent for their 2nd ride. When this is was the case, I would do as you suggest above & effectively get “double the FPs” (trying for all of them to be as early as possible in the day) to have a bunch of rider switches for evening/afternoon.

However, once the system went digital (haven’t yet been to WDW to see how it is on the ground there, but we frequent Disneyland on the west coast & they have been on the digital rider switch for over a year now), it became a lot more tricky for several reasons, one of them being you only have a 1 hr window to redeem the rider switch (instead of all day as before).

Also since the change to digital, the CMs will sometimes (not all) now verify the non-rider has a FP too, and if you don’t have one for that person, then they will either not allow you to obtain a rider switch (which in the past was very easy to do this way) or if they do allow you to obtain the rider switch, the start of the return window won’t be until a length of time equal to the current standby wait. If you were planning on riding back-to-back in the FP line then this throws that plan out of whack. But I have since thought that this might be a nice way to extend the hour that they give you & allow you to do something else with everyone before heading back for the 2nd half of the rider swap.

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Has anyone personally had experience where the CM asked everyone in the party to have a FPP to get the rider switch?

So I went back & found this thread that I had followed for a little bit when WDW first got rider switch. It has a lot of good, current information & it looks like they have settled that FPP is NOT required for everyone (early on it looks as if FoP and 7dmt were requiring all in the goupr to have a FPP).

ETA: In my experience at Disneyland it’s still a crapshoot on if they will give me a rider switch if I only have FPs for one of the adults & not both (but DL also has a much more local/Annual Passholder culture that are almost always in the know & as such, DL makes a lot of their operations subject to change & they do change them up just so the local following doesn’t always have that huge advantage over other guests).

I bet on the whole you’re waiting less with FP or FP+ than without. I suspect that most time being saved by other guests isn’t being applied 1:1 to other lines. Many people are taking that extra time to sleep in or shop…and you can too! If the line for RnRC is super long because of SDD FPP, people will balk. If you get an FPP for SDD and find a long line at RnRC as a result, you can also go shopping or swimming or eating instead.

So I bet the total time being waited by all guests and by you is less even without trickery or manipulation.

Edit: Add in some trickery, manipulation, and 60 day forethought and I think we come out like bandits.