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Disney World recently released a new approach to making room requests via its online check-in process.

I’ll get to the process in a minute, but will first some note some of the new options…and some problems with them.

In most cases new options have been added, including “Adjoining Rooms (no connecting door),” “Connecting Rooms” and “Connecting Rooms (guaranteed).”

See, for example, the new form for Family Suites at Art of Animation:

I’ve spent my spare time the last few days (I do have a real job, after all) taking screenshots of the new options, pasting them to PowerPoint, cropping and recombining the new options, and putting them in my Disney World resort reviews.

This was kind of a pain, and has resulted in a 128 page PowerPoint document and a cluttered Pinterest feed (page down on Pinterest to find all the new online forms, or see this board for the values forms, this for the moderates, this for the deluxes, and this for DVC; while there, follow me on Pinterest!)

And I’m hoping I have to do this all over again, as there are some goofy features to the option sets. For example, there ARE no connecting rooms in the Family suites, so a family clicking “Connecting Rooms (guaranteed)” is both wasting a request and also setting themselves up for disappointment.

There’s basically three problems.

One is not having separate forms for clearly distinguishable room types, and that’s the issue with Art of Animation, where both Little Mermaid Standard rooms (where you can get connecting rooms) and Family Suites (where you can’t) are both covered by the same form.

You’ll find the same problem at many other resorts with very different rooms or areas, for example

• The Contemporary (where both Garden Wing and Tower rooms use the same form, meaning some Tower guests will be clicking for non-existent ground floor rooms)
• Saratoga Springs (The Treehouses and the main resort use the same form, good luck getting that “Downtown Disney view” from your Treehouse)
• Port Orleans Riverside (five person Alligator Bayou rooms, four Person Magnolia Bend Royal Rooms, and four person Magnolia Bend standard rooms all use the same form–if you reserve a room for five people three and older, a “Mansions area” request is wasted)

The second problem is some unclear or incomplete options. Many (but not all!—one that needs it the most, Caribbean Beach, does not) moderates and deluxes now show the option of “2 Queen Size Beds” and, elsewhere on the list “King Size Bed.”

These queen bed options should be expanded at those deluxes and moderates that hold five so that they include the ability to select the third sleeping spot. The “King Size Bed” should be relabeled for clarity and completeness as “1 King Size Bed” and/or “1 King Size Bed plus daybed” as appropriate.

The third problem is a purer form of goofiness, perhaps best illustrated by the form for the Cabins at Fort Wilderness. At these cute stand-alone Cabins, we see the same option for non-existing connecting rooms, and even more goofiness:

• There are no elevators, no upper floors and no lower floors, so why on earth are they in the form?
• You can’t put tents on Cabin sites, so why the option to rent as many as five of them?

These forms need several different types of changes:

• Corrections so that only actually possible options are shown for a purchased room type, even if this means even more distinct forms, and I have to redo all my screenshots…
• Expansions so that the full array of major sleeping options is selectable
• Grouping of like topics, so that all the view options are grouped together, all the bed options grouped together, etc. There’s some of this in the forms, but they need more.

I’d gladly spend a couple of days helping Disney with this, since at least based on the usability of these forms I seem to know more about its resorts and their rooms than it does itself.

I do know a bit about these rooms…having stayed in 129 different rooms, suites, studios, villas, cabins and campsites…as attested to by my MagicBand Lamp…and my book.

I’d even donate my time for free—if Disney flew me down and back, put me up in a renovated Bay Lake Tower two-bedroom lock-off (I need updated photographs of one), and threw in the Deluxe Dining Plan.

HOW TO DO ONLINE CHECK IN AFTER THESE CHANGES

You can do online check-in starting 60 days from your arrival date. Go to My Disney Experience, click “My Reservations and Tickets” in the drop down on the right, wait for your reservation to load, and click the online check-in option.

Alternatively just go here.

If you book your room within the 60 day window, your final booking screen will give you the option to do online check right away:

If you have more than one room booked, then you will click the radio button of the room you want to check in to:

A screen will open. Look for the area that says “These Details Are on File”–even though they aren’t, yet–and click “Show Details”

Then click “edit” on the next screen across from “Room Location Requests”:

This screen, where you actually make your selections (up to two), will then open:

The two drop down menus are the same–you make one selection from one, and another from the other.

I’m sorry to see the unnecessary problems with these new forms, but hope that the drop down layout is easy to edit, and that Disney fixes the problems here. As noted above, I’m glad to help!

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