Genie+ Finds Frustrating New Way to Start Day
Just when you thought the Genie+ UI couldn’t get any worse, Walt Disney World has said “hold my beer” and made more guest-unfriendly changes. This post runs through recent changes to the paid FastPass service, explaining how this will be a frustrating way to start the day for Lightning Lane power users.
In the last several months, Walt Disney World has been making a ton of tweaks to Genie+ in an effort to balance supply & demand, while also attempting to improve dismal guest satisfaction scores. The most recent of these was Eliminating the Genie+ Ticket Add- at Walt Disney World. That was met with a lot of doom and gloom and complaints, but Genie+ has yet to sell out anywhere or any day.
Walt Disney World has also added more entertainment and character meet & greets to Genie+ in an attempt to provide more capacity to the highly in-demand service. In some cases, those additions have been reverted–as happened with a trio of meet & greets at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Still, those were positive, guest-friendly changes from Genie+ perspective.
There have also been a slew of changes that amount to lowering expectations or reducing complaints. To that end, Disney added a ‘warning’ that “on average, guests can enter 2 to 3 attractions or experiences per day using the Lightning Lane entrance if the first selection is made early in the day.” (Read more in Genie+ Really is Paid FastPass+ at Walt Disney World.)
Unfortunately, recent tweaks to Genie+ can be filed under “lowering expectations” rather than “positive, guest-friendly change.”
The latest change is that during the high-demand window from the time Genie+ goes live in the morning at 7 am up until 7:30 am, guests will not be able to see the Lightning Lane return window.
Instead, My Disney Experience displays a “Check Availability” message that requires an extra tap to see the return window. Same goes for Individual Lightning Lane with a “See Available Times” message.
This is undoubtedly being done to “address” a common complaint, which we covered in our recent Genie+ Wish List: 3 Big Improvements for Walt Disney World. In that, our #2 problem was times shifting. That expressed the frustration of being up early, seeing the perfect Genie+ return window, quickly clicking through and reviewing the confirmation screen, only to discover that your “perfect” 9:00 am return time has shifted a little bit…to 5:40 pm!
Our suggestion for fixing this was simple and reasonable: locking selection time windows once clicking an attraction. This proposed solution comes from…pretty much every other online reservation system in use everywhere else? Holding a selection time for 60 seconds, 5 minutes, or whatever is deemed appropriate to give guests adequate time to complete the process without any surprises would fix the issue and reduce guest headaches.
Walt Disney World’s approach can’t really be called a “fix” or even a “duct tape solution.” It doesn’t do anything to address the problem, it just hides it. I guess the thinking is that people won’t complain about shifting return times if they can’t see return times? But that doesn’t actively address anything, it just obfuscates.
The underlying guest-unfriendly issue still exists, it just isn’t as easy to articulate what’s wrong. So if the goal is simply avoiding specific guest complaints, not improving actual satisfaction with the paid FastPass service, mission accomplished?
If you’re making ride reservations right at 7:00:00 am using our Genie+ Speed Strategy, this change doesn’t really impact you.
At worst, it’s a lateral move. In that scenario, you weren’t relying on the accuracy of those return times but were clicking through as quickly as possible and relying on your fast fingers (and internet connection!) more than anything else. It’s a distinction without a difference–the return times were likely to be inaccurate anyway, and didn’t provide any better or worse information than the “Check Availability” message. Both are equally worthless and should be disregarded.
Unfortunately for other Walt Disney World visitors, this is actually going to be a negative change–not just a lateral one.
If you were holding off on booking and instead using the Ride Reservation Refill Rules at Walt Disney World to book between ~7:07 am and ~7:25 am, this throws a monkey wrench in that. No longer will you be able to refresh and see when the refill has occurred. Instead, you’ll have to click around a bit more. For Genie+ power users, it’s another layer of frustration in a system that’s already plenty frustrating.
