Originally Posted By AutoPost This topic is for Discussion of <a href="http://www.LaughingPlace.com/Latest-ID-78112.asp" target="_blank"><b>Latest: Disney World Restricting Use of Resort Refillable Mugs</b></a> <p>Examiner.com writes Disney is testing the use of RFID chips to limit the use of resort refillable mugs to a certain number of days and limit them to one usage within a 5-minute time period.</p>
Originally Posted By bigthunderranch It would be interesting to see what the cost to Disney is to sustain this. Are they just replacing one cost for another, how much will they really save? Wouldn't it be cheaper to just have an attendant stationed at the drink area? Who is their target audience here? Is it guests who stay at the resorts multiple times per year and bring their mugs back within that same year? Call me crazy, but chips in mugs seems a little too extreme.
Originally Posted By sjhym333 I think Disney will fold any extra costs for the chip into the cost of the cups. So at the end it probably isnt going to cost Disney much. Obviously Disney feels there is a problem big enough to address it. Maybe I am not that smart, but we have cups from past trips to the Disney resort but I would never think of bringing them with me. I also assumed that the cup I bought was for that trip only.
Originally Posted By bigthunderranch I've seen people use cups from different years. Once I saw someone using a Dixie Landings mug when the resort had been renamed for over ten years. I guess my point is that the way they are tackling this issue is not the most cost effective or simplest. You can spot different mugs, so that is not too difficult to handle, but what about people who come back within the year with the same mug? Are there that many repeat visitors throughout the year? And if there are, why not reward these people instead of punishing them?
Originally Posted By ChiMike >>I think Disney will fold any extra costs for the chip into the cost of the cups. So at the end it probably isnt going to cost Disney much. Obviously Disney feels there is a problem big enough to address it. Maybe I am not that smart, but we have cups from past trips to the Disney resort but I would never think of bringing them with me. I also assumed that the cup I bought was for that trip only.<< Ding Ding. If this project is rolled out to the entire resort, expect all costs to safe guard against theft to be passed on to the consumer.
Originally Posted By ChiMike >>I think Disney will fold any extra costs for the chip into the cost of the cups. So at the end it probably isnt going to cost Disney much. Obviously Disney feels there is a problem big enough to address it. Maybe I am not that smart, but we have cups from past trips to the Disney resort but I would never think of bringing them with me. I also assumed that the cup I bought was for that trip only.<< Ding Ding. If this project is rolled out to the entire resort, expect all costs to safe guard against theft to be passed on to the consumer.
Originally Posted By SuperDry <<< Ding Ding. If this project is rolled out to the entire resort, expect all costs to safe guard against theft to be passed on to the consumer. >>> You're assuming that there's no offsetting increase in revenue. The "Can't use the same cup more than once within a 5-minute period" tells me that some families are buying one cup and using it for the entire family, transferring the contents to other cups then immediately refilling the mug. If abuses such as this were prevented, then at least *some* of such guests would end up spending more on purchased soda.
Originally Posted By ChiMike Yes. And it was brought up in the other thread. Naturally, revenue would be increased through efforts making it harder to steal. That is separate from the cost of the rfid equipment and the variable cost of placing a chip in every cup. Assuming this initiative moves forward. Those costs, I believe, would be passed through in price increases irrespective of how much future revenue or reduced cost of goods occurs through the initiative. If it costs $0.15 to place a chip in every cup, expect that to be reflected.
Originally Posted By bigthunderranch Like always, people will find a way around this and then Disney will have to build a better mousetrap(no pun intended). So there's a 5 minute restriction. Well, then they'll wait for 5 minutes and do the same thing. They're using a shotgun to kill a chipmunk here.
Originally Posted By ChiMike I agree. The 5 minute restriction is absolutely horrible Show and Courtesy for guests who follow the rules. Those use to come ahead of Efficiency.
