Flex Pass Superthread: Disneyland Resort Introduces New Annual Passport that Combines Value and Flexibility

[cmwade77]

Problem is, if they keep introducing more and more people to more affordable options, they're going to have to. And we all will have to start doing this to plan out FPs and ADRs because Disney just wants to keep cramming people into the parks 365 days a year to capacity, when ideally, they need to keep raising the price ceiling until they find their breaking point (as mentioned in my above post).

Actually what they really should have been doing for the past about 15 years now is increase park capacity by 20% per year at all U.S. parks.

 

[cmwade77]

Yeah, this is prohibitive for anyone not in California or a border state then. There would just be no way to count on airfare at an affordable price. Or even hotels maybe.

Unless you are planning on going on only "good to go" dates anyway, then it really wouldn't matter. Really, let's say you take a two week vacation, Mon-Thrs are "good to go" dates both weeks, leaving you breaks of Fri-Sun to do some of the amazing other things in So. Cal, even if you can't get a reservation for those days.

 

[cmwade77]

As an aside, I foresee a reservation system being baked into ALL passes in the future except for premium. Crowd control will work best when there’s some predictability amongst all passes, as they’ve shown that higher prices just doesn’t dent attendance.

I think I can see a point where everything, except Premier will require reservations and Premier will continue to be the only pass level that you can't do monthly payments on, which will limit its popularity. I could see even Signature and Signature+ levels requiring reservations.

 

[Rich M]

For those traveling from neighbor states (or from up north), the best option is to use Southwest Airlines and book successive flights each weekend and cancel them as your DL Flex reservations are approved/denied. Save the credits for next time. You’ll also want to avoid prepaying for hotel, and it could work.

My plan is to convert to flex pass with the understanding that I may just upgrade to deluxe passes if things just don’t work.

Sometimes you can get great deals on Priceline right before a trip so it could work out great

 

[Lesley Wake]

As an aside, I foresee a reservation system being baked into ALL passes in the future except for premium. Crowd control will work best when there’s some predictability amongst all passes, as they’ve shown that higher prices just doesn’t dent attendance.

I don't know if I quite agree with that. I think the higher levels will stay with the main dates. I could see this starting to eliminate the SoCal one, or just continue to push people toward the reservation one.

I think I can see a point where everything, except Premier will require reservations and Premier will continue to be the only pass level that you can't do monthly payments on, which will limit its popularity. I could see even Signature and Signature+ levels requiring reservations.

You can pay for 1/2 of the Premier using monthly payments (the Disneyland portion). The WDW portion is a lump sum.

 

[Rich M]

You can pay for 1/2 of the Premier using monthly payments (the Disneyland portion). The WDW portion is a lump sum.

When did they start doing this? I would consider it if I knew this was an option

 

[Where's Wall-E]

Unless you are planning on going on only "good to go" dates anyway, then it really wouldn't matter. Really, let's say you take a two week vacation, Mon-Thrs are "good to go" dates both weeks, leaving you breaks of Fri-Sun to do some of the amazing other things in So. Cal, even if you can't get a reservation for those days.

Exactly. We're considering the pass because we tend to go over weekdays anyway, and could plan well ahead for the "good to go" days, and like mentioned, do something else if a reservation wasn't available. You'll know 30 days out, so lots of time to plan alternatives.

 

[twodogs]

Sometimes you can get great deals on Priceline right before a trip so it could work out great

Like OP said, I have to take time off months in advance, we fly in (and we do not fly SWA, so on American, changes are $200 per person per change, so prohibitive for 4-6 people which is our family size), and we like to stay onsite (which would be able to be canceled prior to 5 days before check in). We also have to work around our children's school schedules which have zero flexibility. I have done a lot of the other So. Cal things I want to do on other trips, so if I was using this pass, I would want to use my vacation days on DLR, not other activities if my reservations didn't come through. So this pass just isn't right for us. Hope some of you find it works for you, and I will be interested in the updates.

