Help with AP please

[lindsnlogansmom]

I am still new to the Disneyland thing. I went as a child but it is a whole new world when you are planning as an adult for a family. We went in February and are going again in 4 days! We are also going again for the holidays. We are not AP holders and to be quite honest I don't know a lot about the advantages.

We are a family of five including my mom who lives with us. We take her everywhere because she never had the opportunity to travel in her earlier years. We can run up quite a food and souvenir bill so I was wondering if the AP would benefit us. If so, which one? Or would it be better to just upgrade one for the discounts.

I also have no idea whatsover how much it costs to upgrade.

Thanks in advance.

 

[bumbershoot]

Right now, as far as I know, the Deluxe AP is 239. The Premium is 379. That price is for any age 3 and up.

It gives you a year, from the day you buy an AP or first use a ticket that you upgrade, through the same date the next year. So we used our hoppers on Sept 18 '07, and then upgraded to AP a few days later, and our APs go through Sept 18 '08.
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Membership Includes:

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Admission to Disneyland® Park
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Admission to Disney's California Adventure® Park
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Special rates at Disneyland® Resort hotels
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Select discounts on food
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Special Passholder-only events
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Subscription to Backstage Pass, a collectible Passholder-only publication
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Up-to-the-minute Extra e-mail updates
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Access to the exclusive Annual Passport website

And when you become a Premium Annual Passport holder, enjoy included parking at the Mickey & Friends parking structure and more!
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Premium gives you 365 days admission (well, 366 if it included this February as a leap year!). Deluxe is 315 days, b/c there are blocked out days (I assume you're not in So Cal and aren't eligible for the So Cal APs).

Along with that:

Deluxe AP gets you 10% off most food.
Premium AP gets you 15% off most food and 10% off most merchandise.

If you are only planning on going once in a year's period from this upcoming trip, you might look into only ONE person upgrading for the discounts. You would want to look at your receipts or cc bills or debit card statements to see how much you spent and how much you would have saved, to see if the Deluxe would do you or if the Premium would be better.

For us, b/c we eat fairly lightly while there and don't get tons of souvenirs, we still haven't been able to see that a Premium would have saved us more than the price difference. But you have more people and it sounds like you eat and buy a lot! So one person upgrading to Premium might very well work for you, but only you can answer that.

If you're going to go more than once, and each planned trip wouldn't be in a blocked out time, you could look into getting Deluxe APs for all but one of you, and a Premium for the one, so you get the Premium discounts and don't have to pay for a new set of tickets for the second trip inside the year.



When we upgraded our tickets, we had at least a one day trip pre-planned for later in the year. We had 5 day hoppers, and just adding a one-day ticket to that would have been more than the Deluxe AP. So we just paid the difference in the value of the hoppers and the Deluxe AP, and we had them!


I'm feeling a little loopy, so I'm worried I'm not making much sense. If that's so, just ask me what I meant by whatever is confusing, and I'll try to get my brain more in order.

 

[bumbershoot]

And look at that, you even said you had two trips planned.

So obviously upgrading everyone will very likely be better financially than getting more tickets for your holiday trip.

But it's that holiday trip where you'll have to look at the blocked out dates, so let me find that info for you.

This page should have the info, on the left side, for the various APs. Click on "view calendar" for the blocked out dates for the year's time.


If it all makes sense to upgrade, then there's one thing to ask. Are you staying on-site this trip? If so, then upgrade any time while your tickets for this trip are still valid. You'll get MM each day it's offered during this stay, if you stay onsite.

If you're staying off-site, though, and your tickets for this trip are 3 days or more, than you'll have one day of Magic Morning. Assuming you are going to use the MM, use that day of MM. After that (even that same day!) you'll upgrade by going to the "bank" at Disneyland, across from City Hall. That's where everyone will give names, addresses, then pay and have pictures taken! You'll leave with your APs in your hands. The reason for upgrading after a ticket-based MM is that you don't get MMs with your Annual Passports.

 

[lindsnlogansmom]

You made perfect sense! Oh My Goodness I can only hope to have as much Disney knowledge as you do. Thank you so much! I have to figure out if it makes sense to upgrade all of us. Yes we do shop and eat a lot. Actually, we don't necessarily eat a lot our problem is WHERE we eat. We always want to try all of the fun stuff like character meals, Blue Bayou, Rainforest Cafe, etc. I never fail to almost pass out when we receive our check. At least when we prepay, like at Goofy's Kitchen, the shock has already worn off and then I can relax and enjoy myself! LOL Last time DD 16 and my niece got the flu on day 2 of our 5 day trip. Needless to say none of you would have wanted to see our room service bill at the end of our GC stay.

 

[godalejunior]

I agree with bumbershoot....what she said!! Just the food alone would be worth it for at least one person in your party to have an AP. If you are planning two trips, it makes sense for everyone to have one.

 

[bumbershoot]

You made perfect sense! Oh My Goodness I can only hope to have as much Disney knowledge as you do. Thank you so much! I have to figure out if it makes sense to upgrade all of us. Yes we do shop and eat a lot. Actually, we don't necessarily eat a lot our problem is WHERE we eat. We always want to try all of the fun stuff like character meals, Blue Bayou, Rainforest Cafe, etc. I never fail to almost pass out when we receive our check. At least when we prepay, like at Goofy's Kitchen, the shock has already worn off and then I can relax and enjoy myself! LOL Last time DD 16 and my niece got the flu on day 2 of our 5 day trip. Needless to say none of you would have wanted to see our room service bill at the end of our GC stay.

Aw thanks. I find I have little snippets that I know about. But just today I learned something new about character meals! Your info-snippet is room service, I suppose.

I found that buying giftcards, instead of working from cash, debit, or even credit, helps me to not feel the "augh" feeling when I pay. We're not paying as much as you guys, but it still doesn't feel all that great! So if I buy a giftcard, I get the scary feeling done with when I do that, and each time I use it doesn't feel AS bad. Doesn't work for Rainforest (though I do believe you get a 10% discount there with an AP, I *think*) to pay with a disney giftcard (but there are Landry's giftcards you can get!).

Oh, also (she edits in...) I spend a good amount of time on allears.net and dlresortinfo to look at their menus. Be sure to look at the most current you can find (and know that there might be menu and price changes by the time of a trip), and that can help you prepare for sticker shock. Since we are vegetarian in our family, it's pretty easy to find the things we'll likely eat at any given restaurant, so I have a solid idea of what we'll spend wherever we go. Helps a bit.

Should anyone become ill on this trip, you guys might think about going slightly off site for food to bring back. We had a nice to-go meal from CoCo's on Katella, and Mimi's was pretty good, too!


So are you staying at the GCH this time, too?

 

[lindsnlogansmom]

The gift card idea is a great one! We booked two packages last time and received two gift cards for 100.00 each. I agree that when I used them it wasn't quite as much of a shock. I am thrifty by nature but my DH isn't quite so much. Yes we are staying at the Grand again this trip. I really wanted to stay at the Disneyland Hotel because I think my 3 year old would like them theming of the place much more. It was booked solid! I am a little worried about crowds. We have stayed off site a couple of times but it gets hard with my mom...she had a stroke several years ago and she needs to go back to the room fairly often to rest. We are hoping for a healthy trip this time!

 

[bumbershoot]

For your mom's sake it's good you'll be so close. And since you're staying onsite, you can upgrade or just get your AP first thing, b/c the Magic Mornings aren't tied to your ticket.

Then after you have the APs, you can check for future terrific AP special rates at the hotels, since you like staying onsite.

 

[disneyfan4ever54]

A small edit to bumbershoot's great information:
The deluxe annual pass is $259 right now.