Last week, Disney World’s official reopening date was announced, but with this big news came much confusion.
Breakfast a la Art Entrees
Since Disney World would have to operate with a limited capacity upon reopening, we were told a brand new reservation system would be implemented.
This meant temporarily suspending ticket sales and hotel reservations as well as canceling every existing FastPass, and every dining reservation Disney World had on its books. All Disney Dining Plans have also been canceled at this time.
Topolino’s Terrace in Disney’s Riviera Resort
All of this news was a lot to take in. In fact, it was so unbelievable, a lot of folks quickly went into their MyDisneyExpeience apps to see if in fact their reservations had been canceled, but they were even more confused when they saw all of their plans were still there!
Topolino’s Terrace
Keep in mind — Disney World has thousands upon thousands of guest reservations to work through and it’s going to take some time to cancel them all. Just today, one of our team members received an email notifying her one of her dining reservations had been canceled.
Screenshot of Email from Disney World Regarding Dining Reservations
The email states, “As a result of limited capacity, we have made the difficult decision to cancel existing dining reservations.” and that some dining and other experience bookings may be suspended up Disney World’s reopening such as character meals.
Screenshot of Email from Disney World Regarding Dining Reservations
Character dining is not expected to resume when the parks reopen. Learn more here!
Guests will not be charged any cancelation fees and that all pay-in-advance experiences will be credited back within seven days of the reservation date.
Screenshot of Email from Disney World Regarding Dining Reservations
Click here to see what Disney World is currently refunding!
We expect many more of these emails will be sent out to guests notifying them of these cancelations. If you’re still seeking more clarity, click here to read our answers to the most important questions we’re getting from our readers right now!
Check out this work-around we discovered for making dining reservations at select Disney Springs restaurants!
Disney Park Reopening Details and Info
Click HERE for the All Latest Updates
Click HERE To See FULL LISTS of the Rides, Attractions, Shopping, Entertainment, and Restaurants Opening in Disney World!
TUTORIAL: How To Use Disney World's NEW Park Pass Reservation System
ALL Disney World Reopening Procedures
Disney World Hotel and Ticket Booking Information
We’re Visiting ALL the Reopened Disney World Hotels and Have All the Need-to-Know Details
We’re LIVE in Disney World's Magic Kingdom For the FIRST Time Since the Closures
We’re LIVE in Disney’s Animal Kingdom For the FIRST Time Since the Closures
We Got a FIRST LOOK at Disney World’s New Character Cavalcades and Entertainment!
Everything You NEED To Know About Wearing Masks in Disney World
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Have you received one of these emails from Disney World yet? Let us know in the comments below!
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We received 3 emails today canceling ADRs and after checking MDE, our other 2 ADRs were also gone + our fireworks cruise wasn’t listed. We had to prepay for the fireworks cruise and we have yet to receive a refund on our credit card. The sad thing is our reservations were for a trip in November! I’m at a loss to understand why Disney is canceling reservations so far out.
Disney also canceled my September Lunch reservation at Disney Springs which is already open! I have no idea why they did that, I was not expecting Disney Springs dining reservations would be affected by the cancellations also.
So my reservations was cancelled but I didn’t receive a email to let me know am staying offsite and wondering if this will affect me when they start to let you rebook them
Liz, my thinking is that they’re trying to clear their system. Disney Springs reservations made through Disney are being cancelled, but you can still make reservations to Disney Springs third party restaurants via OpenTable. Bonus: no credit card to hold your reservation so no risk of no-show fees!
Christine, we have received a lot of comments from folks who did not receive emails but did see the cancellations in their reservations. I don’t have any information on why that might be, but when we learn more about this reservation system we will update.
Thanks for the updates. Our eMail notifications are coming a day or two after the ADR drops off MDE.
Any news on the EPCOT Food and Wine Festival this year? We are going in mic September.
