Today was our planned visit to Animal Kingdom and quite honestly, things did NOT start out well. Since you guys don’t really know me, I need to explain that I like to travel with a pretty firm itinerary in mind. Also, if tickets need to be bought, I almost always buy them in advance. This trip was no exception and I made two trips to local Disney stores to buy the seven tickets I needed for our family group. The people at the Disney store gave me two receipts when I purchased the tickets – one for the money portion of the transaction and one showing proof of activation for the tickets. They told me to keep the activation receipt separate from the tickets, because if I lost the tickets I could use that receipt to get the tickets reissued. I guarded the activation receipts with my life and made sure my husband had them in his wallet once we got to Florida. I never expected to have to use them and that is where my little story takes an interesting turn.
As our family group was entering the Animal Kingdom, four of my tickets worked fine (the ones purchased on my second trip to the Disney store) and the other three did not. The ticket machine at the gate gave an error code and said our access was denied. Of course, the three people left to get through the gate was myself and my two boys. There was nothing they could do at the entrance, so they sent me over to Guest Relations to troubleshoot the problem. My hubby was already on the other side of the gate with the rest of our family, so I had him hand over the activation receipt for that group of tickets and I headed for the Guest Relations window.
At the Guest Relations window, I met a lovely woman by the name of Lynda. I explained what had happened at the entry gate and gave her my tickets and activation receipt. She quickly determined that my tickets were indeed valid by comparing the tickets and the receipt, but her computer gave her a similar error code saying that my tickets were actually voided. That started a chain of phone calls that got poor Lynda transferred at least six times and took almost 45 minutes before she was able to find someone that had actually encountered a similar problem and knew how to potentially fix it.
To verify the issue, the person on the other end of the phone needed to receive a fax of my activation receipt and tickets and also needed time to fix the problem. Lynda could tell by the look on my face that I was suddenly quite distraught. While I had done my best to stay calm during the 45 minutes at the window, I was suddenly concerned I’d be spending more of my planned Animal Kingdom time at Guest Relations while they fixed the issue. On top of that, I had two little boys who didn’t understand why they weren’t on the other side of the gate with their cousins PLUS my whole family group was waiting for us to make it through the gate so we could start our day.
My concern turned to joy when I heard Lynda tell the person on the other end of the phone that she would be happy to send over the documents, but her first priority was her customer at the window (that would be me) and that she didn’t want to waste more of my time, especially for something that wasn’t my fault. After apologizing profusely, Lynda quickly issued one day passes to Animal Kingdom for myself and my boys and made sure she had my cell phone number so she could call me with a status update. And to make up for my time at the window, she provided me with a bunch of FASTPASS tickets. With entry and FASTPASS tickets in hand, we were finally able to enter the park and start our day.
I want to take a moment to recognize Lynda for her help. True to her word, she called me about an hour later to let me know that my problem had been resolved and that new tickets had been issued and were waiting for me at Guest Relations. This, my friends, is what customer service is all about. And Disney, if you happen to be reading this, please make sure that Lynda is recognized for working so hard to help me. She saved the day for us with the one day passes and our entire family recovered the time lost by using the FASTPASS tickets. Her professionalism and persistance were the key ingredients to solving the problem.
After a somewhat upsetting start, our family ended up having a wonderful time at the Animal Kingdom (don’t miss Expedition Everest, Kali River Rapids, or The Festival of the Lion King Show). And it was a good reminder for me that sometimes life throws a few curve balls, even with the best advanced planning. However, the curve balls don’t have to ruin your vacation if you just breath and trust that people like Lynda will be willing to help you out. In the end, it was a beautiful day!
Laura…
Blogger Malise Terrell will visit Kissimmee next week! Want to share your Kissimmee story? 
