DDP with wedding discount, or not?? (Update, page 2)

[SRUAlmn]

UGH!!! I am so irritated!!! I am so tired of calling Disney and people having no clue about their own policies!

Here is what just happened...

DF and I have been going back and forth for about 2 weeks as to whether or not to add the DDP and buy the 2 1day MYW tickets to be able to do so. Last night we figured what the hey, let's do it and live it up while we can on our one and only honeymoon!

I called CRO last night, they confirmed what we would need to do (buy the tickets) and I explained about our wedding discount for our rooms, they said it was fine. We had to call group reservations, though, to do it since that's who we booked our room through.

I don't know about anyone else, but each time I have called GR I have spoken to someone pretty unfriendly. This time, the guy was VERY condecending. It made me so upset that I actually sort of snapped back at him. He was talking to me like I was a 4 year old that didn't know anything. He said that the only way we can get the DDP is to cancel our GR wedding discounted room and book a regular room at the regular rate of a MYW package.

So which person had the correct information? I know many other brides have used the DDP (heatherlynn and forkeeps come to mind most recently.) Did they have to give up the wedding discount for their room, or what??

I emailed my EM's assistant, but I have emailed them a couple questions over the past 2 weeks and haven't heard back, so I'm guessing they are really busy and I'd like an answer soon so we can book this if anyone can help.

THANKS!!!!

 

[Maggimus]

Karen,

Im not going to be able to help you but DH and I did have the DDP. Its amazing and I really hope that you are able to finaggle a way to get it.

Tiffany (ForKeeps) had an intimate wedding-- so neither of us had room discounts.

Heatherlynn was a honeymooner so the room discount didnt apply to her either.

I do believe only Customs get this. I have seen this discussed before with the dining plan and im sure someone has an answer for you.

GL ! The DDP is so worth the money you pay-- you wouldnt spend more than that on food and it really makes for a more enjoyable (less stressful) time.. I hope you get it

I really cant believe how they spoke to you on the phone. Maybe you could try and speak with a manager and they will know the right answer?
-Maggie

 

[SRUAlmn]

Karen,

Im not going to be able to help you but DH and I did have the DDP. Its amazing and I really hope that you are able to finaggle a way to get it.

Tiffany (ForKeeps) had an intimate wedding-- so neither of us had room discounts.

Heatherlynn was a honeymooner so the room discount didnt apply to her either.

I do believe only Customs get this. I have seen this discussed before with the dining plan and im sure someone has an answer for you.

GL ! The DDP is so worth the money you pay-- you wouldnt spend more than that on food and it really makes for a more enjoyable (less stressful) time.. I hope you get it

I really cant believe how they spoke to you on the phone. Maybe you could try and speak with a manager and they will know the right answer?
-Maggie

DOH! I didn't even think about all of you having intimates and Heather being a honeymooner! Uh oh! Maybe we can't If they came out with a REALLY good AP rate we could switch over, but the wedding discount is so good, I doubt it would compare. Man I guess I'll have to just wait to hear back from my EM.

Thanks!

 

[Maggimus]

Okay heres my suggestion (or what we did rather)...

We are AAA members (which works out great for us because we travel a lot and only one person needs to be a member-- the membership is like $40 or so).

I called my agent and she got us the AAA rate on the MYW package. Then i watched the budget board for "codes" that disney puts out to save you money. I found 2 codes, both which worked on top of my AAA rate. I had already payed her standard for the AAA Rate and when the codes came out, she applied them to my credit card account and DH and I ended up saving around $800 by just booking with AAA. We saved $400 with the two codes that I found after we booked.

If you are interested in this ive got plenty of time right now so let me know when you will be there and I can dig for ya and see what kind of discounts you can get. Just let me know the weeks and days.

 

[SRUAlmn]

Okay heres my suggestion (or what we did rather)...

We are AAA members (which works out great for us because we travel a lot and only one person needs to be a member-- the membership is like $40 or so).