I also wonder, if both parks are blue for a day (require reservations) and you want a park hopper day, what happens if one park is more "reserved" than the other, and they use one of your reservation days for the month but you only get one park? That would frustrate me too, because we have to have a park hopper to tour the way we like to tour.

 

[Ryan120420]

When did they start doing this? I would consider it if I knew this was an option

The year the was Premier pass introduced. Its not advertised as its more of a loop hole.

It works like this: you buy any Disneyland annual pass using the monthly payment plan. Once your pass is processed, you ask to upgrade to the Premier pass. You pay the difference between the full price of your current Disneyland annual pass at the time of purchase and the current price of the Premier pass. Your monthly payments continue as usual.


Same scenario works for Disney World passes.

 

[OKC Disney Fan]

Then this makes sense only for locals or people who can drive in for a short trip. I live in Texas, and I fly in. This is basically useless for me because I can't make a flight reservation and then just hope that I can get into the parks more than one day of my trip... I'm not flying all the way out there for one park day (or maybe no park days if I have to book my flight before 30 days, and then I can't get a reservation at all). I work and have school aged kids so doing a mid week trip on the "good to go" days would not work either. Oh well...

Agreed. We are AP's from Oklahoma and I don't feel this would work for us at all. I have trips booked for June and October right now. Wouldn't want to pay for air tickets and then find out we can't get a reservation when we plan on going.

 

[RemainSeatedPlease]

For those traveling from neighbor states (or from up north), the best option is to use Southwest Airlines and book successive flights each weekend and cancel them as your DL Flex reservations are approved/denied. Save the credits for next time. You’ll also want to avoid prepaying for hotel, and it could work.

My plan is to convert to flex pass with the understanding that I may just upgrade to deluxe passes if things just don’t work.

I could see how it might work out sometimes, but another consideration is work schedules. My work place is pretty flexible, but I don't think they would take kindly to me saying "I might take my vacation this week...or this one...or this one...you'll have to wait and see what Disney allows!"

Again, it COULD work, but this pass just doesn't seem worth the uncertainty if you're not within a couple hours' drive.

 

[EmJ]

Unless you are planning on going on only "good to go" dates anyway, then it really wouldn't matter. Really, let's say you take a two week vacation, Mon-Thrs are "good to go" dates both weeks, leaving you breaks of Fri-Sun to do some of the amazing other things in So. Cal, even if you can't get a reservation for those days.

I guess it depends on how you vacation. I know people do it, but I can’t even conceive of a vacation longer than 7 days, including travel on days 1 and 7. My work just couldn’t accommodate it. DH’s probably could, but they’d be pretty irritated. So we do one 4-6 day trip per year (including travel) and several long weekends, or two 4-6 day trips about 5/6 months apart.

 

[Jperiod]

I'm super excited about this! We were planning to upgrade our hoppers to deluxe APs this summer. We like to go during the light crowds anyway, and already have our next 3 trips planned so I can easily book those fringe days 30 days out. I suppose if I hit a snag, we can just upgrade to deluxe like we were already planning! I don't understand why they don't give deluxe the option to reserve as well. I'd be annoyed if I already had a deluxe and no opportunity at DL all summer!

 

[Lesley Wake]

Like OP said, I have to take time off months in advance, we fly in (and we do not fly SWA, so on American, changes are $200 per person per change, so prohibitive for 4-6 people which is our family size), and we like to stay onsite (which would be able to be canceled prior to 5 days before check in). We also have to work around our children's school schedules which have zero flexibility. I have done a lot of the other So. Cal things I want to do on other trips, so if I was using this pass, I would want to use my vacation days on DLR, not other activities if my reservations didn't come through. So this pass just isn't right for us. Hope some of you find it works for you, and I will be interested in the updates.

Yeah, it just seems like for you, this pass isn’t worth it. It’s unfortunate but that’s just the way some of the APs are set up.