For those who are unfamiliar with these reservation refills, the above screenshot illustrates one of them. Compare this to the previous set of screenshots and you’ll notice that the return times are earlier. That’s because Walt Disney World quietly refills ride reservation availability at various times throughout the day–and we caught one such instance of that.
Unfortunately, you now wouldn’t be able to observe this occurring from the Tip Board between 7:00 am and 7:30 am. It would require clicking on each individual attraction to “Check Availability,” which is quite tedious.
Our recommended approach for the 7 am sharp super strategists would be to book your first selection using the speed strategy without pausing to check times or review anything. Once you made your reservation, check the time to see if that conflicts with your schedule–or whether you think you can do better.
If so, cancel and wait for an anticipated refill time and book again then. This approach entails more risk and committing more time, so understand that before proceeding. For most people and attractions, simply booking at 7 am as speedily as possible is still going to be the best and most straightforward strategy.
With that said, we have to acknowledge that power users should not be the intended beneficiaries of Genie+ changes. One thing we’ve stressed since the original announcement of the whole Genie system was that its policies were formulated in response to complaints from Walt Disney World first-timers.
In particular, we’ve pointed to same-day selections, rather than those made 30 or 60 days in advance. While the latter is favored by many savvy planners and repeat visitors–disproportionately the readers of blogs like this one–it was not popular with park-goers as a whole. Unfortunately, many first-timers had no clue they could make ride reservations until arriving. By then, it was already too late.
Two of the guiding principles behind Genie were monetization and democratization–making it easier to use for more guests and making money in the process. It has been an unequivocal success at accomplishing one of those goals.
However, the Genie system went off the rails at some point during development. It launched as something convoluted and confusing to all (so I guess in a sense it did level the playing field…but not in the way intended!), rather than being an easier and more intuitive–albeit paid–system. In any case, this is mentioned because changes should be evaluated at this point based on whether their guest-friendly and positive for inexperienced users of the system, not seasoned pros.
This “Check Availability” change benefits no one. At best, it reduces confusion about why times shifted–but that’s really only in theory. It doesn’t even properly resolve that, as there’s still not any sort of time lock. All it really does is add an extra click, and one that doesn’t yield anything positive for anyone.
In the end, you could say this is the equivalent of a duct tape solution…if your phone had a cracked screen and you opted to fix it by covering the crack with duct tape. In other words, not much of a solution at all, in practical terms.
On a different note, we’re now less than two weeks away from several Genie+ headliners reverting to Individual Lightning Lane status. In case you missed it, Expedition Everest at Animal Kingdom, Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway at Hollywood Studios, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure and Frozen Ever After at EPCOT, and Space Mountain at Magic Kingdom have been included in the flat-rate Genie+ service for spring and summer.
Way back on February 25, Walt Disney World moved one Individual Lightning Lane attraction per park to the Genie+ service. This was done in response to the system (yet again) coming close to collapsing under the weight of Presidents’ Day crowds/demand, just as had previously happened for the prior holiday season. At that time, the change was made effective through August 7, 2022–for a total of over 5 months.
From the beginning, we’ve written that this change would occur through “at least” August 7, 2022. Our assumption has been that, at some point, Walt Disney World would quietly remove the August 7, 2022 asterisk from its official site and make the change permanent. After all, this change debuted last year at Thanksgiving and will almost certainly be necessary then. If October returns to normal, the added Genie+ capacity might be necessary much sooner–possibly by Columbus Day.
It doesn’t make much sense to keep bouncing these attractions around, changing their status from Genie+ to Individual Lightning Lanes and back multiple times per year. The whole Genie system is already a morass of random rules and policies that seemingly change on a weekly basis with little rhyme or reason as to why. (Spoiler: more changes are coming later this year and in early 2023!) There’s no compelling justification for reverting these rides to Individual Lightning Lanes once the off-season starts.
Of course, there is a reason for it–capturing more revenue during the off-season when Genie+ doesn’t technically “need” the added bandwidth to function as intended. That’s not a good or compelling reason, unless you’re looking at it from Walt Disney World’s perspective.
