Charging Priviliges

[Sunny NY]

Hello. I am receiving very confusing information from OKW when I call. We are checking in Tuesday and, in the past, always left our debit card for charging priviliges (at Port Orleans and WDL) then settled our account with a check or cash.

Hoiwever, our bank now holds any PREAUTHORIZATIONS out of your account (funds are not available) and so I am concerned about having $1500 on hold.

The resort has told me everything from NOTHING is held to all $1500 will be held.

Does anyone know the truth .

Thanks for any help. I may just leave cash if the $1500 is really held...

J

 

[nygrl]

we were at cr in oct and also left a debit/credit card and they DID hold the money on it. as a matter of fact we just happened to go on line to check our account and saw we had a zero balance we iommediatly panicked and called the bank. she told us never to give a debit card for charging at hotels or for rental cars because this always happens. she saw we were in disney and released the funds. the main point is they never told us they were doing this at the hotel so if we didnt go on line we would have never known and probably would have had some checks bounce! . my advice is use a regular credit card or plan on having this money held and make sure you have enough money in the account to cover existing checks!

 

[Sunny NY]

Thank you so much for the information

 

[Mymatisse]

Our last trip in September we didn't have any money "held". They put the card through to make sure it's good, but we had no money held out of our checking acount, and we gave them a debit card.

 

[Sunny NY]

Thanks for the information. I am wondering if this procedure varies from resort to resort. I just found this website and I am hooked!

Thanks again.

 

[Carrieberry]

They will authorize $1 on your card to make sure it is valid. I have never had a Disney resort hold any money and we have always used a debit/check card. I posted this a few days ago asking if this was still the case and a very reliable CM posted that it is still the case. $1. We always check when we get in our room and see the $1 charge. Also, sometimes we have gone and wanted the express checkout so we have left our card and gotten charging privilges as well. We have been given a $1500 charge limit when there is only $500 in the account, so obviouly they do not authorize this amount. If this happened to the previous poster, it must have been some sort of error on the part of whomever checked them in. Also, if you want to pay your room charges off in cash, you have to either go do it the night before you check out, or tell them you don't want express check out and you will come to the desk on check out day to pay off your charges, otherwise they will charge whatever card you left at about 3:30am on your check out day for all room charges. Also, if you feel you are getting close to your charging limit, go pay it off in cash or they will automatically charge your card when the limit is hit and start all over with a new limit.

 

[Sunny NY]

I am so confused . Thank you so much for all of the information! Enjoy your upcoming trip!

 

[Carrieberry]

Thanks! I am sorry you are confused. Here is the link to the post I started that the CM responded to and I just sent you a private message!
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=706229&highlight=room+charges

 

[nygrl]

They will authorize $1 on your card to make sure it is valid. I have never had a Disney resort hold any money and we have always used a debit/check card. I posted this a few days ago asking if this was still the case and a very reliable CM posted that it is still the case. $1. We always check when we get in our room and see the $1 charge. Also, sometimes we have gone and wanted the express checkout so we have left our card and gotten charging privilges as well. We have been given a $1500 charge limit when there is only $500 in the account, so obviouly they do not authorize this amount. If this happened to the previous poster, it must have been some sort of error on the part of whomever checked them in. Also, if you want to pay your room charges off in cash, you have to either go do it the night before you check out, or tell them you don't want express check out and you will come to the desk on check out day to pay off your charges, otherwise they will charge whatever card you left at about 3:30am on your check out day for all room charges. Also, if you feel you are getting close to your charging limit, go pay it off in cash or they will automatically charge your card when the limit is hit and start all over with a new limit.

not to confuse you more but i have to disagree with the above poster. they most certainlly held our money , didnt tell us they were doing it and screwed us up. they also did not our card all at once if we bought tickets to mnsshp we were charged seperatly. and they charged the balance of the room well before we checked out. we were staying concierge and did check in up there so maybe that had something to do with it but i really dont thinki so since my bank said this happens all the time. good luck with whatever you decide to do but if i was you i would count on them charging and if not then you can always transfer the money back after your trip!

