DDP and Split Stay Questions

[Misha72683]

We still have over a year until our next trip, but we're starting to plan/budget in earnest. We're leaning towards DDP for at least part of the trip because my mom admit she would have sticker shock if she had to see the prices and she would second guess what she ordered and I want her to enjoy the trip. She acknoweldges she'd be much happier to have it "already paid for".

We're probably going to be doing a split stay, so that's the part I'm trying to figure out.

1) If we get the DDP for both parts of our stay, we get two refillable mugs, right? Because we have two separate DPs? If we only get the DDP for the first part, can we use the mugs in the second resort?
2) If we get the DDP for both parts of our stay, there will be an over-lap day, right? All of the credits from the first plan have to be used by checkout day, while the new ones will be active check-in day? Has anyone ever had problems because of this?
3) We might do DDP for part and DxDP for the other, like the above, would that cause confusion on overlap day?

 

[sharonabe]

I can speak to the overlap day. There is always a possibility that you will have a problem. The best thing to do is get a paper "receipt" from guest services at your check-out resort of what credits remain on that first stay. Continue to use your credits that day until midnight. You need to check-in to your 2nd stay in order for credits to be active. You should be able to do online check-in to do this. This way you have your 2nd stay credits ready if you need them. One thing you cannot do is combine credits from both stays to "pay" for a 2TS meal. The system can't do that. If you do have a problem, you will have your paper receipt to take with you to guest services at your 2nd resort to straighten things out.

 

[chicagodisfan]

We just got back from a split stay last month, first three nights regular DDP and next four nights DxDDP, so hopefully I can answer some of your questions.

1. Yes, you will get two sets of mugs, one for each stay. The first set will work at the second resort (I think they are all activated for a certain number of days). We got two sets and activated them all, so I'm not entirely sure what happens if you don't get the DDP for the second resort, but I think I've read that they will still work. Maybe someone else can weigh in on that.

2 and 3. There is an overlap day. We did have a problem on our last split stay but not on this one. Your credits from the first resort are good until midnight on check out day and the credits from the second day are activated upon check-in. On our last trip, the system started to pull credits from our second resort instead of using up the ones from the first. I had read that this could happen and had been checking the receipts. When we got back from the parks, I just brought it to the attention of the front desk at the second resort and they fixed it right away. It was really a simple fix but if I had not been looking out for it, I might have inadvertently lost those credits.

This trip when I asked at the first resort, they assured me that the system knows to use the first credits before pulling from the second. Not wanting to take that chance again and since we had DxDDP second which is a ton of credits, I had us use them all up before we checked into the second resort and purposefully did NOT do online check-in at the second resort. I then checked us all into BCV and activated our second set of credits right after my DH used our last snack credit in Epcot. Worked out great!

 

[mrs moon]

How did you find the DXDDP? we are thinking of upgrading ,we

We just got back from a split stay last month, first three nights regular DDP and next four nights DxDDP, so hopefully I can answer some of your questions.

1. Yes, you will get two sets of mugs, one for each stay. The first set will work at the second resort (I think they are all activated for a certain number of days). We got two sets and activated them all, so I'm not entirely sure what happens if you don't get the DDP for the second resort, but I think I've read that they will still work. Maybe someone else can weigh in on that.

2 and 3. There is an overlap day. We did have a problem on our last split stay but not on this one. Your credits from the first resort are good until midnight on check out day and the credits from the second day are activated upon check-in. On our last trip, the system started to pull credits from our second resort instead of using up the ones from the first. I had read that this could happen and had been checking the receipts. When we got back from the parks, I just brought it to the attention of the front desk at the second resort and they fixed it right away. It was really a simple fix but if I had not been looking out for it, I might have inadvertently lost those credits.

This trip when I asked at the first resort, they assured me that the system knows to use the first credits before pulling from the second. Not wanting to take that chance again and since we had DxDDP second which is a ton of credits, I had us use them all up before we checked into the second resort and purposefully did NOT do online check-in at the second resort. I then checked us all into BCV and activated our second set of credits right after my DH used our last snack credit in Epcot. Worked out great!

are staying at the Poly for 10 nights,we have a 12 yr old with us,we like character breakfasts .What is yr opinion now you have used the DXDDP would you recommend or not?

 

[Lisa F]

How did you find the DXDDP? we are thinking of upgrading ,we

are staying at the Poly for 10 nights,we have a 12 yr old with us,we like character breakfasts .What is yr opinion now you have used the DXDDP would you recommend or not?

