Here Now! Rider Switch Update!

[poptart90]

You've never needed a FP if you're the 2nd swapper. That's one of the reasons people feel it's a system that can be "abused."

At Disney World, it means parties of two with a little one can book 6 FPs in day instead of 3.

Wow! How did I not know this? LOL All this time I've been pulling a FP for the Rider Switch because one time I had a CM at Star Tours ask to see my FP before he would give me a Rider Switch pass. So I thought I needed one as well! Whoops!

 

[poptart90]

Did you notice the standby time when you were issued the RS?

I did not. But I will check that tomorrow. I'm going to write more about the wait times...

 

[Ldat7]

I appreciate this update too. Thank you. Like a poster in another thread, I didn't know that adults visited Disneyland on their own until I started researching here for our little family with young kids. I did run in the inaugural Disneyland half marathon years ago and I must admit that I was a little embarrassed. I kept thinking, I'm an adult, what am I doing here???

This is a very rude and somewhat passive aggressive comment.

 

[MacMama0930]

This is a very rude and somewhat passive aggressive comment.

I know, right? A lot of people on this board do go on adult only trips (as do I) and I see and meet a ton of people there who don't have any children. There is so much to do at the parks, I don't know why certain people think it's just for kids.

 

[HuskyGal]

This is a very rude and somewhat passive aggressive comment.

I apologize for offending you. I only meant that I truly thought it was a place for kids until I started reading disboards recently. And Now that I have my own kids, I'm really into Disneyland too. It's nice to read here for advice and opinions because I know very few adults IRL who are Disneyland experts. That thought was running through my mind ten years ago. Now I want to go all the time!

 

[Hofmanns4]

From what I understand, this seems like a case of "double jeopardy".

Parent 1 "does their time" in line while parent 2 waits with baby.

When parent 1 and jr finish the ride, parent 2 should not have to also "do the time" and wait. Parent 1 already waited and the time is served. Making parent 2 and jr wait 20, 30 min etc. to ride is "double jeopardy". I understand putting an end time limit as to not hold until the end of the night, but the time limit now is not right.

My RS days are over at the moment, but I hope they get this fixed.

 

[poptart90]

We utilized RS three times today and here is what I have learned about the "extra" wait times:

The CMs at the FP queue are determining the "extra" wait time length. They manually program the time to return right before they scan the RS on to your park ticket. Seems to be based off when they think the 1st person will actually exit the ride after factoring in how busy the FP queue is and possibly the stand by wait time, but I don't think that factors as much.

At Screamin the CMs programmed my RS to be valid 5 minutes after my husband entered the ride as the 1st party. Or as they explained it to me, "basically when he gets off, you'll be able to go on".

At Star Tours the CM looked at the FP return time currently being accepted and said "ok, I'm going to estimate this" and programmed the RS to be valid 30 minutes after the 1st party. Not the hour wait it was yesterday in the middle of the afternoon when it was busy.

And it was an extra hour wait for Soarin, again in the middle of the busy afternoon.

However, in all three instances the window to return and redeem the RS was only ONE HOUR.

So it appears not to be an exact science. No standard extra "one hour" wait. Which I guess is good news, and potentially frustrating as well. It will be very difficult to predict whether RS will be useful on any given day or time as it now seems to depend on what the CM manning the FP queue thinks. ??? Hopefully others will contribute their experiences as well so we can pool our various experiences to find the best ways to use RS to continue the magic of Disney with younger children.

 

[onlyoneash]

....so we can pool our various experiences to find the best ways to use RS to continue the magic of Disney with younger children.

Well said. I hope this can eventually all get adjusted to a more realistic rider swap experience, but in the meantime, it is nice to hear everyone's experiences so I can adjust my own expectations.

 

[SOCALMouseMommy]

We utilized RS three times today and here is what I have learned about the "extra" wait times:

The CMs at the FP queue are determining the "extra" wait time length. They manually program the time to return right before they scan the RS on to your park ticket. Seems to be based off when they think the 1st person will actually exit the ride after factoring in how busy the FP queue is and possibly the stand by wait time, but I don't think that factors as much.

