Walt Disney World has updated their rider switch (a.k.a. child swap) policy to limit the number of guests who can ride twice.
Here’s the description and directions for rider switch from the Walt Disney World website:
If a child does not meet the height requirement or a Guest does not wish to board a particular attraction, no problem! With Rider Switch, one adult can wait with the non-rider (or riders) while the rest of the party enjoys the attraction. When the other adult returns, they can supervise the non-riding Guests, and the waiting adult can board the attraction without having to wait in the regular line again!
To Use Rider Switch:
1. First check with a Cast Member to see if Rider Switch is offered at the attraction in question.
2. Once at the attraction, approach the greeting Cast Member with your entire party. At least one adult member of your party and the Guests who are not riding will be issued a Ride Switch entitlement by the Cast Member and asked to wait in a designated area (usually outside of the attraction). This group is “Party 2.”
3. The other party members (“Party 1”) ride the attraction.
4. After riding the attraction, Party 1 locates Party 2. Then, Party 1 takes over supervision of the non-riding children or Guests.
5. Party 2 enters and boards the attraction without having to wait in the regular queue a second time. The Rider Switch entitlement must be validated by a Cast Member at this time.
The policy previously read “If the person in Party 2 waited alone with the child, he or she may bring up to 2 other Guests back to ride the attraction with him or her. Please note that only 3 Guests are allowed per Rider Switch Pass.”
It now states “Please note that if the person in Party 2 waited alone with the child or non-riding Guest, the number of Guests who may join him or her and ride again is limited.”
This seems to indicate that only 1 or possibly no other guests may ride with Party 2. This may be to prevent some guests from riding multiple times in a row, and therefore shorten wait times for other guests.
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It makes sense. You really don’t need 2-3 others to go with you. But none the less another nice Disney perk lost
Not a fan of this change. As an adult, I don’t go to ride alone-If I have to wait off of 7DMT with my two year-old, I don’t want to ride alone when the rest of the party is done. I want to go with my 6 yo.
I could not agree more!! I don’t want to ride by myself after waiting with my little one after my wife and bigger one ride 7DMT.
You’re not going to have to ride by yourself. This is a big nothing of a change and people are reading far too much into this. The new language still clearly contemplates you being able to ride with others – they’ve just moved from 2 others to a more flexible standard which can vary by ride capacity and crowds. But the language is unambiguous in still contemplating that there will be some “number of guests” that will be able to ride with you and will be at least 1. If they meant that no other guests could ride with you – there were 100 ways they could have easily said that. This was not one of them.
I completely agree, parents pay a lot of money to go each parent should be able to enjoy the ride with their children.
I would suspect the number will equal the number who can ride with the person in the same car (so for example, a father could bring 2 smaller children who could fit in a single car for Big Thunder but only one other child for 7DMT. I have a hard time believing they’d make the parent ride alone but possibly for rides such as Space Mountain that are single seats.