How a Disney FastPass Technique Helped Our Reader Get Her Parents a Vaccine

There are some things you do at Disney World or skills you develop as a life-long Disney fan that you might think you won’t ever use in the “real world.” When will knowing all of the words to the Haunted Mansion ghost host spiel really be key to your survival?

But sometimes Disney techniques can come in handy when you’ve left the magic.

One of our readers got in touch with us and shared a truly AMAZING example of this. Are you #TeamFiddleFaddle when it comes to FastPass+ reservations? (You know — fiddle-faddle, toggling between screens on My Disney Experience to refresh FastPass availabilities until one works for you!) Well, you can’t use your skills to make a FastPass reservations right now, but your fiddle-faddle skills might be more useful than you think.

From FastPass Guru to Vaccine Appointment Guru?

Not too long ago, an AllEars reader reached out to us and shared that they used our FastPass+ tips and (with the help of those skills) were actually able to schedule their parents for COVID-19 vaccine appointments. WOW! First of all, we are beyond excited to find a member of #TeamFiddleFaddle — go, team!

But in all seriousness, we’re thrilled to know that our Disney tips were able to help a member of our AllEars reader family on this level. Forget scoring over 25 FastPass+ reservations in one day, this definitely wins in terms of epic use of Disney knowledge.

What’s Going on With the Vaccine

The situation with the vaccine differs by state and changes every day, so whether you and/or your family members are eligible to get the vaccine right now will vary. At the moment, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, and Pfizer vaccines are being distributed throughout the country. They’re even been administered in part of the parking lots at Disneyland Resort in California.

When it comes to Florida, the state is focusing on administering the vaccine to those who are 65 and older, health care personnel with direct patient contact, and residents & staff of long-term care facilities. Certain locations are only serving specific populations, though, so that’s important to keep in mind when looking to book an appointment.

Because supplies of the vaccine are limited, there is a pre-registration system available in Florida. Currently eligible Florida residents can pre-register and the system will alert them when new appointments are available in their area.

In terms of actually registering for a vaccine appointment in Florida, you’ll want to look at the location you’re trying to register for carefully. For example, some stores in Florida like Publix, Walmart, Sam’s Club, and Winn Dixie are also distributing vaccines. For those places, you’ll register through their individual retail pharmacy websites.

If you’re actually signing up for an appointment to receive the vaccine in Florida (not just for the pre-registration), what you’ll likely see is a website that allows you to search for and select an appointment time. At first glance, you might not see any appointments available or not see an appointment for the date/time you’re looking at. But, like our reader, some FastPass+ tips might just help you find the appointments you need.

FastPass+ Tips

So what are our FastPass+ tips exactly? We have a few, but basically it all boils down to refresh, refresh, refresh. 

To book your FastPasses for Disney World you’ll go to the My Disney Experience app and search for the day and park you want to get your passes for. The system will then show you a number of available FastPass options that you can book. But here’s the catch…

…the FastPasses shown on the screen when you open the app aren’t necessarily the only ones available. If you refresh the screen (that’s fiddle-faddling, y’all), new options might appear. For FastPass+, you can refresh the screen by selecting different hours at the top of the screen. By telling the system to show you FastPass selections available at different times, entirely new options sometimes pop up!

We’ve got proof of the efficacy of fiddle-faddle! In early 2020 we searched for FastPass reservations in Magic Kingdom. In our first search, shown in the photo above, you’ll notice that Big Thunder Mountain Railroad didn’t appear as an available FastPass+ option. But when we searched for FastPasses available at 10AM look what showed up: Big Thunder Mountain! Just like magic, new options became available.

Once you’ve made a FastPass+ reservation, you can also tap that reservation and try to edit it to see if you can potentially find something earlier or entirely different. We actually used our fiddle-faddle technique to get OVER 25 FastPass+ reservations in Magic Kingdom in ONE day.

Could these tips help you score a vaccine appointment? According to our reader, they just might! How could that translate to your vaccine appointment efforts? Well, when you go to make the appointment, you could try refreshing the screen to see if different appointment options appear by asking the system to show you available appointments on different dates or at different times. That will all depend, however, on your particular system and whether it allows you to search by time or date like that.

If there’s an option to “edit” your existing vaccine reservation and you want a different date/time, that might also be something you can do similar to FastPass+.

Because of how difficult it can be to get these appointments, you’ll likely want to treat them like those elusive FastPass+ reservations for some of Disney’s most popular rides. Think Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. What we mean by that is, like those super popular FastPasses, you’ll likely want to book your vaccine appointment as SOON as you see it pop up in the system (rather than take the chance that you refresh for a better date/time, and it will be gone). Then (if the system allows it) you could potentially edit the appointment to try and find a different time (like you do with FastPass+) without “giving up” that spot.

Like FastPass+, you’ll also likely want to try and book your vaccine appointment as early as you can. And, similar to FastPass+, you may also want to keep checking while the vaccine reservation system is open. For FastPass+ reservations, you might not see any available on a certain day, but as others cancel or as things change, you could find new reservations just days later. This may be true with some vaccine appointment systems as well.

It also might be a good idea to consider using different browsers when checking for vaccine appointments, similar to how you can look online versus on the app for FastPass.

At Disney World, the FastPass+ system is currently suspended. But your skills might just come in handy elsewhere. You never know — being a member of #TeamFiddleFaddle might help you get one of those elusive appointments.

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