Disney's Club Level (CL) Information & Questions

[mickeyluv'r]

PP was asking about Poly specifically in their question.

That is why I specifically clarified my post THIS way:

Just to clarify, in the case of at least some of the other resorts, Nespresso starts around 7am.

At CR, …

I'm also rather certain at WL...

I think it was pretty clear in how I worded my post, but maybe I wasn't?


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[PolyRob]

Looking at the BC CL floor, I am thinking this area circled in red would be the most ideal to request for standard view. A little removed from the main hallway, yet close to the elevators and lounge without being right next door. Am I thinking correctly?

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I'm not really sure how I would ask for these rooms. I also want two queen beds. Would I just list specific rooms numbers? Near elevator? "Wing H?" (whatever that means) Also, is it best to just reach out to Signature Services for a room request? I usually just send a fax via TP. Are both acceptable for CL stays? Thanks!

 

[Nadine and Fred]

Man do I wish they'd fix this. This one thing is the sole reason we won't participate in the extra CL FP system. I move FP around all.the.time. Having to call them to move their FP around is simply not feasible for the way we tour. We'd be on the phone all the time. If they change that, and we would be in

It was (surprisingly) fast to do; actually was able to change the FPs as we waited on line for one of the attractions. I agree that it would make it easier if we could make our own modifications. That being said..... LOVE not having to worry about the tiers in AK,DS and EPCOT and LOVE being able to make ALL of the FPs 90 days prior to our departure. I do not miss the terror of waking up on FP Day... wondering... will I get this?? Now... no stress!!!

 

[CaLuCa]

Want to update...

This morning, in an effort to avoid ironing and doing dishes and other wonderful SAHM things like look for dirty socks, I played around with MDE. Amazingly, something is fixed and now it works like it should. I currently have 15 days of FP ALL associated with on site stays (I don't want anyone thinking I am gaming the system. These are all with stays and our APs.). These stays range from this coming Friday through Sunday, May 12. This is how I believe it should work. If you are willing to pay for on site, you should be able to book fast passes without a limit. And none of these are fake reservations...no campsites. (But that's a whole other can of worms.)

So I guess chatting with DSS yesterday and my email to guest services resolved the manner.

I am very much looking forward to our BWI CL stay. As a former rope drop commando/you can sleep at home visitor, being local and having AP is so much more enjoyable. Disney might actually become a vacation and not the experience I have called it. Don't get me wrong...we're still up at AK at 7 to hit Pandora bright and early. But heading back to the resort to just relax will be incredible.

 

[reluctantredhead]

I believe you and I told the CM that I knew people were able to do it even though he was adamant it was not possible without a continuous stay. It’s very frustrating though when you have multiple CMs telling you you can’t and some people have had problems with it as well. We have CL stays booked for both trips plus one right before that may also cause issues with overlap and I’ll be calling DSS tomorrow to see what they say. I’m very frustrated because I am a first time passholder and I probably would not have upgraded if I knew this was a thing.

@Mzpalmtree , we were victims of this on our last trip. I'm not sure if I'm keeping all of your details straight in my head, but we had a CL split stay 12/20-12/27 (where we booked the CL FP+ for 12/21-12/26) and then another CL split stay 2/23-3/2 (booked CL FP+ for 2/24-2/26). We discovered on day 2 of our Feb/March trip that our regular (free) FP+ were unmodifiable, and when we called DSS/IT, we were told the same as you...that it was because of the 7 day limit and, unbeknownst to us, the DSS person who had booked our FP+ for us (both CL and paid ones) had "fixed" the problem by booking the free FP as CL ones. Sounds great in theory, but we frequently change things up on the fly and really hated not being able to modify them...and the fact that we were never told that this would be the case. Supposedly the problem had to do with our 90 day booking window opening before the December FP already being used.

And we had zero offsite stays involved. In nearly 25 years of going to WDW, we've had one offsite stay, in June of 2018...and I personally don't even count it as a "real trip" because we were there for my H's work and only popped in to the parks for a few hours for 3 nights.

I hate to say it, but often folks on the DIS are more knowledgeable about FP/MDE quirks than CMs, and DSS is no different.