If Disney makes this guest-unfriendly move, our advice would be to respond accordingly. First, don’t buy Individual Lightning Lanes for any of the aforementioned attractions. Second, don’t purchase Genie+ for EPCOT or Animal Kingdom. Now, we’re not suggesting this as some sort of “moral stand” that fans take.
Rather, you should do so as a rational consumer. If those attractions are removed from the Genie+ ride roster, the service is no longer worthwhile for EPCOT or Animal Kingdom. The value proposition changes, it’s as simple as that. Moreover, it’ll be the off-season when crowds and wait times are lower (decreased demand is what’s allowing Disney to make the change in the first place), so Genie+ won’t be as necessary or useful. Same deal with Individual Lightning Lanes on those attractions–it’ll be quite easy to avoid long lines at those attractions without paying extra.
Ultimately, we’re still hopeful that Walt Disney World will make the changes permanent between now and August 7, 2022. It’s the right thing to do, both logistically and in making things easier on visitors. As for the frustrating change with return times from 7:00 am until 7:30 am, we really hope that’s simply a temporary duct tape fix, as it’s not helpful or a real solution in any way whatsoever. It simply hides the problem which is not the same as actually addressing it.
If you have questions about the basics of using–or not using–the paid FastPass service, see our Guide to Genie+ at Walt Disney World & Lightning Lane FAQ for all of the foundational need-to-know info. This whole system is confusing and convoluted, so you might have a question or two-dozen. That answers all of the most common ones we’ve been receiving from readers.
Planning a Walt Disney World trip? Learn about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels Reviews page. For where to eat, read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post. Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post takes a unique look at clever items to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides will help. For comprehensive advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Do these ride reservation refill rules make sense to you or is it too overwhelming? Will you use this strategy for scoring Genie+ or Individual Lightning Lane selections? Have you had success in getting Slinky Dog Dash during one of these refills? What about headliners in other parks? Thoughts on leveraging Genie+ refills versus other strategy? Do you agree or disagree with my assessment? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
You are the only blog that noticed this & reported it. Thank you! I have been tracking the 7am info on the app for a while now, to notice trends to inform my strategy in the parks at the end of August — when I first saw this happening over the first few days, I thought they changed it because I didn’t have park reservations … I thought maybe Disney was prioritizing people who actually had a reservation on that day. What an annoying thing to impose on us. :/
I still love Disney, but I really miss when we could plan everything ahead of time and just show up and ENJOY our vacation. With the Magical Express and other beloved perks gone, and the aggravation added by Genie+, that “all-inclusive” feel I loved is gone. The value of my vacation is greatly reduced, and I cannot get it back no matter how much I am willing to pay. You hit the nail on the head when you said to lower your expectations!
Strategy moving forward: We still visit Disney, but not exclusively anymore. We are exploring other vacation options and planning to visit Disney World less frequently, starting with our next trip, which will include Universal for the first time in 15 years. I don’t plan to purchase Disney Genie+ anymore, it’s too stressful and I want to enjoy coffee in the morning and the park during the day, not a glitchy phone app. We plan to visit “real” France. We miss the all-inclusive feel of the Disney we used to love so much that we are looking into other types of all-inclusive vacations. I hope Disney leadership will make some different decisions that will bring back the value and the magic. After the post-CoVid “revenge travel” phase, Disney may find that the guests have disappeared like magic. It will be harder to get them back than it was to drive them away. I really am hoping for some good changes and better decisions by leadership in the future.
Genie + suuuuuuuucks. I long for the old fastpass system, it was fairly fair. What I hate the most is if you want to do a specific ride and it is even a little bit busy it will propose a time late in the day and not the next truly available time it also doesn’t allow you to plan to hit experiences in the same area but rather has you running to opposite sides of the park constantly. Finally, the fact that most of Fantasyland is excluded and then you are forced to buy individual experiences on top of it. Such a disappointment. Disney was my happy place, but Genie has completely ruined it and I will be going to Universal next year.
