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Found this at MousePlanet. If any Fiends there in the next couple of weeks learn anything more about this first hand, please report back!

Fastpass crackdown

According to our partners over at TouringPlans.com, Walt Disney World has begun a test to crack down on the ending times of Fastpass return periods. It has been standard practice that—if Fastpass tickets were returned past the end of their designated return window on the same day—guests could still enter the attraction. This was done to avoid penalizing guests for various late-making issues such as not wanting to wake sleeping children, transportation delays, or getting stuck in a restaurant or by a storm.

This new test, however, entails sporadic enforcement of the time window and no longer advising guests that they can return beyond the end of the window in case of extenuating circumstances.

TouringPlans.com's R.A. Pederson speculates that this may be related to the upcoming Next Generation initiative in the parks. MousePlanet's Jeff Kober has previously written about the "Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom" interactive game coming to the Magic Kingdom park. It is uncertain at this time, however, how the game might be related to the enforcement of Fastpass end times.

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FASTPASS Return Policy Change Testing at Walt Disney World

by R. A. Pedersen 35 Comments

Disney has begun testing changes to the functional FASTPASS return policy at Walt Disney World.

In theory, the written policy has always been that a guest should return to the FASTPASS return area during the allotted return-time window printed on the FASTPASS ticket. This has rarely been enforced, thus leading to many guides including our own offering the following advice for park touring:

In practice, you may use a
FASTPASS
at any time between the beginning of the window printed on your
FASTPASS
and park closing. Our data suggest that no specific time is better or worse than any other.

Previously, the only reported instances where Disney has adhered to the return-window policy has been during peak periods with headliner attractions like Epcot’s Soarin’. In the last few weeks Disney has begun sporadically enforcing the return-time window at various park attractions as part of a test period. Further, Cast Members working the FASTPASS return areas have been explicitly directed to honor late returns – for the time being – but to no longer mention or advise guests to use the old open-ended setup of the system.

This slow phasing-in of changes to the return-window is said to be part of preparations for the upcoming NextGen initiative in the parks. For the time being our advice remains the same as before on the utilization of FASTPASS, but please be aware that Disney may choose to change their policy and adhere to the return-window at some point in the near future. We will keep you updated with details as they become available.

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In most cases, we do come back within the window.

BUT, in one of our big RADP group meetings in December, we usually tell everyone to get a FastPass for Toy Story Mania first thing on Studios day, then we have a group ride together of Toy Story Mania about 4pm. So in that case, we are waaaay outside the FP window.

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