Got my fast passes today with the help of a leading reservation! (changed from throwaway room)

Ok, so it was a false alarm then. Phew! my next scheduled cancellation was coming up and I was worried this was official.

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:+1:

So a question about how best to do this, putting aside peopleā€™s personal views on this. If I have an on property hotel reservation that I will use and a 3-day ticket, do I book the leading reservation for 14 days prior to my last day of FP need and overlap my other reservation? For example, if my actual days in the park will be May 1st, 2nd and 3rd, and my actual hotel reservation is for May 1st, my FP window opens 60 days prior to May 1. If I want a leading reservation, do I then book a separate reservation that begins 74 days prior to May 3rd? Or do you do one that begins 74 days prior to May 1 and then have 3 mornings of picking FP? In either case, I assume this duplicate reservation needs to overlap and have check out on May 3 in my example?

Thanks!

OK, here is what I have figured out for getting the greatest benefit based on other peopleā€™s experience and the WDW rules. I have not tested this myself, so YMMV:

  • Make a Leading Room-Only Reservation checking in 13 days before and checking out the same day as the Actual Room Reservation. If your Actual Reservation starts May 1, the Leading Reservation would start April 18.
  • On Day 60 for the Leading Reservation, book FPPs for Actual Check-in day. If your Acutal Reservation starts May 1, this would be Feb 17.
  • Continue doing this day by day until all FPP days are booked
  • Cancel the Leading Reservation after Day 60 for the Actual Reservation
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I wish I was brave enough to try this.

@JMS23 @brklinck @qwerty6, I book FPP with a leading reservation every trip, and have for quite a long time. I have also answered many personal messages here to help people do it who know that I have the knowledge, but donā€™t want it out in the open on the threads because so many give a hard time about it.
I have an AP, and my kidsā€™ tickets are from before the date specific pricing. It really is easy to do, I make my leading room only for 7 days before my real stay, with the checkout day of first the same as check in day for real stay. They donā€™t need to overlap (they do if you are doing this for a leading reservation to get ADRs). I always cancel my leading reservation once my real FPP date (or dates if we do a split stay) are within the 60 day window. On the FPP day for your leading reservation, you can make FPP for any days you choose between your first and second reservation within 14 days (my kids tickets are usually 8 days, so that is all I make). You will have your pick of times for every ride, every day.
I actually believe that all the loopholes Disney closes are not because they feel bad for people not getting FPP, or they are trying to even the playing field. Nope, they close loopholes so that they can charge for the same thing (Goodbye scanning magic band with no tickets attached to get 3 extra FPP day of in the parks, Hello Club Level buy 3 FPP for $50 a day). Anyway, unless something changes, this has always worked and the FPP donā€™t disappear as they are for your actual stay dates.

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Ok, so weā€™re going to Orlando from the UK for a significant trip this summer (23 days split stay at universal and a holiday villa off the 192). Having two teenagers we just canā€™t stay at Disney for that long in one hotel room without a death in the family! :joy:.

I have 14 day tickets assigned in MDE for each of us and one night tent pitch booked (at the recommendation of some US friends). We only just made the reservation yesterday after Skyping with them but our call was cut short before I got to the nitty-gritty of the deets (but DH booked it anyway :laughing:).
My question is, how many days of fast pass booking will I get 60 days before?

TIA.

The rumor (according to our Minnie Van driver about a week ago) is that Disney is about to close the loophole. We were talking about FP+ tricks, like the refresh/modify techniques and then he brought up the topic of this phantom resort booking technique. Iā€™ve never tried it myself because my personal views are in line with @ryan1. So, Disney is well aware of the ā€œissueā€ and it appears it may be ā€œaddressedā€ soon. Of course, this was coming from the driver of a red polka dot-covered SUV, so I guess weā€™ll see.

(Edit: Iā€™m not sure if he was alluding to cancelled reservations, leading reservations, or bothā€¦)

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All signs point to the Club Level Fastpasses continuing through the summer, so you may be right about that. It is weird that they donā€™t advertise them. I wonder if this potential closure of the loophole is related to that. I mean, whatā€™s to stop a person from booking a Club Level room, getting the extra FP at 90 days and then canceling that room? Disney needs those rooms filled, theyā€™re already steeply discounted as it is. So maybe theyā€™re cleaning things up for that program to roll out officially.

But they also need to be careful of what they wish for. Itā€™s very difficult to schedule that many FP in a day with ADRs and paid events. They may find you can only get so much cash out of a single visitor. They should think about the experience for ALL of the guests.

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I doubt that would happen. They charge your credit card $150 for those, and thatā€™s non-refundable.

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Yes, I know. But there are people who really want the rides more than a fancy room. This may really be an issue with SW;GE. I could definitely see people buying the FP without buying the room that goes with them. You could ride both SW rides twice in a day. People are willing to shell out thousands for a Stormtrooper costume, $150 for their favorite rides might seem like a deal.

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I have never done a throw away and not judging. I have gotten an ADR for some places that also take Open Table. If I canā€™t get the time I want through MDE, when it gets closer to time and I can get the time I want through Opentable, I do that, but immediately cancel the other. Hoping that is not considered ADR hoarding

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Are your fast passes still there? Wondering if a purge will happen eventually. hope not!

Still there!

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Thanks for the update, I just found out that DS has his finals in the LAST POSSIBLE TIME SLOT so weā€™ll have to cancel part (if not all!) of our leading reservation.

Or just take off for WDW without him, which is equally likely.

(I donā€™t see why we all have to suffer just because he does. He goes to school out-of-state so we just wonā€™t tell him where we went. :wink:)

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You need an advance party, check places out, explore, get to know your way aroundā€¦all for his benefit of course.

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Thatā€™s actually not (too) far from the truth- we will be all tucked in at BWI by the time he gets to MCO, DH can go fetch him from the airport and off we go. Heā€™ll be landing at MCO about the time the other two get up. :wink:

Somehow I think he wonā€™t complain about a very early flight to Orlando.

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Given that Disney seems to be cancelling FPā€™s when onsite hotel reservations are cancelled, Iā€™m wondering if the OPā€™s strategy of two reservations will work? When the All Star Sports reservation is cancelled, which opened the FPP window for both, will that cancel all of the fast passes? Cancel just the ones during the time of the All Star Sports reservation?

Also, I understand that if I donā€™t show up/check in for a room only reservation that I will be charged one night. I assume then I would keep the fast passes for my check in an check out days. But I would be stripped of them for the rest of the stay? If I want to pay for the nights of my room only reservation and not actually stay there, can I just check in online so I donā€™t have to go to the hotel?

I think itā€™s fair to say no one knows, but all signs point to the leading reservation loophole being closed. I decided to forget it and get club level FP for our first day there, which I wanted to avoid, but there are 5 of us and I donā€™t feel proficient enough with the drops and refresh strategy to get what we want.

After finding out about our (most likely) schedule, I do still have a leading reservation of 1 day which we will (most likely) keep, but thatā€™s not enough to really get the FP I want & Iā€™m tired of stressing out about it.

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I would not defend the OP or anyone else with ā€œghostā€ reservations, leading reservations, RS abuses, ect. It is all ā€œLINE JUMPING.ā€

Iā€™ve seen some posts saying ā€¦ ā€œhaha Disney, abusing your loopholeā€ or ā€œstick it to the manā€ News flash, its clearly line jumping in front of other PEOPLE, and MAKE-A-WISH families.

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