ID bands for kids

JakeAZ

DIS Veteran
Joined
Sep 25, 2018
In prep for our trip, I wanted to see if anyone had suggestions for ID bands for the kids. We will make sure they know if they get separated, to find a CM, but we want the CM to then be able to find us easily. Can the magic bands have this kind of info (parent's name / cell number etc) coded in them as ICE (in case of emergency)?

Any advice on what worked for you would be appreciated.
 
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I don't know if your magicband has that info somewhere, but I don't think magicbands are scanned routinely to find out parents info. A good tip I've learned is take a picture of your kid everyday so you can describe what they're wearing in an emergency. We never did anything special, but once the kiddos were old enough to do so(around 4), we had them memorize one parent's cell phone number. I have seen people that write phone numbers right on the magicband with sharpie or do dog id tags in the laces of kids shoes. One caveat with the phone number thing, we lost our at the time 11 year DD at the aquarium at Epcot. I think we actually wandered away from her, but I digress. Anyway, she quickly found a CM and asked to call her parents because she was lost. It took them like 10 minutes to find a cell phone for her to use to call us, so the phone idea isn't as great as it sounds. By that time, we had found her. And this was a non-panicked older kid so I don't know how well that would go down with a younger panicky kid.
 
We used these: kidsidbracelettags dot com

(the forum won't let me post the actual link, but we were happy with the bracelets)
 
We used ID bands for our first trip, one of which was lost on the plane ride there. Last time, we opted for an approach that cannot get lost: I wrote my phone number on their tummies with a Sharpie. There is one particular kind that is made for writing on skin, and if you let it dry and then spray it with hairspray, it lasts for a couple days, even with getting wet, and is easy to touch up when it starts fading. I used the same approach for medical info on the wrist where a medical alert bracelet is usually worn.
 
Ugh I lost sight of DD at Cosmic Ray’s once, it was only for 30 seconds but it was terrifying. I thought I heard that magic bands have RFID and can be tracked to find a lost child? Is that not true?
 
Ugh I lost sight of DD at Cosmic Ray’s once, it was only for 30 seconds but it was terrifying. I thought I heard that magic bands have RFID and can be tracked to find a lost child? Is that not true?
MBs do have RFID (at least new ones - older ones probably don’t have the battery life left for that). However, I don’t think the system is set up for CMs to be able to track the whereabouts of individuals.

In theory it could be done because the bands give off RFID and there are receivers at every ride and most restaurants, but Disney would also need to have the technology to search through all that data to identify the location of an individual and make it easily accessible to CM users. We are not at that point.

If a child looks lost or identifies him/herself as lost to a CM, the CM can scan the MB, though I think it might also be a few steps to being able to track that scan back to your phone number.

Given the limitations of MB technology, I would want to have name/number somewhere else on the kid, and let the MB be the backup, not the primary identifier.
 
When my kids were young we used temporary tattoos (safetytat) that had our phone numbers on them. Now that they are older we used a dog tag necklace from mabels labels with the same information.
my understanding of the magic bands is that they don’t store information on them but provide a means of accessing information. However what is accessed can be limited by a cm role - someone at guest services may have access or ability to see different information than a cashier. So I would not rely on a magic band as a means of finding a lost child.
 


You can go to a pet store and have a name/phone number tag made in just a few minutes while you wait. Others have posted some great online resources that were designed with lost kids in mind, but a literal dog tag will work just as well if you only have time to hop over to petco.
 
I don't know if your magicband has that info somewhere, but I don't think magicbands are scanned routinely to find out parents info. A good tip I've learned is take a picture of your kid everyday so you can describe what they're wearing in an emergency. We never did anything special, but once the kiddos were old enough to do so(around 4), we had them memorize one parent's cell phone number. I have seen people that write phone numbers right on the magicband with sharpie or do dog id tags in the laces of kids shoes. One caveat with the phone number thing, we lost our at the time 11 year DD at the aquarium at Epcot. I think we actually wandered away from her, but I digress. Anyway, she quickly found a CM and asked to call her parents because she was lost. It took them like 10 minutes to find a cell phone for her to use to call us, so the phone idea isn't as great as it sounds. By that time, we had found her. And this was a non-panicked older kid so I don't know how well that would go down with a younger panicky kid.
based on small park I work at you can be fired if you are found to have cell phone on you in the park so I can see it take that long to find a cell phone and most phones in stores are inside park no outside line.
 
