Lots of questions...

[VBAndrea]

We are using military passes, but friends of ours who did this said they were still able to purchase the DP. We are staying at AKL with a military discount, so we don't qualify for free dining.

Can we indeed add the DP? And what is the cost? We are staying six nights; does that mean we must purchase a six day dp? Or would we be able to purchase a 5 day dp?

Do I have to know if we are going to be using the dp prior to making ADRs or can I add it after our ADRs are made (I make ADRs on Monday so don't have a lot of time to decide)?

I don't want dining to overwhelm our trip, but I do have enough meals planned that would warrant using all the table service credits providing we can get into CRT. I also know for CRT you have to leave a credit card or already be on the dp, so I assume I would need to purchase the dp prior to making our ADRs. Any thoughts on that?

Thanks for all the help. The last time I was at Disney you just made your table service reservation the morning you arrived....ah the good ol' days!

[TDC Nala]

Yes, you can buy the dining plan with your military discount. This is an exception to the usual rules that you must add tickets to your package. With the military discount you can buy the dining plan without adding tickets.

You must buy the dining plan for every night of your trip. You can't break the trip up and buy dining plan for some nights and not for others, unless you make two separate room reservations and add the plan to one reservation but not the other. You must also buy the same plan for every person on your reservation. The basic dining plan (1 TS, 1 CS and one snack per night, by far the most popular plan and probably the one you are thinking of buying) costs $39.99 per adult per night and $10.99 per child per night.

You can make reservations for CRT before you add the dining plan - you'd just have to pay in full for it. Then, when you get there, pay with dining credits and have the prepayment refunded. If you want to just leave a credit card when you reserve CRT, then you have to have the dining plan on your reservation when you book it. You could always try, if you are on the phone speaking to a live person, telling them you don't have the dining plan booked yet but you intend to get it and pay for CRT with credits. This will not work if you are booking online.

You should make reservations if you know all the TS where you want to eat. I just came from the front desk of Kidani where a gentleman was complaining about being unable to get the character meal of his choice at a time he liked - for his entire week's stay.

[VBAndrea]

Thanks for the reply. Do you know what time the dp starts? We are arriving in the morning of Dec 6 and I think our hotel check in is at 3pm -- can we get our KTW with dp options prior to that so we can eat lunch at a resort or dowtown Disney?

[disneynuts777]

Yes....you can get your KTTW card even if your rooms are not ready. We arrived at 1:00pm, checked-in and got out KTTW cards. We then went and had lunch and used our ddp credits to pay for it.:thumbsup2
By the time we were finished lunch our rooms were ready.:goodvibes