This subject came up on this thread a few weeks ago and I spent some time testing it and made 23 days of FPs over 3 different on-site resort trips. No magic to the 23 other than I got tired of messing with it. The general advice is that you 'should' be fine with multiple on-site stays and length-of-stay FP bookings. Things after 14 total days get a little less well documented, but that would only apply to a small section of people for many practical circumstances anyway.

I'd suggest that situations such as SOG or the good neighbor resorts with 60 day beneifts have the potential to mess up the length-of-stay privileges as 'sometimes' those resorts can interact differently with MDE, and any day of FPs booked without a resort stay will definitely trigger the 7 day max rule.

I'm like @AngiTN and often have a few smaller trips in short windows and I can't think of a time where I've ever triggered the 7 day max rule.

I'm not saying that there isn't a bit of "YMMV" on this topic as strange things can happen given individual circumstances, but I wouldn't stress too much.

@GADisneyDad14 , is it possible that multiple split stays and/or the CL FP+ are what is triggering this for both me and @Mzpalmtree ? I think I've read that Disney doesn't actually recognize "split stays", so according to them I've now had 4 stays in the past 2 months, and CL FP+ as part of all 4 stays.

Hope this all makes sense...it is very confusing and for some reason tough for me to articulate, lol.

 

[reluctantredhead]

Want to update...

This morning, in an effort to avoid ironing and doing dishes and other wonderful SAHM things like look for dirty socks, I played around with MDE. Amazingly, something is fixed and now it works like it should. I currently have 15 days of FP ALL associated with on site stays (I don't want anyone thinking I am gaming the system. These are all with stays and our APs.). These stays range from this coming Friday through Sunday, May 12. This is how I believe it should work. If you are willing to pay for on site, you should be able to book fast passes without a limit. And none of these are fake reservations...no campsites. (But that's a whole other can of worms.)

So I guess chatting with DSS yesterday and my email to guest services resolved the manner.

I am very much looking forward to our BWI CL stay. As a former rope drop commando/you can sleep at home visitor, being local and having AP is so much more enjoyable. Disney might actually become a vacation and not the experience I have called it. Don't get me wrong...we're still up at AK at 7 to hit Pandora bright and early. But heading back to the resort to just relax will be incredible.

@CaLuCa , glad they were able to fix this for you.

I noticed upthread that you were offered CL+ FP as a "fix"...very interesting that that's what they did to "fix" mine without telling me. I guess they figured it was no big deal since we'd already paid for them and they figured we wouldn't notice, lol.

Oh, and to be clear, since you mentioned it...no campsite bookings or throwaway bookings or anything like that for us either. I have a weird feeling now that it's the multiple split stays and the 90 day CL FP periods overlapping that somehow triggered this problem for us. It's great that they were able to fix it for you! In our situation, our only option was either to stick with the times we already had or to cancel and rebook...and there wasn't availability for the headliners at that point.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

@Mzpalmtree , we were victims of this on our last trip. I'm not sure if I'm keeping all of your details straight in my head, but we had a CL split stay 12/20-12/27 (where we booked the CL FP+ for 12/21-12/26) and then another CL split stay 2/23-3/2 (booked CL FP+ for 2/24-2/26). We discovered on day 2 of our Feb/March trip that our regular (free) FP+ were unmodifiable, and when we called DSS/IT, we were told the same as you...that it was because of the 7 day limit and, unbeknownst to us, the DSS person who had booked our FP+ for us (both CL and paid ones) had "fixed" the problem by booking the free FP as CL ones. Sounds great in theory, but we frequently change things up on the fly and really hated not being able to modify them...and the fact that we were never told that this would be the case. Supposedly the problem had to do with our 90 day booking window opening before the December FP already being used.

And we had zero offsite stays involved. In nearly 25 years of going to WDW, we've had one offsite stay, in June of 2018...and I personally don't even count it as a "real trip" because we were there for my H's work and only popped in to the parks for a few hours for 3 nights.



@GADisneyDad14 , is it possible that multiple split stays and/or the CL FP+ are what is triggering this for both me and @Mzpalmtree ? I think I've read that Disney doesn't actually recognize "split stays", so according to them I've now had 4 stays in the past 2 months, and CL FP+ as part of all 4 stays.

