This exactly. We haven’t run into problems with security checks in the past year or so, I think largely because my kids are older and we rarely nap in the afternoons anymore so are out of the room most of the day. In the past, circa 2019-2021 we have definitely had staff insist on entering the room both during an afternoon nap (which meant the nap was over! Thanks Disney!) and in the morning in the 9-10 am timeframe when we were still sleeping. Very disconcerting when I was there alone with my little girls; I don’t know who these people are or what they really wanted. The worst however was the one time we stayed at GF in 2021. Housekeeping came around late afternoon as we were showering between pool and dinner time. We asked them to just leave towels. Within 30 minutes a manager was knocking on our door saying we had refused housekeeping and they would be doing security checks regularly. I explained we did not want to refuse housekeeping, we just had people showering at the moment they came by. Later that week housekeeping came while I was trying to settle my daughters down for a nap; I didn’t dare ask them to come later. In fall of 2022 we returned to our room at POFQ in the evening to find all the lights on and window coverings pulled all the way open so our room was like a display window. We had left the lights off and curtains closed. That was also pretty creepy.
The way Disney has done this is really intrusive and scary and intimidating. They should do better.
This also proves that they don’t really clean between guests. If they were doing even a remake-the-bed, empty-trash and new-towels clean, then they’d have known that there were people still there.
The other link is disturbing in that they got beyond the safety lock.
Very possible!
I don’t recall checking out last visit. But I also didn’t pay attention. I have never had a security check in our room. And we do midday breaks. Maybe we have just always missed them.
We do also put the do not disturb or the equivalent on the door. But I wouldn’t think this would deter a security check.
I would be livid too. I would think housekeeping just made a judgment call because the sheet said they checked out. It was cleaning time. There wasn’t much left and people leave stuff behind all the time for room service to discard. Time is precious in the housekeeping world.
I will be turning the geo- location feature off. I thought they would wait till checkout time to check someone out.
All right. Let me phrase it this way: I think Disney’s checkout practices are too aggressive. Specifically, that they automatically check you out without asking or informing you - opening the door to unpleasant situations occurring like reported in the reddit thread.
- Many people, including Liners, report being unexpectedly checked out when they look in MDE
- 2 different people in the reddit thread stated that Disney told them they use geolocation data to automatically check people out, suggesting that this is policy, not an accident.
- While most of the time this may not be a big deal, I object to Disney automatically checking you out prior to check out time. You paid for the room, if they want early access to start the cleaning cycle, they can darn well ask.
- Combined with the ‘room security checks’ it’s enough to dissuade me from staying onsite. Other hotels don’t do this.
I get a push notification from MDE that says I can “click here” to check out now
This doesn’t really surprise me. It seems that they use it to know when you’re in Orlando.
My mom has one like this for travel. Some hotel rooms doors seem like a heafty shoulder bump could bring it down. She feels safer with it. And it serves it’s purpose.
You can get assigned a room before it’s ready, well, at least get it promised to you, but I don’t know how you would get access to it. We have had to wait for a reassigned room before. I haven’t tried but wouldn’t have thought I could enter it with app or band before I saw it officially assigned to me.
But we also have to believe some facts about this story that could be mistakes or embellishments. The suitcase thing is creepy. But it also has me thinking that there just may not have been much in the room. They were only there for one night. People leave stuff. Maybe the room attendant really did think it was abandoned. I bet it’s happened some.
And maybe the door wasn’t shut all the way and the poster just thought his band worked. It’s hard to remember if you actually got the green light that exact time when thinking back.
Me neither.
Is this a Disney imposed rule? I wonder is mouse keeping can serve as a check in many instances so we don’t register it.
This would bother me to though. It’s not an emergency.
But this may be counter productive to the checks. Because criminals would make sure every thing was peachy around this time. Not that I think anyone would use a Disney hotel to carry out something nefarious. There are other hotels nearby that are much more lax about security. I feel icky just saying that though .
I think this auto checkout system is to blame. It creates confusion - at least with some of these issues. Not the security check obviously.
This should be a concern for anyone that leaves minors alone in the room. It’s one thing to tell your kid not to open the door for strangers. But what if that stranger has a key. That could be traumatic. I do agree there should be some sort of ultimate DND feature- even if you can only use it for a few hours straight during the day.
I forgot to check out last trip. This is the first time I noticed that Disney did it for me. It was before 11 but I can’t recall when. I got an email when it happened I believe and I noted it was before official checkout. But I don’t check those but a couple times a day.