At Screamin the CMs programmed my RS to be valid 5 minutes after my husband entered the ride as the 1st party. Or as they explained it to me, "basically when he gets off, you'll be able to go on".

At Star Tours the CM looked at the FP return time currently being accepted and said "ok, I'm going to estimate this" and programmed the RS to be valid 30 minutes after the 1st party. Not the hour wait it was yesterday in the middle of the afternoon when it was busy.

And it was an extra hour wait for Soarin, again in the middle of the busy afternoon.

However, in all three instances the window to return and redeem the RS was only ONE HOUR.

So it appears not to be an exact science. No standard extra "one hour" wait. Which I guess is good news, and potentially frustrating as well. It will be very difficult to predict whether RS will be useful on any given day or time as it now seems to depend on what the CM manning the FP queue thinks. ??? Hopefully others will contribute their experiences as well so we can pool our various experiences to find the best ways to use RS to continue the magic of Disney with younger children.

Wow, that sounds so inefficient and crazy! CMs arbitrarily decided when RS will be valid on a case by case basis? How does this make any sense whatsoever? I feel sorry for the poor CMs who have to do this.

 

[SMD]

Wow, that sounds so inefficient and crazy! CMs arbitrarily decided when RS will be valid on a case by case basis? How does this make any sense whatsoever? I feel sorry for the poor CMs who have to do this.

If Disney kept track of the FP return queue wait times like to do the SB queue times it could be automatic. Otherwise, this system is better for the CMs than not knowing when the RS passes will come back and potentially slamming the FP return at any unknown time.

 

[DellyHoliday]

At the parks right now!!

So, the new rider switch pass is basically a fastpass. I don't know how they calculate the return times (haven't asked yet) but it's added to your park ticket as a fastpass and has one hour time frame. All the rider switch passes I got had return times within 20min (at the lastest) so it's not too bad.

Also, you CAN add rider switch pass to the people who were in Group 1.

Let me know if you guys have any questions

 

[agamble]

From what I understand, this seems like a case of "double jeopardy".

Parent 1 "does their time" in line while parent 2 waits with baby.

When parent 1 and jr finish the ride, parent 2 should not have to also "do the time" and wait. Parent 1 already waited and the time is served. Making parent 2 and jr wait 20, 30 min etc. to ride is "double jeopardy". I understand putting an end time limit as to not hold until the end of the night, but the time limit now is not right.

My RS days are over at the moment, but I hope they get this fixed.

This is why I never saw RS as a big advantage. It takes twice as long to ride a ride when you have to swap than it does to all ride together. People said it was unfair of us to save them and use them later because it was "gaming the system," but in reality we were just trying to make the most of a long day where we had to wait twice to ride a ride. It's not like you get back on immediately. You still have to wait in the FP line. So your wait is double what it could have been. Ahhh...one day my kids will all be big. A blessing and a curse. Oldest going to second grade in the morning.

 

[cpster]

The only ride where RS is close to bring a true swap is Space Mountain, although I'm not sure if entering through the exit has changed since electronic RS came along. Does anyone know? I really think the return window should be immediately effective or at most 15 minutes out so the other adult can ride as soon as the first group returns. A two to three hour return window seems reasonable. We're just about exiting our RS days, but hope that Disney will revise the current policy to make it a little easier for families with non-riders that need supervision. CMs should check for the existence of non-riders in the group before issuing the RS to weed out the cheaters that have no business using RS in the first place.

 

[sljl]

I went on Friday, had a maxpass for CA screaming for the whole party of 4....after scanning in and going through the whole queue, DS chickened out. I left and asked the fronst for a RS since i just scanned through and technically scanned through my FP, and he was nice enough to oblige...and added on my first DS to ride with me...but although Standby time was 15 minutes, my RT was started in one hour for a 1 hour window. So it's not based on standby time...i think it's just automatically scheduled for one hour later. The CM was nice enough to just let me through because I thought it was like the old system where I usually just rode right away

 

[theluckyrabbit]

At the parks right now!!