Hope this all makes sense...it is very confusing and for some reason tough for me to articulate, lol.

That’s a good question, not sure I know the answer. Usually when AP/FP/7 day issues come up it is ‘something’ unusual in that person’s individual details that can be the cause, in this case the CLFP program could be that unusual trigger for some reason - although I don’t know that for fact. That program is sort of a “circle in a square” type of setup with MDE to begin with so it wouldn’t surprise me if it was somehow involved (again, speculation on my part).

You may have just the right combination of lots of trips/FPs in a very short window that is triggering something.

Or you’re just randomly caught up with issues with no good explanation. I’ll occasionally see these kinds of reports.

You are right in that Disney doesn’t recognize “split stays” as any sort of official designation. In their view (and their computer system’s view), you have multiple separate individual resort reservations. Normally though that should not matter - you have length of stay FP privileges for any stay combination, whether back-to-back or separated.

But I’m sorry you seem to be stuck in an AP/FP pickle and wish I had a better explanation.

 

[CaLuCa]

@CaLuCa , glad they were able to fix this for you.

I noticed upthread that you were offered CL+ FP as a "fix"...very interesting that that's what they did to "fix" mine without telling me. I guess they figured it was no big deal since we'd already paid for them and they figured we wouldn't notice, lol.

Oh, and to be clear, since you mentioned it...no campsite bookings or throwaway bookings or anything like that for us either. I have a weird feeling now that it's the multiple split stays and the 90 day CL FP periods overlapping that somehow triggered this problem for us. It's great that they were able to fix it for you! In our situation, our only option was either to stick with the times we already had or to cancel and rebook...and there wasn't availability for the headliners at that point.

My choices for March 23 were slim pickings. And I still couldn't get SDD for the May 12. Well, I got DH one but he wasn't maxed out yet at 7, but now I can't get mine or the twins.

At this point in the game, I don't want to add on $900 for the CL FP (family of 6) for things we can really accomplish with EMH. We were contemplating a CL stay to deal with SW but with the announcement of no FP for SR, it negates a lot of the benefits for us.

I wonder if you talked with DSS, since you are already paying for CL FP, they could help you with the choices? I know creating extra fast passes when they aren't there is hard, but to be really disappointed with a service that is not a small amount of money, is very frustrating.

 

[reluctantredhead]

My choices for March 23 were slim pickings. And I still couldn't get SDD for the May 12. Well, I got DH one but he wasn't maxed out yet at 7, but now I can't get mine or the twins.

At this point in the game, I don't want to add on $900 for the CL FP (family of 6) for things we can really accomplish with EMH. We were contemplating a CL stay to deal with SW but with the announcement of no FP for SR, it negates a lot of the benefits for us.

I wonder if you talked with DSS, since you are already paying for CL FP, they could help you with the choices? I know creating extra fast passes when they aren't there is hard, but to be really disappointed with a service that is not a small amount of money, is very frustrating.

Ugh, sorry you weren't able to get the passes you wanted. I would have hoped that they would have offered them to you for free to correct the problem for you...but you still would've been stuck with not being able to modify them yourself.

Our situation was complicated by the fact that we didn't find out that they had converted our regular (free) FP+ to CL FP+ until the day we were using them...so at that point, there was little availability. We have actually been told different things by different CM about whether DSS/the CL CMs have access to any "extra" FP+...on the phone we were told that no, they do not, that the CL FP+ are drawn from the same pool as the regular (free) ones...so when they're gone, they're gone. But the CL CM at BWI told us that the reason they were unmodifiable in the first place was because they were NOT drawn from the regular FP+ pool, but from a separate CL one that only DSS/the CL CMs have access to. Who knows what the truth is??? Lol.

The dumbest part is, that them turning our regular (free) FP+ into CL FP+ *could* have been quite a boon, had we known about it in advance. Because they were CL FP+, MDE didn't recognize us as having any regular (free) FP+...so we could've actually been holding 9 FP+ at once! And we actually did at one point, when we were trying to figure out what the heck was going on! Before you get too excited though, know that because this was all happening day-of, they were only FP+ for things that are easy to get...no headliners. So we didn't really need them, and they were actually preventing us from being able to get more in the sense that you have to burn through your first 3 before the system will let you get any more "4th and beyond" Tier 1 FP+. So we in essence had to churn through 5 Tier 2 rides before we could get any more Tier 1 FP+...does that make sense? I hope I'm explaining it all right!