I saw my reservations canceled in the app last week and just got official emails today. My Boat House reservation for end of October was canceled, but I understand. Even though they are open, they can’t be at full capacity. I cannot book in open table yet as it is too far out. Open table is only booking through September 3, so 3 months in advanced for those of you who want to try and book Disney Springs 3rd party restaurants.
Yes, I have received emails cancelling three experiences (Savi’s Workshop, Droid Depot, and Chocolate at Riviera Resort) and dining (Sanaa at AKL, Skippers Canteen at MK, Oga’s at HS, and Cruella at MNSSHP). Only one still left Character Couture at GFH. So far my hotel reservations , park tickets and ticket for MNSSHP seem safe, These are all for trip 10/31-11/9/2020. I am keeping optimistic.
I understand cancelling dining reservations, but am puzzled about why cancel dining plans? Without the dining plan, we would not eat in the parks much. And experiencing the different foods is part of the reason we go.
The cancellation emails are coming through in ‘spurts’ I had two of the on Monday and another single one today. Still waiting for the rest. I like one of the others noted above about Disney Springs reservations being cancelled. I am guessing it is because they could not accommodate everyone as they have to reduce the number of dining spaces available with in restaurant.
My dinner reservations for September at Disney Springs all cancelled and you can’t rebook past July. Not even open table
HI DFB! I received some email notifications in the last couple of days that my ADR’s had been cancelled with the same message as your screenshot. I seem to remember, from the original news reports about this, that guests with cancelled reservations would somehow recieve priority when ADR’s became available again 60 days out. This is not mentioned in the email notifications but they do include a cancellation reference so do you think this is to facilitate the priority rebooking when the time comes?
What I’m seeing is that my cancellation notices are coming one at a time. They’re pretty random. Our trip is in September. Right now I’m just rolling with it. Honestly – the WDW folks are probably just like us. They’re having to monitor and adjust one day at a time. I’ll be interesting to see what is going on in three months when we’re down there.
My ADRs were cancelled Monday and I am just getting the emails now. There may be a delay due to sheer volume. Our trip is end of August, so they may have cancelled them all and are working from closest to furthest out.
I also got a cancellation notice from Disney for Droid Depot. That’s a bigger bummer than our dining reservatiosn.
My reservations disappeared from the app a few days ago and I started receiving emails about the cancellations today. We still have tickets for Mickeys not so scary Halloween party and praying they don’t cancel that. We are going to try and downgrade our hotel from deluxe to economy if possible since all of our carefully planned reservations have been canceled along with our dining plan. Still wondering about the park hopper plus that we may also be canceling. This is a hurry up and wait situation as we cannot even see the prices or modify our reservations right now. I check several times a day for updates. Very frustrating!
My friend and I called earlier in May and made reservations to stay at Disney World through Southwest Vacations with a 4 day park hopper pass and staying at Disney’s All Star Sports resort. Are they going to cancel this reservation and we’ll have to start all over again? Usually with Southwest, they send us an itinerary but we haven’t gotten that yet. Also, do you know if Disney’s Magical Express will be operating at any certain time?
Jim, thanks for sharing.
Jim, I think the volume is having an impact. It seems to be taking time for many people.
Tony, I think you’re right that they’re working through this day-by-day. We’ll be updating all along, so in three months, it sure will be interesting to see how it’s going.
Seems like Disney should have waited to open. No meal or faspass reservations. No parades or fireworks. Limited park hours. No guarantee of getting into the park even with a ticket. No park hoppers. No special events. No characters. At this point Disney is just a few rides and nothing more. Most people won’t go at all until the mask requirement is lifted anyway.
Neil, no word on whether the cancellation reference number will come into play. The sixty-day window is in the official information (which we know can change), but we’ll just have to wait and see how it all shakes out when the new system goes live.
Alice, that is interesting! Would you mind if I ask which restaurant(s) so we can look into it?
Deidre, it is hard to process all these changes without also having the new theme park reservation system live to get in there and make changes and plans. Hopefully we’ll see it soon!
We staying at yacht club in November but ours got cancelled last week just got confirmed by email today
They canceled my Minnie Van pick up from the airport in August. I just received my email today along all of my dining reservations.
