Am I thinking Correctly?

[PrincessDadx2]

Our family of 4 is doing Disney in November and we have 5 nights offsite where we will eat primarily offsite.

I booked one night at AKL with our annual passholder discount and got the Deluxe Dining Plan. This gives us 3 TS meals for our one night.

I booked 3 meals

Friday lunch at Tusker House Character Meal Buffet
Friday dinner at Cape May Clam Bake Buffet
Saturday morning (check out day) Princess breakfast at Epcot

These 3 buffets would have cost my family ~ $365 and we get two character meals vs. doing them earlier in the week.

We also get 8 snacks and 4 resort mugs so the total value is ~ $400

The package cost $557 so I am getting an AKL Arusha Savannah bunk bed room for ~ $157 with tax. The rack rate is $435 so it seems like a great way to see the savannah (which I love), get the kids some character meals, and get to our favorite buffet at Cape May for a reasonable price.

Is this how it works for one day? Are your credits available as soon as you check in? We would also pick up a bunch of snacks for our travel which I know we can do.

 

[purple figment]

Your credits will be available to you as soon as you check into AKL and will be good until 11:59PM in the evening of the day you check out so the 3 TS you scheduled will be fine.

One note - Tusker House lunch is not a character meal, only TH breakfast is. However, if you've scheduled the lunch between 1:00 - 1:40 you'll automatically get tickets to the 3:15ish Finding Nemo stage show. The same offer is available for tix to a later show if you book between 1:45 and 2:30 or so. (Not positive about the booking times for the later offer.)

 

[PrincessDadx2]

Your credits will be available to you as soon as you check into AKL and will be good until 11:59PM in the evening of the day you check out so the 3 TS you scheduled will be fine.

One note - Tusker House lunch is not a character meal, only TH breakfast is. However, if you've scheduled the lunch between 1:00 - 1:40 you'll automatically get tickets to the 3:15ish Finding Nemo stage show. The same offer is available for tix to a later show if you book between 1:45 and 2:30 or so. (Not positive about the booking times for the later offer.)

Thanks Purple There is a bug in the dining reservation system because it looks at a two hour window and searching for character experiences still returned Tusker House Lunch. My kids would have been disappointed, so I switched to Crystal Palace

As side benefit is that my meals now cost more, so I guess I am getting a better deal

 

[Mikey'swife]

I find that dxdp is a great deal if you do not do it for your entire stay. Credits start as soon as you check and are good until the next night.

 

[3Minnies1Mickey]

Thanks Purple There is a bug in the dining reservation system because it looks at a two hour window and searching for character experiences still returned Tusker House Lunch. My kids would have been disappointed, so I switched to Crystal Palace

As side benefit is that my meals now cost more, so I guess I am getting a better deal

The search feature doesnt distinguish between what meals actually have characters. Cape May and Ohana would come up in a dinner character meal search because there are characters at breakfast.

 

[Dizneydaz]

Sounds like my kind of thinking! Don't you just love Disney math?

And as PP have said, your credits are good until midnight of your check out day so you could use them any time during that Saturday. And if you wanted to spread it out even further (not have all your TS meals in a row) you could check in at AKL early in the a.m. and get your KTTW cards then. Then you would have your credits earlier in the day and who knows you might even get into your room early. (it does happen )

Happy Dining!