I’m not thrilled about paying for what is basically FPs. And I haven’t actually tried Genie+ so maybe I’m wrong – but it really sounds like legacy FPs except with the app instead of crisscrossing the park to grab FPs. And people threw a huge fit at the switch to FP+ saying how horrible it was.
Yes-I totally agree that it’s similar to legacy FP. I don’t like paying for it but I actually prefer the system to picking 3 rides 2 months ahead (helps that we get to parks early although we did not rope drop we did get to MK around 8:45 so early entry sort of but pretty late for us) We tried it at MK for the first time yesterday and used eight genie plus selections easily not a lot of criss crossing(technically we had a 9th but we left park instead). First one was Peter Pan at 10:05. We also rode 9 “rides” (country bear was one of course!) via regular standby and left the park after dinner around 7:30 pm. We could have done even more if not for the rain…as in we were eligible for another LL on top of the 9th one, AND it was jungle cruise for late evening but we were too tired not to mention the lightning shut that one down too last night. My advice is if you are an off site one day visitor to MK absolutely purchase the genie plus. I hate that it’s no longer free but it was 100% worth the $100(there are six of us). I know this is a bit unpopular and know some will angrily think this perpetuates the nickel and diming but it’s the current reality, isn’t changing anytime soon and dramatically improved our experience. Anyone who says all the selections are sold out before the park opens isn’t really giving completely accurate info. Many thanks to Tom for prepping us on how to power use the system.
My family is not huge Disney park enthusiasts (although my husband and I have been there before multiple times); however, we did want our 13yr old to experience Disney at least once at an age that he would remember + he’s a huge Star Wars fan. With that said, we have a trip booked later this year. The amount of effort already put into articles, YouTube videos, and Disney App trying to learn all the in’s & out’s of just trying to get on the rides I’ve already spent thousands to procure (airfare, park tix, hotels, etc.) is beyond disheartening. It should not be this complicated. Do better, Disney!
You will do fine. Even before Genie+ Disney had a learning curve. You couldn’t show up unprepared and expect to get the most out of your trip. Here’s a daily checklist for you:
7am: book one (paid) individual lightning lane AND one regular lightning lane for whatever park you are visiting. Then set a reminder for 2 hours after park the opens (if the park opens at 8am set reminder for 10am) so you can book your next lightning lane and set a reminder for 2 hours later so you can book another. You can book a lightning lane every 2 hours or whenever you use your last active lightning lane.
Example 1: at 7am you book a 9am for pans flight and a 10am for seven Dwarfs. As soon as you check in for seven Dwarfs you can book another lightning lane.
Example 2: at 7am you book a 10 am for pans flight and then seven Dwarfs at noon. Magic kingdom opens at 9am so at 11am you can book another fast pass. At 11am you book splash mountain for 1130am and as soon as you use it you can redeem another one as the 2 hour rule doesn’t apply once you use your Fastpass.
If all of this seems confusing the app will tell you whether or not you are eligible to book a lightning lane and if you aren’t it will tell you what time you are eligible to do so. It’s a lot of screen time but unfortunately that’s the way it is now.
Last tip make note of the return times. If it’s 1pm and you notice jungle cruise has a return time of 830pm that means it will likely run out of lightning lanes for the day so if you want to use a lightning lane you should book it.
Does the 1:00 Virtual Queue still stay “open” for quite a while (15 minutes or more) for Guardians of the Galaxy or has that changed now?
Return to Fast Pass, Disney. It was simple, straight forward, and without extra cost. Genie + Genie LL are well named, ‘cos Genie makes everything go “poof” and it all turns to poop. I (a life-long regular at WDW) HATE this convoluted system. Disney is sliding down the drain! So many sucky issues with it now.