Of course, "having to" churn through Tier 2 rides sounds horribly entitled, and I apologize for that...cue the world's smallest violin! If we'd been in MK that day, obviously it would've been a huge advantage because of no tiers. But when you're hopping between HS and EP and want to get your TT and TSL on, it becomes a bit of a problem, lol. I've gotten pretty good at refreshing and am usually able to score pretty much everything but the swirling saucers by refreshing, so it made for a fairly frustrating day. And since you can't overlap the FP+ (or at least we weren't allowed to...again, there have been mixed reports on that), we had 9 hours of "burn time" before we were able to book what we really wanted to book.

 

[AngiTN]

@Mzpalmtree , we were victims of this on our last trip. I'm not sure if I'm keeping all of your details straight in my head, but we had a CL split stay 12/20-12/27 (where we booked the CL FP+ for 12/21-12/26) and then another CL split stay 2/23-3/2 (booked CL FP+ for 2/24-2/26). We discovered on day 2 of our Feb/March trip that our regular (free) FP+ were unmodifiable, and when we called DSS/IT, we were told the same as you...that it was because of the 7 day limit and, unbeknownst to us, the DSS person who had booked our FP+ for us (both CL and paid ones) had "fixed" the problem by booking the free FP as CL ones. Sounds great in theory, but we frequently change things up on the fly and really hated not being able to modify them...and the fact that we were never told that this would be the case. Supposedly the problem had to do with our 90 day booking window opening before the December FP already being used.

And we had zero offsite stays involved. In nearly 25 years of going to WDW, we've had one offsite stay, in June of 2018...and I personally don't even count it as a "real trip" because we were there for my H's work and only popped in to the parks for a few hours for 3 nights.



@GADisneyDad14 , is it possible that multiple split stays and/or the CL FP+ are what is triggering this for both me and @Mzpalmtree ? I think I've read that Disney doesn't actually recognize "split stays", so according to them I've now had 4 stays in the past 2 months, and CL FP+ as part of all 4 stays.

Hope this all makes sense...it is very confusing and for some reason tough for me to articulate, lol.

It's the CL FP. No question. I've read many with an AP is having issues when they book them and have multiple trips
The FP system sees them as the same as off site FP because they are not one of your regular 60 day resort stay FP. Anything booked outside of those 60 days triggers that 7 day limit. It's like it throws up an automated stop sign that can't be removed by anyone. It's the same reason the guest can't modify the FP themselves.
And another reason why we won't use them. Not until they work out this issue.
I'll add it's ridiculous they haven't worked this out yet

 

[Sajchinook2015]

So, that's the quick update from CR CL. Overall, it fit our travel needs well and we had a pleasant weekend. A lot of new looking CMs, but several faces we recognized from past trips as well. I'm pretty sure the 12th floor was full, so they were always quite busy but very attentive.

CR is one of the CLs that has consistently had small bottles of Dasani, and this was still the same this trip, upon request. It's a nice touch.

I'd by lying if I said the food services didn't make me think back to those few months of "cutbacks" back in, what, 2016ish(?) that hit all the CLs, but CR CL has always had a bit lighter offerings compared to others so I'm not sure my feelings were anything new. In fairness, one night of evening app experiences isn't a full body of work so we didn't really see enough to form a full assessment.

Also side note for those with kids, we dumped ours (did I say that?) at the Pixar Play Zone one night and had dinner up at California Grill. Best-Disney-decision-ever and my kids seemed to really enjoy it.

Happy to answer any questions.

Thanks for the review. I arrive in 47 days! I switched from garden wing to club level bay lake side after reading several of your reviews over the years. We are only at CR for 3 nts then move over to BWI - club level also. Then after 6 nts move over to GF RPC. This will be a trip of a lifetime staying at 2new resorts and all club level.