So, the new rider switch pass is basically a fastpass. I don't know how they calculate the return times (haven't asked yet) but it's added to your park ticket as a fastpass and has one hour time frame. All the rider switch passes I got had return times within 20min (at the lastest) so it's not too bad.

Also, you CAN add rider switch pass to the people who were in Group 1.

Let me know if you guys have any questions

Glad to hear that this is working for you! Question: have any of your RS passes cancelled out any of your FPs? Or has that glitch been fixed?

 

[DellyHoliday]

Glad to hear that this is working for you! Question: have any of your RS passes cancelled out any of your FPs? Or has that glitch been fixed?

Nope! Although there was one incident when my DH and DS went to Star Tours 7mins earlier than their FP return times. DH asked for RS for me and my dad, RS appeared on the app but our "multiple experience" (it's like fastpasses but you can use them anytime within that day. The CM gave them to us when BTMRR broke down while we were in line) passes disappeared along with DH&DS's Star Tours FP. So I went to the guest services and the CM there explained to me things like that could happen if you show up earlier than the return time then granted us another multipe experience passes!

 

[theluckyrabbit]

That is helpful information so that people know to be careful about not returning too early. Thanks for reporting back!

 

[PurpleKomodo]

This whole thing is interesting. I think we were there when they were starting to transition and our experience was just weird based on what I had read about RS. When we used it, we were given a very temporary tag (lanyard, random card that said nothing about RS, etc.). It did not ever appear that we could take that and return whenever we wanted. The expectation was that we would swap immediately. This was the same no matter if we were going through the SB line or the FP line.

When I read the posts earlier talking about the RS starting after the time of the SB line I assumed Disney was trying to cut down on people trying to double the FPs they held by using RS. For example, half the group gets FP for Guardians and the other half for RSR and using RS everyone rides through the FP line. But, the more recent posts with arbitrary return times are confusing.

As far as I am concerned (and I have traveled with young kids) I am good with a system that requires an immediate swap. I feel like that makes sense. If my plan was to do it later for the other group, I don't need a RS, I'll just come back and do it later. But, I would take issue with the lag time. If the first group gets off the ride and we have to wait 30 minutes to an hour before group 2 can go, that throws a wrench in touring for the day. As PPs have said, it already takes twice the time to tour when you are doing RS. If we have to try to kill an hour and then double back to an attraction, that is just plain inefficient.

I am totally okay with Disney trying to close loopholes, but they have to think how that will actually impact people in reality. IMHO, as long as I can swap immediately, I am good with an hour return window, but making groups wait to use the swap seems a bit much.

 

[onlyoneash]

I really wish there was no "start" time and maybe a 2 or 3 hour end time for the swap. This would give plenty of time for parent 1 to get through the ride, but at the same time give parent 2 a bit of flexibility to ride immediately or maybe after the kids ate/napped or whatever came up that parent 2 couldn't ride immediately.

At the same time, CMs really checking that there are children involved so people don't just abuse the system.

I think this would be a good compromise from the old vs new rider swap.

 

[jcourtney]

When I read the posts earlier talking about the RS starting after the time of the SB line I assumed Disney was trying to cut down on people trying to double the FPs they held by using RS. For example, half the group gets FP for Guardians and the other half for RSR and using RS everyone rides through the FP line. But, the more recent posts with arbitrary return times are confusing.

As far as I am concerned (and I have traveled with young kids) I am good with a system that requires an immediate swap. I feel like that makes sense. If my plan was to do it later for the other group, I don't need a RS, I'll just come back and do it later. But, I would take issue with the lag time. If the first group gets off the ride and we have to wait 30 minutes to an hour before group 2 can go, that throws a wrench in touring for the day. As PPs have said, it already takes twice the time to tour when you are doing RS. If we have to try to kill an hour and then double back to an attraction, that is just plain inefficient.

I am totally okay with Disney trying to close loopholes, but they have to think how that will actually impact people in reality. IMHO, as long as I can swap immediately, I am good with an hour return window, but making groups wait to use the swap seems a bit much.

These are my thoughts exactly! I couldn't have said it better.