booking advice

[MichVick]

Hello - my friends and are going to Disney in 2015 and I have read that we will be able to book within the next couple of months. We normally go through a travel agent but I would like to book it myself online. I have a couple of questions, first of all if we book early and free dining comes out for next sept in may, will they give us a refund if we call to get the free dining? Also if we book our flight later are we able to add Disney magical express then or do we need to book it with our package? Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

[Altoqueenkelly]

Hello - my friends and are going to Disney in 2015 and I have read that we will be able to book within the next couple of months. We normally go through a travel agent but I would like to book it myself online. I have a couple of questions, first of all if we book early and free dining comes out for next sept in may, will they give us a refund if we call to get the free dining? Also if we book our flight later are we able to add Disney magical express then or do we need to book it with our package? Thanks in advance for any advice.

Yes and Yes

You are able to make modifications to your reservation until the 45day mark. So if you book your trip and make a deposit, you will be able to take advantage of offers that apply for your time frame at a later date. However, remember that free dining does have blackout days and also is not eligible at every resort, so you may have to consider switching resorts to get the offer if that situation arises.

Yes, with Magical express you just need to call Disney once you receive your travel/flight information and they will update the system and send you your booklet & luggage tags! Its quite simple and can easily be done after you book your reservation!

 

[POOHsie]

If you book room-only, and later see a FD package offer, you can't modify your reservation for that. You would have to cancel and re-book.

However, if you book a package to begin with, a FD offer would be considered a modification and would be allowed. This might be important bc some resorts fill up, and if you had to re-book (from room-only), your resort might not have availability in the room category you chose. As PP posted, with FD your resort might not have that package available anyway. FD is used to fill empty hotel rooms, and isn't offered at a resort that's mostly full at the time FD is offered. You may have to switch resorts. There's no way to predict when or where a FD offer might take place.

 

[purple figment]

Yes and Yes

You are able to make modifications to your reservation until the 45day mark. So if you book your trip and make a deposit, you will be able to take advantage of offers that apply for your time frame at a later date.

Actually you can make modifications to your res even within 45 days of arrival. If you have a package you can make changes to the package up to 45 days before arrival without any financial penalty. Once you are within 45 days of arrival, any modifications might be subject to a $50 change fee, especially if your new total is less than previously. If the modification results in an additional cost the $50 is usually waived. If you make changes within 14 days of arrival there is a $15 paperwork fee assessed.

As POOHsie said, if you have a room only and the special is a package you will have to cancel the room only and book the package. Fortunately you can cancel a room only res up to 5 days before arrival date without penalty.

If a FD offer comes out you will need to call ASAP because it is not automatically applied to an already booked package. The resort/room category needs to be included in the special and there still has to be rooms available that have been allotted for the special.

 

[MichVick]

thank you very much for the information - I have another question We are four people booking 2 rooms at POP - is there anyway we can request connecting rooms since they will be booked as two separate packages?

 

[TDC Nala]

Yes, you can link the reservation and request connecting rooms. Be advised that even if linked, connecting rooms are not guaranteed.

 

[karly05]

When you book, you can go ahead and let them know you want Magical Express but don't have flight info yet. When I booked for this year, the CM asked if I wanted ME and went ahead and noted it on my reservation. Once I knew my flights, it was just a quick phone call back to Disney, they pulled up my reservation and plugged in my flight info for ME.