Yes! I call my sister everyday and announce how many’s days we have left! Can hardly wait.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

Thanks for the review. I arrive in 47 days! I switched from garden wing to club level bay lake side after reading several of your reviews over the years. We are only at CR for 3 nts then move over to BWI - club level also. Then after 6 nts move over to GF RPC. This will be a trip of a lifetime staying at 2new resorts and all club level.

Yes! I call my sister everyday and announce how many’s days we have left! Can hardly wait.

That sounds like an awesome trip - a little bit of three great resorts/CLs each with their unique attributes. Hope you have a great trip.

 

[CogsworthTN]

It's the CL FP. No question. I've read many with an AP is having issues when they book them and have multiple trips
The FP system sees them as the same as off site FP because they are not one of your regular 60 day resort stay FP. Anything booked outside of those 60 days triggers that 7 day limit. It's like it throws up an automated stop sign that can't be removed by anyone. It's the same reason the guest can't modify the FP themselves.
And another reason why we won't use them. Not until they work out this issue.
I'll add it's ridiculous they haven't worked this out yet

I am so confused at what is going on with fast passes. We have gone the past four years with no problems at all. What you just stated makes sense and is causing me to rethink what I did over the weekend. We have a split stay coming up March 30-April 6. I was able to book fast passes straight through. This was done in January before the new rule started or should I say issues? I have been told from several CM’s, DSS CM’s, and VIP AP Cm’s, That seven fast passes are all that AP will allow at one time. The website clearly states AP’s can book Fast passes for length of stay up to 14 days. For some reason they don’t read that.

I have another split stay May 30-June 8. Fear got the best of me after reading several posters having issues making fast passes for their split stay. I called Sunday at my 90 day mark for the second stay to check out the club level fast passes. The CM said she would have to work around the system to book my paid FP’s because I already have seven days of fast passes booked in April. Again with the 7 day statement. I went ahead and purchased the three days, but they are fixed where I cannot modify them. I don’t like that because we sometimes change on the fly.

I’m not sure if I should cancel them and just take my chances April 1 on my FP booking day. I want to have decent fast passes for our trip. I also have a third trip June 30-July 6..this trip is special. We are bringing my Dad to celebrate him finishing up 12 weeks of radiation treatments. I’m so afraid I will have booking issues for that trip too. I know GADisneyDad14 tested all kinds of booking scenarios with no issues. So this makes me wonder if you are on to something concerning the purchased club level FP’s.

 

[focusondisney]

Well if it is the paid CL fastpasses causing the issue, they better get that fixed before they start selling fastpasses to everyone.

 

[jbb4me]

Wine is limited to one white, two reds, and one sparkling. It's kind of a shame to have such a limited selection when there is such abundance just two floors up, although I guess I'm just being picky. It is self-serve during evening service times, as is the beer which is in the fridge. Available upon request at all other times.
View attachment 387764


Closer look at the beer/wine list.
View attachment 387765

CR does have a decent selection of beverages. Again, beer is in the fridge in the evening services - self serve. Also Coke, Diet Coke, Caffeine Free Diet Coke, Sprite, Fanta, Minute Maid Lemonade, and apple juice boxes. This was left stocked overnight, which is a nice touch.
View attachment 387767

CR has the smaller Nespresso machine common at most CLs except for Poly and AKL. This was turned off overnight and not available.
View attachment 387768

Wow, that wine selection is INCREDIBLE! I am enjoying a glass of the Meiomi Pinot right now (one of my faves) and love the Chappellet as well (it averages $16 a glass when purchased at a bar/restaurant...at least in my area)! The whites aren't quite as swanky but still good choices. They are clearly spending their budget on legit wine and aren't so worried about the food items. I remember the breakfast being very similar to what you posted the last time we stayed at CR, but we were also looking for something quick to grab on the way to MK. And the snacks were laughable (which totally made me appreciate other CLs once I realized serious mid-day snacks existed). But I am so sad to see their evening choices have deteriorated even more. Thanks for such a great trip report!!

