Any reason to wait for making reservations?

[Keyser]

Sorry if this is a repost - my first attempt seemed not to go through.

I'm wondering whether there is any good reason to wait to make resort reservations. In particular, if Disney ends up having some special promotion (say, like free dining, or buy x nights, get y nights), is it possible to change a reservation to take advantage of that? Or, is there a penalty for changing a reservation in those circumstances? Am I correct that at 45 or more days out, it is easy (+free) to make changes to a reservation, but maybe there's a charge at less than that?

Also, can anyone give me a sense for how far ahead of time such promotions are announced (we would be going the 2nd week of January)?

Thanks!

 

[theSurlyMermaid]

Hm, I booked my vacation through Small World Vacations and then several months later a postcard rate came out. I changed my reservation several times (to fit the time of the postcard rate to correspond with an available room). There was no extra charge. The only issue we had was that it got a little confusing with the charges (stuff I had already paid) and credits that were applied to my credit card. In fact, Disney accounting called me up so we could sort through it and make sure the charges were correct.

Long story short, we had no problem reserving earlier and changing later.

 

[Hincher]

Even if you are dealing directly with Disney and a better rate comes out, call them up and they fill give you the better deal. No problem.

 

[brentalex]

If you have a room only reservation, you can make any changes up to 5 days from arrival with no penalty. For our last trip, I first made the reservation, then added a AAA discount when it became available, then changed it to a different discount when it became available. The last change required them to cancel the existing reservation and create a new one. The money already paid on the old one was credited to one credit card and the deposit for the new one went on another credit card. It was very easy.