Hi! We just received our notifications on the two ADR for November. We are riding with this one to see what happens. Since we are planning on it being the first trip to WDW for our 6 year old grandson, if they still have no meet and greet or pics with the Disney characters, we will rebook. We have had this in the works for over a year and it will break a lot of hearts, both child and adult if we have to cancel.
We were going to Walt Disney World in September, but since the Australian government doesn’t allow us out of the country, we are going to reschedule. I got a bunch of emails overnight about our cancelled dining reservations.
I’m keen to see what will happen with our existing reservation as we had the free Dining Plan deal. No doubt Disney will look after us (I saw something about a 35% discount if we rebook), but any idea how it would work. We are looking at re-booking for late April 2021 (fingers crossed). Been saving for 10 years so an extra 7 month delay is bearable….
My trip is in September. I have been getting dining cancellations over the past few days.
Many of our September dining reservation disappeared from our plans a day or two ago, but not all. Then today the cancellation emails started showing up in no particular order. I suspect that their reservation cancellations are overloading their email system and causing the apparent confusion. I’m just keeping copies of the emails so I can retry the reservations when Disney gets it all sorted out. Sad I have to do the planning all over again, but that’s how it goes when things out of Disney’s control get weird…
Received 3 dining cancellations yesterday for our July trip. Very curious about when booking will reopen since we are well inside our 60 day window already.
Glen, thanks for reaching out. So far I haven’t heard much beyond what our readers are commenting with regard to international visitors. Hopefully we’ll get more info on this soon.
Thanks for letting us know, Toniann.
I have reservations in Sept, Oct, and Nov. I received 18 cancellation notices all in one day at the same time! But I like planning, so I am waiting for the 60 day reservation system to open.
I did not hear or read anything about having a priority to remake dining reservations? Did I miss something?
Deidre, I also have Not-so-scary tix and confirmed with a cast member that this event is still scheduled as planned. They are just not selling any more tickets at this time to keep capacity low. (Yay, for buying them early!). Of course I was told that this could change at any moment and the whole event could be canceled at any time, so reconfirm once your event date is closer. At least for now it is something to look forward to. I posted this info yesterday in another post for the event but it was never posted by DFB.
I also posted in here yesterday to say that open table reservations for Disney Springs 3rd party restaurants were booking up to 3 months in advance ( at least that is what BoatHouse is doing), so if you are like me and had your Fall trip ADRs canceled, you can try to book through Open Table once you are 3 months out.
Julia, Disney has said that folks with cancelled reservations will get priority access to the new reservation system. But we don’t know what or when that will be.
Hi, CeCe, apologies that I missed that comment yesterday. Looks like I missed a handful on that post, so I’ve gone in to moderate them.
Kevin, no news about F&W yet. But we’re hoping for clarity soon!
Brock, I’m not sure how Disney is handling packages booked through third parties. You’ll want to reach out to SouthWest Vacations, maybe, to see what they say. No word on Disney’s Magical Express yet, but it’s one of many things we’re watching for. Good luck!
How do I stop the comments from appearing in our e-mails? We are being overrun!!
Thank you!
Shelley, I’ll see if I can change that from my end. You must’ve clicked the “notify me of responses box” — which can admittedly be a little overwhelming right now. If I can fix it, I will!
Sarah, I just reread all my emails from Disney. Received confirmations for all my cancelled dining reservations.
Then I went back to an email from May 29th. We will get priority for the Military Promotion Voucher for tickets. I think only because the day we received our packet I synced the individual voucher numbers to our individual Magic Bands! Thank goodness for my over excitement!!!
DFB Sarah did you find out info on only being able to get dining reservations thru July even at Disney Springs?
Alice, I see availability via OpenTable for several Disney Springs restaurants through July/August. I think the third-party restaurants may be opening reservations on their own timelines, but if you’re not seeing what you need, hopefully it’ll open up soon.
Dawn, so happy to hear it’s working out for you. Thanks for coming back to let me know!