 

[GADisneyDad14]

Wow, that wine selection is INCREDIBLE! I am enjoying a glass of the Meiomi Pinot right now (one of my faves) and love the Chappellet as well (it averages $16 a glass when purchased at a bar/restaurant...at least in my area)! The whites aren't quite as swanky but still good choices. They are clearly spending their budget on legit wine and aren't so worried about the food items. I remember the breakfast being very similar to what you posted the last time we stayed at CR, but we were also looking for something quick to grab on the way to MK. And the snacks were laughable (which totally made me appreciate other CLs once I realized serious mid-day snacks existed). But I am so sad to see their evening choices have deteriorated even more. Thanks for such a great trip report!!

Thanks for the wine info, that’s good to know they are decent bottles. I’m not a wine person so that stuff is above my league! Although I did have the Chappellet one night and thought it was quite tasty.

In somewhat related news Disney has new style coffee/to-go cups in the lounge that are more paper-like than the prior plastic/foam ones. Don’t ask why I thought about this given we’re talking about wine.

 

[vinotinto]

I am so confused at what is going on with fast passes. We have gone the past four years with no problems at all. What you just stated makes sense and is causing me to rethink what I did over the weekend. We have a split stay coming up March 30-April 6. I was able to book fast passes straight through. This was done in January before the new rule started or should I say issues? I have been told from several CM’s, DSS CM’s, and VIP AP Cm’s, That seven fast passes are all that AP will allow at one time. The website clearly states AP’s can book Fast passes for length of stay up to 14 days. For some reason they don’t read that.

I have another split stay May 30-June 8. Fear got the best of me after reading several posters having issues making fast passes for their split stay. I called Sunday at my 90 day mark for the second stay to check out the club level fast passes. The CM said she would have to work around the system to book my paid FP’s because I already have seven days of fast passes booked in April. Again with the 7 day statement. I went ahead and purchased the three days, but they are fixed where I cannot modify them. I don’t like that because we sometimes change on the fly.

I’m not sure if I should cancel them and just take my chances April 1 on my FP booking day. I want to have decent fast passes for our trip. I also have a third trip June 30-July 6..this trip is special. We are bringing my Dad to celebrate him finishing up 12 weeks of radiation treatments. I’m so afraid I will have booking issues for that trip too. I know GADisneyDad14 tested all kinds of booking scenarios with no issues. So this makes me wonder if you are on to something concerning the purchased club level FP’s.

I have almost your same dates, March 30-April 7 split stay onsite (POR / YC) and then May 24-27 BWI CL. I have 9 days of FPs with my AP already on the March-April trip. My FP window for May should open up 6 days before yours and I'm hopeful everything will work the way it has been working. In all the instances where someone couldn't make FPs past 7 days, there was funky stuff going on: CL FPs, Disney Springs hotels, SOG, random offsite FP, etc. I honestly think the CL FP cause more problems than they solve for guests with APs and multiple onsite stays. I promise to report back so you can decide whether to keep your CL FP or cancel them.

 

[vinotinto]

Well if it is the paid CL fastpasses causing the issue, they better get that fixed before they start selling fastpasses to everyone.

Right! If I'm paying extra for the privilege of FPs, they better work properly!

 

[jbb4me]

Thanks for the wine info, that’s good to know they are decent bottles. I’m not a wine person so that stuff is above my league! Although I did have the Chappellet one night and thought it was quite tasty.

In somewhat related news Disney has new style coffee/to-go cups in the lounge that are more paper-like than the prior plastic/foam ones. Don’t ask why I thought about this given we’re talking about wine.

That's good to know!! We use those cups A LOT (for more than just wine!) and I've always felt a little guilty that the foam-ish ones may not be the best for the environment.

 

[vinotinto]

It's the CL FP. No question. I've read many with an AP is having issues when they book them and have multiple trips
The FP system sees them as the same as off site FP because they are not one of your regular 60 day resort stay FP. Anything booked outside of those 60 days triggers that 7 day limit. It's like it throws up an automated stop sign that can't be removed by anyone. It's the same reason the guest can't modify the FP themselves.
And another reason why we won't use them. Not until they work out this issue.
I'll add it's ridiculous they haven't worked this out yet

This makes complete sense to me. The system looks at the FPs and does not see an onsite resort stay at the 60 days and thinks that those FPs are not onsite, triggering the 7-day limit. I think this is part of what they are working on fixing with the new 75-day glitch. Especially if they are planning to open paid FPs to everyone and/or offer a paid early booking window.