You know, I have been vocal on this site, because it is weird how I care about the direction of a company I keep giving money to is going. When people say this is not what “Walt” would of wanted, I don’t believe it is all about just monetary issues, Genie plus is probably something he would have backed. However, I believe it would be a far superior product, we are talking about a man, who sat in a theme park and counted how many steps it takes before someone threw trash on the ground, and said, nope not in my park, does anyone one think Chapek or Iger would do that? No, because they do not have to build it, they don’t even have to maintain it. These people running this mega corporate turnkey operation don’t care, they will make millions despite how you or I feel about these parks, or the entire direction the company goes. The likely hood of Disney ever going bankrupt is slim to nil, it is an international household name. Walt and his legacy built that, not Chapek, he is just faceless bean counter in an expensive suit that we all have paid for. Sure, they will make more rides and cheaply themed overpriced hotels, that will cost a fortune for most of us to ever want to afford, and I don’t have magic answer to what declining number it would take for these faceless money surfers to finally take notice, and do something more user friendly, however it obviously is not there yet, and I honestly doubt it ever will be. It is not Disney anymore that is kind of making me excited to go on our 20th anniversary overpriced pay for less deluxe run of the mill trip, It is Tom’s more positive upbeat articles, our wonderful travel agent we used this time, all of the ADR’s we have that we have never ever done before, the couple of YouTube bloggers we watch. This may very well be our last onsite trip, especially with Epic verse on the horizon, and unless things change for the better and I am guessing they won’t, this is probably the last time we will ever see Disney this way. It is sad, yet just another of many examples of what happens when a company gets in the hands of faceless shareholders, and run of the mill CEO’s, the magic of its original creator and those associated with them dies with them.
Well said
We are from Canada and have traveled to WDW and other theme parks with the family for almost 30 years. We have a trip planned for Sept and I am now regretting the 4 planned days in the Disney Parks. The Reservation system is bad enough. No sponteneity. We refuse to spend the vacation on our phones all day scrambling to book rides. No Genie or paid Lightening Lanes for us! What a money grab! It costs enough to get into into the parks! Wish we would have bought more Universal days!! Our next trip will skip WDW altogether and focus on the other parks.
Ha. Checked the Tip Board just now and the times have reappeared. It sure if anything else has changed.
Another possibility is that this is designed to keep guests from getting information about the utility of G+. I used to track the availability of various rides and shows from home. Now I can’t. Just another reason to make other vacation choices.
I spent over $18k on my Disney afamily vacation for 8 days at a resort and parks and amount spent includes what we paid for dining which Disney no longer offers as an option for our package. Not writing an article on this but genie plus came with stress and aggravation. The worst service ever. Can’t believe I spent extra on poor service.
Disney messed up big time with us as we have about 8 Disney vacations under our belt since starting a family. The pandemic made this mess and its evident through poor poor training of cast members and managers and techs that couldnt make genie plus work.
The magic is gone. The friendly conversations with cast members does not exist. I’m waiting out another Disney possibility by 6 more years but will be closely monitoring complaints. Universal was so much better and next theme park vacation will be when Epic Universe opens. For those that have $ to spend please avoid Disney World for now and consider something abroad and relaxing. Wish I would have done something different. I made some great memories with my family but am done being a loyal guest. 🙁
What Rolando said!
Rolando, Thank you for mentioning “epic universe” because I had no idea that Universal was building this new addition! After reading what you said I went and looked it up. Its massive! By the time the entire thing is completed its going to make Universal as big as WDW! Disney will no longer be the only cookie in the jar after this!
Thanks for the nifty links. We are long time fans of WDW and visited at least every other year from 1980 until 2019. We were thrilled to get back to parkthis year until we realized what a chore, bore and oain in the neck the Genie+ and Lightening Lane systems are. Being over 60 we aren’t overly techy and didn’t realize we would be spending so much time staring at our phones while on vacation. Gone are the days of leisurely wandering the parks and choosing what to do or where to go on a whim. The experience is less than magical. It’s limiting and very frustrating. We could just be don’t like changes old folks but we won’t be back until Disney rethinks this really dumb idea