Disney can track them by their magic bands. I've always liked the tattoo idea mentioned already.
 
I don't think this is true.

Honestly, I would be surprised if it’s not true. The bands definitely do have RFID technology and the sensors are picking up when you’re nearby (like at the end of Small World when the signs say goodbye to you by name). I think it’s very possible for Disney to look up a guest’s name, find the magic band ID number assigned to that name, and then look up where that magic band was last located. I’m not saying it would be a simple or easy process, or that there are enough sensors all over the park to track the magic bands closely, but the technology that Disney currently has definitely makes it possible. I can’t imagine they aren’t utilizing it if a child goes missing for a length of time.
 
Honestly, I would be surprised if it’s not true. The bands definitely do have RFID technology and the sensors are picking up when you’re nearby (like at the end of Small World when the signs say goodbye to you by name). I think it’s very possible for Disney to look up a guest’s name, find the magic band ID number assigned to that name, and then look up where that magic band was last located. I’m not saying it would be a simple or easy process, or that there are enough sensors all over the park to track the magic bands closely, but the technology that Disney currently has definitely makes it possible. I can’t imagine they aren’t utilizing it if a child goes missing for a length of time.
As I wrote above, I agree that Disney has the data, but that doesn't mean they have put together the system to utilize it as you describe. The RFID bracelets are generating a ton of information at all times, but having the software to sift through it all and organize it to locate an individual is another issue. There's a difference between tracking and searching. Disney can monitor aggregate data points from MBs for crowd levels, know if there's a bottleneck at some point, etc. the way that Googlemaps tracks cars for traffic purposes, but that doesn't mean Disney can (currently) search for where each individual guest is.

There is also a legal issue. There is nothing at all on Disney's site that says they use MBs for locating purposes. Since Disney does not make that part of the TOS regarding MB, it would be illegal for them to essentially install a tracking device without consent, especially on a minor. Disney states MBs are used for many things - room entrance, park entrance, ride photos, fast pass entrance, point of sale charges to the room. But without language that says they are using MBs for real-time location purposes, collecting that data and organizing it for locational searches would be problematic. I don't think Disney's legal team would want to touch that with a ten foot pole, especially not when more conventional methods of locating lost children/parents work so well.
 
We have silicone bracelets for our kids that we had printed with their name and our phone numbers in them. The bracelets can turn inside out so the name/phone number info is on the inside.
 
We have silicone bracelets for our kids that we had printed with their name and our phone numbers in them. The bracelets can turn inside out so the name/phone number info is on the inside.
We used a kit we found at walmart. You can make silcone bracelets.... it has a letter stamp that presses into the silcone. They are super cute.
The bands also fit around playtex cups and the wide bottles perfectly. Great for the babysitter/daycare. I think the kit was 15.00
 
I purchased some bracelets from amazon. They are like the plastic bands that you get when going to a concert or event. The outside is yellow and the inside is where you write all your info. They are hard to get off for the little ones and have worked for us very well in the past.

They are called "Travel ID bands" on amazon.

In prep for our trip, I wanted to see if anyone had suggestions for ID bands for the kids. We will make sure they know if they get separated, to find a CM, but we want the CM to then be able to find us easily. Can the magic bands have this kind of info (parent's name / cell number etc) coded in them as ICE (in case of emergency)?

Any advice on what worked for you would be appreciated.
 
In prep for our trip, I wanted to see if anyone had suggestions for ID bands for the kids. We will make sure they know if they get separated, to find a CM, but we want the CM to then be able to find us easily. Can the magic bands have this kind of info (parent's name / cell number etc) coded in them as ICE (in case of emergency)?

Any advice on what worked for you would be appreciated.

A lost boy ~ 4 years old approached my family awhile back in Epcot and it was then I realized how difficult it can be to find a CM. I can’t imagine him being able to locate one as he was already scared and crying.

He wasn’t able to remember his phone number or even what his dad was wearing but we made sure to not move him at all while one of us went to go get a CM. It took maybe 8 minutes for dad to find us which would have been a lot longer if the kid had wandered around searching for someone with a name-tag.

I’m a bit more confident in the goodness of guests and prefer the “find a mommy” approach. As soon as you know you are lost, stay put and find a mommy to call your memorized phone number or to get a CM. Make sure not to go far because parents will be looking in the area everyone was last together and if someone tries to hurt you, yell.
 

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