Originally Posted By sjhym333 Well we all know that Disney has to spend a lot of time staying ahead of the people who are trying to abuse a system. It really is terrible if a family is using one cup to fill several other family members cups. Same thing about using a 10 year old cup. Sorry, but I dont think anyone truly believes that purchasing a $5 cup eight years ago gave you lifetime drinks. I was talking to a friend in mgmt at the Studios the other day and he told me that they are having a real problem with tickets coming from the 192/I-drive area. It seems that someone has figured out how to code tickets that makes the ticket machines believe they are real tickets. Originally Disney was catching them because the info printed on the ticket and the coding didnt match. Now the only way Disney is cathing them is because the bio-coding doesnt work. Disney is then taking a very very close look at tickets where the bio codes dont work trying to catch people who didnt purchase real tickets. FP is another place that people have tried to buck the system by doing forged FP. We used to have morning meetings with CM to show them how to spot a forged FP. It seems to be a little better now, but sometimes you can still spot a fake FP. I expect that at some point (XPass?) you will see a scan gun that like you see at some rock/theater events that will enable the CM to scan the FP.
Originally Posted By Manfried People are cheating the system, and Disney wants to stop it and people who are cheating the system are mad?
Originally Posted By ChiMike I'm not cheating the system, I never had, and I think this is overkill. What does that make me Manfried?
Originally Posted By Autopia Deb No, people who aren't cheating the system are concerned. I buy a new mug for both of us on each trip. But I like to use it to get hot water and a little milk for our oatmeal and then fill my mug w/ coffee and hot cocoa. That's 4 pours in less than 5 minutes. Also, will this keep us from using it at another resort? When staying at POR we will occasionally eat at the FQ food court. Should we have to buy separate drinks because we wanted beneits for dessert?
Originally Posted By sjhym333 Cant answer the other resort question. However, if I needed to use the system to get hot water for oatmeal then hot cocoa I would be tracking down a CM and explain your need. I find that CM's can and will be accomodating when you have a real need. In fact, I have to say some of the best guest service I have received over the past couple of years has been at the resort quick service food locations. Once when our family wanted several orders of beignets and the hostess told us that they were defrosting dough and it would be 30 or more minutes (at breakfast?) I told the CM that it was poor planning not to have more dough ready for breakfast (there were 10 people behind me on line). A food mgr came up and asked what the problem was. When I told her what we had been told she apologized and suggested other options. We bought our coffee and decided to sit and just talk and get food somewhere else. We had gone there specifically for the beignets. While we sitting the mgr came with 4 orders of beignets. When I offered to pay for them she said that they were free because of the wait. Very impressive. At the Contemporary quick service while I was trying to decide what to get for dinner I had a great conversation with a mgr who made several suggestions about what was good. After we paid for our food and were sitting enjoying the meal the mgr came over with a dessert and told us to enjoy our stay. Very nice.
Originally Posted By Autopia Deb I don't deny that I can get satisfaction from a friendly CM, but should I have to spend all that time for something that should only take a few seconds? I get that many guests abuse the system and I have seen old mugs used, as well as people using the mugs to fill multiple cups. But for every abuse I've seen there are 20 or 30 guests using the mugs as intended, 1 new mug for each member of the party. The whole thing is disrespectful to the vast majority of guests and "bad show".
Originally Posted By Spirit of 74 Come on ... a second mug thread? The Spirit feels like someone just dumped a mug full of stolen icey soda on him.
Originally Posted By bigthunderranch "However, if I needed to use the system to get hot water for oatmeal then hot cocoa I would be tracking down a CM and explain your need. I find that CM's can and will be accomodating when you have a real need. In fact, I have to say some of the best guest service I have received over the past couple of years has been at the resort quick service food locations." Have you been to the resorts lately? Good luck finding an available CM. Besides, what will they be able to do to help with this new system? A chip override? Disney may back themselves in a corner with this one. Why not take away the entire refillable mug program? Pretty soon we'll have to return the entire mugs at the end of our stays. Here's a novel idea, move the beverage area behind the registers so people will be more apprehensive about stealing drinks. How about inserting a chip directly into the guests? When vacation becomes more like a prison, that's when customers stop coming. When this happens, then we can discuss loss of revenue.
Originally Posted By CDF1 From post 19: How about inserting a chip directly into the guests? When vacation becomes more like a prison, that's when customers stop coming. When this happens, then we can discuss loss of revenue. Wristbands like they use for county fairs or waterparks with a chip embedded would work just as well - could encode your ticket information, your meal plan or your purchased refillable items. When your visit to the resort was complete, if any items remained the guest could then get a record of that information for each guest wristband and require identification on any return trip to get the chip installed on a new wristband. Would clear up their counterfeiting and reuse issues. Of course, returning guests with credit (like park days) would have to go through a special process but hey, isn't that what accounting types want in terms of not allowing anybody to get away with something not purchased by Disney's rules?