I think the big test of who this will be worthwhile to will be how quickly the reserved days fill up. If you need to book it 30 days in advance all the time, then it certainly will be a much smaller group of people who this makes sense for. If the reservations still are available a few days before, then more people would consider it (which would mean more people grabbing the reservations: a self-defeating cycle).

also wonder, if both parks are blue for a day (require reservations) and you want a park hopper day, what happens if one park is more "reserved" than the other, and they use one of your reservation days for the month but you only get one park? That would frustrate me too, because we have to have a park hopper to tour the way we like to tour.

I think when you go to make the reservation and you click the “both parks” option it will show dates which still have availability for both parks. If one park is full for that day, then it won’t be an option to select. But if you changed to a specific park, maybe that day would become available?

 

[twodogs]

Yeah, it just seems like for you, this pass isn’t worth it. It’s unfortunate but that’s just the way some of the APs are set up.

I think the big test of who this will be worthwhile to will be how quickly the reserved days fill up. If you need to book it 30 days in advance all the time, then it certainly will be a much smaller group of people who this makes sense for. If the reservations still are available a few days before, then more people would consider it (which would mean more people grabbing the reservations: a self-defeating cycle).


I think when you go to make the reservation and you click the “both parks” option it will show dates which still have availability for both parks. If one park is full for that day, then it won’t be an option to select. But if you changed to a specific park, maybe that day would become available?

Yes that last part makes sense to me about both parks. I just need to plan much further out than 30 days for a Disney trip!! Have fun with this pass to all who it works for. I wish I lived closer and could make any type of AP work!

 

[disneycat321]

I could see how it might work out sometimes, but another consideration is work schedules. My work place is pretty flexible, but I don't think they would take kindly to me saying "I might take my vacation this week...or this one...or this one...you'll have to wait and see what Disney allows!"

Again, it COULD work, but this pass just doesn't seem worth the uncertainty if you're not within a couple hours' drive.

This made me laugh. DH's work is also really flexible, but yeah, not this flexible!

I'm a northern CA resident, so I guess part of the possible target audience. 30 days is not far enough in advance for us. I'm a teacher, so every single day I could go is a "reservation day." DH needs to be able to get time off...and preferably needs to know when that time actually is. I like having my vacations planned in advance, dang it!

We've also been local AP holders, and would have hated this then, too. We had both SoCal and Deluxe passes in the 5 years we had them. We rarely (possibly never) planned our trips 30 days out. Sometimes it was more like 30 minutes out...ha! We also very often went more than twice a month, and almost exclusively on Friday evenings and weekends.

I could see this working for the people in the further fringes of southern CA - maybe a couple hours away from DLR. They might plan a little more than we did (we lived 45, 15, and then 60 min away while we had passes - lots of moving during that time period.) This would also be kind of great for the central valley people who are 4 hours or less away and can go a little more easily. (We're 8ish hours away - kinda removes the ability to be super spontaneous.)

Anyway, it's certainly an interesting development. It's totally off the table for us, personally, because we're planning our first ever 5 park day trip in June 2020 for our 10th anniversary. I really don't want to make it only 2 days (what we usually do) or get into some weird, "Fingers crossed I get a reservation on our anniversary!" mentality....

 

[finchy3]

No good for me coming from the UK I plan 12 months out lol.

 

[Jperiod]

I could see locals reserve every other saturday on a rolling 30 day basis so they have the option. Similar to how locals book FP+ in WDW. But they have the option to cancel anytime until the day of, so personally, I'd just keep an eye on reservations a few days before for cancellations. Our Sept trip is planned for 9/14-21, so I'd book 9/14-15 30 days out and then as soon as I use 9/14, start watching for 9/20 to become available. I bet there will always be cancellations.

 

[Jperiod]

I hope they make the reservation system public so people can see if they want to try this pass.

 

[SomeGuyInOz]

Yeah, this is prohibitive for anyone not in California or a border state then. There would just be no way to count on airfare at an affordable price. Or even hotels maybe.

Not really - it depends when you plan to go. Outside of Summer and peak seasons, most Mondays to Thursdays and some Fridays are "Good to go". This pass wouldn't be great for a summer vacation, but for most other times of the year it could be the perfect pass.