I had a similar experience in Italy. I had a chronic migraine (the kind where I sleep for 24h). I had the DND on for a really long time so they came to check on me. I didn’t answer when they knocked so they came in, saw me in bed, and profusely apologized. But I can see their concern that maybe I was injured or something.
I have them all the time! But it doesn’t bother me because they also take.out the trash and sometimes give me new towels (DVC stay).
One time someone in the room (maybe me? Yes it was me!) was changing and I had to run to the door, throw the latch and ask them to come back because I was changing. Which they did. But it was stressful because I was yelling “please don’t come in!” Before running over. I suspect they can’t hear into the room very well.
That said - I am a little suprised at the temperature of the discussion. Beyond active shooter threats (not the worry IMO)[possible trigger] there is also human trafficking and people comitting suicide, very real scenarios.
Practical info from the reddit thread on how to avoid the auto checkout:
I had the front desk tell me that the app automatically checks you out, but you can override that by calling in the morning and telling the front desk staff of the time you actually want to be checked out
Source
I forgot about these. I’m sure DH uses them religiously.
They are. But this is true anywhere. I haven’t heard of any other hotels doing daily checks. And these daily checks were in response to a specific event- or that’s at least how the timing played out. Housekeeping visits regularly enough. Maybe declining housekeeping (with the sign) could be a trigger? IDK. I’m surprised to hear they actually, factually visit every room, every day.
P.I.T.A. @ 11a.m. if I don’t manually check out. I know they want to get a jump on housekeeping though.
Yep.
I’ll try to call them on checkout morning and request not to be auto checked out, and request a checkout of 11am, and see if they honor that.
I am one who was annoyed by the aggressive ‘room checks’ historically, but I thought I would also share what amazing housekeeping we had at Yacht Club last week. Each day, they hit the room while we were out and they really stepped up their towel animal game every day. It was a fun surprised to arrive back to every evening.
I always thought the security checks didn’t happen daily…they were for when a room hadn’t been checked on in a few days (or maybe certain amount of hours but definitely not daily.) I also thought it was to make sure the guests were ok assuming no contact in a few days. If its just to try to bust someone doing something nefarious (i.e. stockpiling weapons) how does looking around guarentee that? I’m assuming a person doing such a thing wouldn’t necessarily just leave that kind of thing laying out. Are hotel employees rifling through guests belongings?
Traveling alone, whenever I am in the room, I use the inside lock so folks can’t open the door. This past December, I was in the bathroom twice when they tried to come in. Later they called.
They can open that lock…and will if necessary. They have a tool that allows them to bypass that lock.
It very rarely happens, I’m sure, but I have heard of a few cases where it has.
Exactly, it’s theater and super stupid. It takes no time at all to put a magazine into a gun.
Hey, I’m surprised that this took off so much! But also kind of not surprised b/c of the egregious intrusions into peoples’ vacations. Thank you all for replying. I have been too busy to forum much this past week but will catch up as time allows. It was for a good cause, a huge project of the last 2 years drew to a close this Sat. I am so relieved.
YEAH! Happy to see you more on the forums. I’m surprised at the vastly different levels of intrusion people have experiences with these daily checks.
I would be very upset if I set that lock while napping or showering and they bypassed it. I would expect this to be a last resort attempt at entry. And by last resort I don’t mean after a few knocks with no answer. In an emergency though, I would be grateful for Disney to have a way to gain access. But with great power, comes great responsibility. I hope they use this tool wisely.
Update:
- I requested that I not be auto checked out of BCV by going in person the day before to front desk, and that I would need the room until 11. At 10:40am from the parks I saw in MDE I was already checked out. So much for that workaround.
- I polled a dozen ppl in the hotel industry and asked if they auto check guests out prior to checkout if they have reason to believe they are not coming back. 100% the answer was no. One answer was that even if it was ok 9/10 times, it was not worth the problems that would arise the other 1/10 times.
Wow! Something has to be triggering the auto checkout. Did you turn off your location that morning? And what type of response did you get from the front desk? Did they seem reserved or very accommodating at the request to not be checked out?
What if one family member was left behind to pack up the car at 10:45. Would they have problems accessing the room? This is bothering me.
I wonder if the key cards to enter the room have the same location function and would leaving one behind in the room stop the auto checkout…
This is a little beyond my expertise, lol. But I don’t like it. There should at least be a prompt that pops up in the app asking if you are ready to check out and if you say no it cancels any auto checkout.