 

[Mymatisse]

I guess the best bet would be to ask at the front desk before you authorize charging privileges. We probably charged about 1000.00 worth of stuff and it only showed up on our bank acount after we came back from WDW. Our money was never held so if a hold of a certain amount of money is placed on an acount it is probably in error. They are suppose to just do the dollar thing to make sure the card is good.

 

[Carrieberry]

They will charge whatever balance you owe on the room and tickets immediately. They will also charge the card in the middle of your stay if you hit the limit they give you on check in which is $1500 at deluxes. Again I have never had a problem like money being held no matter what our charging limit is at or where I am staying and I have satyed at 6 different resorts, some more than once-only ever $1. If this is a major concern just pull out all of your cash and leave that for your charging privileges. They will take that as a deposit and anything you charge to your room will come out of that instead. You do not have to give them a card, or you can give them one for express check out and room chagres but it does not have charging priviliges for the parks. All they have to do is enter a "Y' or an "N" for charging privileges and the same for express check out. Hopefully Liberty Belle will come along shortly to clear this up.

Oh yeah and they will charge any additonal tickets bought after your stay seperately.

 

[LibertyBelle]

As Carrieberry posted (and as a CM at OKW)... They will charge any remaining room and tax and any tickets purchased immediatly... If you have already pre-paid room and tax (or are using DVC points) and do not purchase ticket from the front desk, they will NOT charge anything to your credit card. The authorization is for $1.00 and $1.00 only to make sure that the card is not stolen or reported lost. If you reach the $1500.00 limit and are on express check out they will charge the $1500.00 to the card on file... If you are NOT on express check out they will call you and ask you to come to the desk to make a payment...I have worked OKW, WL, Coronado and Y&B... not sure what happened to nygrl (unless it was Room/Tax and tickets charged up front and then a charge for reaching the credit limit)... but I assure you that only $1.00 is pre-authorized...and the only charges taken immediatly are remaining room and tax balance and any tickets purchased...and the only charges taken during ones stay are for reaching the credit limit (and in this case they will leave a voice mail advising you of that).

Just FYI there is no way to Pre-authorize more than a dollar in the system. If they have taken any more than the $1 pre-authorization it will show up on your room folio as a Charge to the account and you will have the credit showing (if you have not charged anything)

 

[pulphero]

What if I want to pay for everything with cash and not use a credit/debit card at all? Will the resort still require a card at check-in?

Also -

Has anyone used the new 'travel cards' from AAA? They are prepaid Visa debit cards. Would Disney accept one of them at check-in and grant charging privileges on it?

 

[Carrieberry]

From what I understand:

If you want to use cash you have two choices. You can either delcine express check out and charging privileges and pay for everything in cash. If you do this and you do not want to leave a card at all then you will not be able to do anything like make phone calls or get room service and you will be carrying all that cash.
Or you can leave your cash to charge against and a card just to cover the phone incidentals or in case you go over the cash you have left. Also you would decline express checkout so if there is any remaining charges, rather than charge your card you can pay in cash. Disney makes it so convienent that basically as long as you have the money you can pay however you want. Most people that take a lot of cash or travelers checks eave it as their charging deposit and just charge against that rather than carry all of the money around.

 

[BevS97]

we have always had charging privelidges and they would never have been able to take $1000 out of our account, there was never that much in there. Our room and tickets are always prepaid, and we have just been charged for any room charges at the end of our trip. I was told if we spent $1000 then it would be charged to the card and we would get a fresh limit of $1000 but we didn't spend that much.

 

[pulphero]

Let me see if I understand correctly -

I can leave extra cash or traveler's checks at the front desk and Disney will then authorize me to charge up to that amount on my room card?

If I charge less than the amount I leave, will they return it (in cash) when I check-out?

Interesting option...

 

[Carrieberry]

If it is any kind of VISA debit card they will take it as long as it has the VISA logo on it.

 

[Carrieberry]

pulphero-
That is exactly correct!

 

[luvsTink]

Pulphero...that is just what we did last year. We even got a hundered back when we left (can you believe we didn't spend it!)

Anne

 

[KilleriMac17]

I too use debit cards, any mine only have a limit of 350 per day, thus, we usally take down travelers checks for about $1000 or more, and we put that on a room charge 'credit' so this way you can use your room keys, if you dont use it all you just get the rest at checkout(or you can add more money to it if you want).