The influx of holiday crowds is pushing Walt Disney World to be more strict on who can visit their resort hotels, and more surprisingly, who can dine at them. This weekend, we received a pop-up message on our My Disney Experience app stating mobile order at Disney’s Contemporary Resort is being restricted to only resort hotel guests.
When attempting to place a Mobile Order at Contempo Café, app users are met with a message stating that this feature is only available to Guests staying at Disney’s Contemporary Resort. We have not seen the message at other resort hotels.
Attempting to place a to-go order for The Wave… of American Flavors gives this message as well.
It seems as though Walt Disney World wants to deter non-resort Guests, or guests from other resorts, from taking pickup windows from those who are actually staying at the hotel. That being said, with increased crowds and limited dining options open, we have seen several resort guests complaining this week that they had to eat counter service food, or worse, frozen food from the hotel’s gift shop because restaurants at their hotel were overburdened.
Given the scarcity of reservations and these situations, we think it’s time for Disney to reopen more restaurants around Walt Disney World, or at least extend hours at many theme park eateries that close early.
Keep with WDWNT as we bring updates on this story.
I have a NOVEL idea. Why doesn’t Disney move forward and open up to 75%, do away with the crazy social distancing lines and go back to fast pass, re hire all those furloughed (yea I know people rather collect unemployment than work- Fact according to management). Florida is doing fine. Governor and Mayor have already approved 100%. Stop this difficult balancing act. If YOU feel not ready to bare the crowds, just stay home longer. No judgment, but we need to return to normal-cause this is too complicated to navigate Disney! Be a leader.
The reason for this is that people staying either offsite or in other Disney resorts were taking a rideshare to resorts within walking distance and booking a cheap mobile order meal to get past the guard gate at the hotel, hoping to gain access to the hotel property because they had a “reservation.”
In reality, they just want to avoid the TTC hassle, or, if staying in a Disney property elsewhere, they want to avoid taking the bus.
Is Disney protecting the restaurant slots for hotel guests? Likely not. Instead, they are likely doing it to ensure their walk-up screening isn’t overwhelmed.
In the past, DCA has done a similar thing with the hotel entrance at the Grand Californian, where they restrict DCA entry to hotel guests only early in the morning.
That’s not accurate, because people did that for years. This is now because the restaurants are actually overwhelmed.
Disney knows how many guests they have and should be able to anticipate how many others will want to come from other hotels. The wallk up places are all the same so they can’t pull CM from one hotel that is low performing for the day and shift them over? I would be furious if I had to eat frozen meals on my vacation. Disney is being cheap at this point.
We were here in March (Spring Break) and were allowed to mobile order from Contempo Cafe, but then weren’t allowed in to the hotel to get our order. At least there’s a message now so you don’t waste your money!