Changing Ressies from Party of 9 to 4

[staceycrouton]

Quick question. We are going to Disney Oct.30-Nov.7 with my sister and her family. We all currently have the Deluxe Dining Plan and all of our reservations are made for a party of 9. Now, my sister thinks that they might downgrade back to free regular dining (they are staying at POR). Will we be able to change numerous reservations from 9 down to 4 without having to cancel or will we have to try to book new reservations? I'm afraid that we would never be able to book a new 'Ohana reservation or Cinderella at this late date. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

 

[mommyof3princess27]

i think you can call disney and get it changed down but i wouldnt do it until you are certain

 

[kddisney502]

You say you have ressie for Cinderella. Do you mean Cinderella's Royal Table (CRT)? On another thread, someone said that for CRT you can remove people from your reservation without losing your ressie time. But for other reservations you would have to cancel and rebook. So for Ohana, you may lose your ressie time if you try to change the ressie, but you should be fine for CRT. Just make sure you call CRT at least 1 day before otherwise you will not get a refund.

 

[staceycrouton]

Thanks! Good to know that we won't lose CRT! I have to admit that I will be really disappointed if we lose 'Ohana if we have to cancel it and then try to re-book!

 

[purple figment]

First of all, don't do anything until you know for certain that your sister won't be coming. If she decides not to come you have several options.

Option 1: You can call the dining line and modify your reservations. Make it absolutely clear to the CM that you don't want to cancel your res, just modify it and make certain the CM knows how to do this. This is especially important with CRT where many CMs will do the easiest thing which is cancel and re-book. However, there's a chance that during that time period someone else will come in and pick up the res you just canceled and nothing else will be available for you.

Option 2: You can go online and see which reservations you can make for just your family. If it's close in time to your current res you will be asked which one you want to cancel, but a that moment you'll be holding both reservations so it's not like the CRT in the above example.

Option 3: According to the Disney dining FAQs page, you will not be charged the no show penalty as long as at least some of your party shows up for the reservation, so you could just arrive at the restaurants and let the CM at the podium know you're now a smaller group. Obviously, for the restaurants without a cc guarantee, this won't be a problem. I don't know if the same policy applies for CRT or the pre-paid dinner shows, however.

 

[TheRatPack]

First of all, don't do anything until you know for certain that your sister won't be coming. If she decides not to come you have several options.

Awesome information! We've done option 2 quite a few times. Just keep checking online until another reservation opens up and then it'll cancel the first for you when you book the second because of the conflicting times. Good to know Option 3 about not being charged for smaller parties showing up as well though.