I'm not who you are asking but I am doing the DxDDP for the first part of a split stay (4 nights, 5 days - so covers most of my trip with only 2 days OOP for the second 3 nights). We are doing pretty much a character breakfast or early lunch (11-11:30ish time frame) and a dinner (many 2TS choices) a day. The 12 year old is probably not a great deal on the DDP unless they have an adult sized appetite or if you do mostly buffets/aycte where you have to pay adult prices regardless. I haven't done it yet myself but a few things to keep in mind about the DxDDP:

the value of a TS credit is lower than with the regular DDP, which means that you pretty much break even at character breakfasts, which are $30+tax. On regular DDP you need to spend something like $37 or 38 to break even on a TS but on DxDDP it is more like $32 a credit with tax. With the appetizers at dinner OR even the price of a full buffet, you should do better than break even on the plan. It is a LOT of food though, as others have said. If you don't do at least a 2ts meal a day then you will quickly find yourself having to eat 3 meals a day. Some people say they are fine with this and don't clean their plates - they eat 3 meals a day at home and they eat 3TS a day on vacation and just eat until full even if they just eat a few bites of this or that. Even though the DxDDP is only for the first half of my trip, I am continuing my pattern of late breakfast/early dinner for the last two days of my trip. I prefer sit down meals to QS and I think 2 a day plus a snack should work out well. I will let you know when I come back

 

[mrs moon]

I'm not who you are asking but I am doing the DxDDP for the first part of a split stay (4 nights, 5 days - so covers most of my trip with only 2 days OOP for the second 3 nights). We are doing pretty much a character breakfast or early lunch (11-11:30ish time frame) and a dinner (many 2TS choices) a day. The 12 year old is probably not a great deal on the DDP unless they have an adult sized appetite or if you do mostly buffets/aycte where you have to pay adult prices regardless. I haven't done it yet myself but a few things to keep in mind about the DxDDP:

the value of a TS credit is lower than with the regular DDP, which means that you pretty much break even at character breakfasts, which are $30+tax. On regular DDP you need to spend something like $37 or 38 to break even on a TS but on DxDDP it is more like $32 a credit with tax. With the appetizers at dinner OR even the price of a full buffet, you should do better than break even on the plan. It is a LOT of food though, as others have said. If you don't do at least a 2ts meal a day then you will quickly find yourself having to eat 3 meals a day. Some people say they are fine with this and don't clean their plates - they eat 3 meals a day at home and they eat 3TS a day on vacation and just eat until full even if they just eat a few bites of this or that. Even though the DxDDP is only for the first half of my trip, I am continuing my pattern of late breakfast/early dinner for the last two days of my trip. I prefer sit down meals to QS and I think 2 a day plus a snack should work out well. I will let you know when I come back

thankyou x

 

[chicagodisfan]

How did you find the DXDDP? we are thinking of upgrading ,we

are staying at the Poly for 10 nights,we have a 12 yr old with us,we like character breakfasts .What is yr opinion now you have used the DXDDP would you recommend or not?

Hi! We really enjoyed the experience and are glad we did it. It gave us the chance to try a lot of new restaurants and some signatures that we've been wanting to try. And we loved getting the appetizers with our meals. We each tried a bite of everyone's and got to share some great dishes. That being said, we will probably stick to the regular plan for our next trip. A lot of that is the makeup of our family. It is me, DH, DS 9 (turned 10 on the trip), DS 6 and DD 2. My mom came with us too on this trip (she has several food intolerances and the DxDDP was great for that with her). We found it to be a great value for us because the kids were able to order off the adult menu when they wanted and my 2 year old was free and shared with all of us. Our biggest issue was that we spent a lot of time in restaurants, especially for the non-buffets and it was a little tough on my kids even with the activities I brought with us to keep them busy. A three course sit down averaged us about an hour and a half, sometimes a little longer. We did two meals a day, a one credit and then a signature so we were just sitting down for two meals. You might fare better with a 12 year-old, especially if he likes to eat and try new things. We enjoy character meals too and had quite a few of them, I think that makes the plan a good value too. It is a lot of food, so 10 days might be a while for so many big meals, but many people have done the plan for that long and really enjoy it.

 

[mrs moon]

Hi! We really enjoyed the experience and are glad we did it. It gave us the chance to try a lot of new restaurants and some signatures that we've been wanting to try. And we loved getting the appetizers with our meals. We each tried a bite of everyone's and got to share some great dishes. That being said, we will probably stick to the regular plan for our next trip. A lot of that is the makeup of our family. It is me, DH, DS 9 (turned 10 on the trip), DS 6 and DD 2. My mom came with us too on this trip (she has several food intolerances and the DxDDP was great for that with her). We found it to be a great value for us because the kids were able to order off the adult menu when they wanted and my 2 year old was free and shared with all of us. Our biggest issue was that we spent a lot of time in restaurants, especially for the non-buffets and it was a little tough on my kids even with the activities I brought with us to keep them busy. A three course sit down averaged us about an hour and a half, sometimes a little longer. We did two meals a day, a one credit and then a signature so we were just sitting down for two meals. You might fare better with a 12 year-old, especially if he likes to eat and try new things. We enjoy character meals too and had quite a few of them, I think that makes the plan a good value too. It is a lot of food, so 10 days might be a while for so many big meals, but many people have done the plan for that long and really enjoy it.

Thank you so much. that was really helpful x