I called my agent and she got us the AAA rate. Then i watched the budget board for "codes" that disney puts out to save you money. I found 2 codes, both which worked on top of my AAA rate. I had already payed her standard for the AAA Rate and when the codes came out, she applied them to my credit card account and DH and I ended up saving around $800 by just booking with AAA. We saved $400 with the two codes that I found after we booked.

If you are interested in this ive got plenty of time right now so let me know when you will be there and I can dig for ya and see what kind of discounts you can get. Just let me know the weeks and days.

Thanks, we have AAA too. The problem is that we are booked for 9 nights in the Contemporary garden rooms and because they are now tearing down the north wing, there are NO ROOMS! Even my family members who tried to book in November couldn't get 2 of the nights they wanted. I don't think there is any way there would be anything available. Plus, we got a REALLY good wedding rate. If AAA could match it (or do better) and there was a room available, then that would be awesome, but I seriously doubt it. Our dates are July 10-18 and then we are staying the 18-19 as our complimentary night in a tower concierge room.

 

[Maggimus]

I meant to mention that we booked the entire stay seperate from the wedding stay (through AAA). We had two completely seperate transactions.

Our entire trip was a MYW package. We stayed at the WL (deluxe resort), 6 nights, 2 round trip flights from Knoxville, TN to Orlando, FL, 6 day MYW park hopper passes with the DDP.... all for under $3,000.

I have no idea what type of discount you get as a custom, so that really may be the deal breaker--- that might be better!

 

[SRUAlmn]

I meant to mention that we booked the entire stay seperate from the wedding stay (through AAA). We had two completely seperate transactions.

Our entire trip was a MYW package. We stayed at the WL (deluxe resort), 6 nights, 2 round trip flights from Knoxville, TN to Orlando, FL, 6 day MYW park hopper passes with the DDP.... all for under $3,000.

I have no idea what type of discount you get as a custom, so that really may be the deal breaker--- that might be better!

Here is a link to our wedding website to give you an idea of the rates. Click on accommodations at the top. The prices include tax.
http://www.disneyweddings.go.com/ms/pub/index.jsp?eventId=66070

 

[Maggimus]

If you already have that night booked at the contemporary-- all you have to do is call AAA and have them phone disney-- you will still keep your same rooms and everything the only difference will be your form of payment and discount. AAA works directly with disney and AAA is Disney's biggest travel agency sponsor.

 

[balatonbabe]

SRUAlumn, here a link to another thread which discusses the DDP and weddings. Hope this answers your question.

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1335639

 

[SRUAlmn]

SRUAlumn, here a link to another thread which discusses the DDP and weddings. Hope this answers your question.

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1335639

Thanks. Sounds like we are out of luck for the DDP unless an AP rate comes out and they let us apply it to our same room that we already have booked in our room block.

 

[Maggimus]

You should be able to call AAA and get them to keep your existing reservation with disney but switch the discounts out. I know that they do that. It is worth a shot calling-- all they can tell you is that they cannot do that. Either way you wont have to cancel your reservation to find out-- either they override it or they cant and you still have your contemporary rooms.

You might want to get a good experienced agent to work with though-- we know ours really well shes a family friend so its not real hard for me to get her to work for us-- but i hear some arent as eager.

 

[SRUAlmn]

Thanks Maggie.

I'm going to look up the phone number for our local AAA office right now. I'll ask if they have anyone who specializes in Disney reservations.

 

[ForKeeps]

Hey Karen,

I found this whole situation frustrating as well. I wasn't able to use the discounted ticket rates available through our wedding website if we wanted the DDP.

The whole thing was really confusing! In the end DH and I wound up snagging an offer for Canadians that gave us the parkhopper & water/fun for free and you could book the package with DDP.

So we just gave up on the wedding discount

I'm sorry they treated you that way

 

[TinkerBabe1010]

Karen,

So sorry this has been so crazy for you! I HATE it when two people who work for the same company give different information-- it's like hello??? Get your act together people!!

I will say, if you can get the DDP, to go for it. We've had it twice now, and we will have it again when we're there in April. It's sooo much food, but it's so fun to go into a restaurant and get to order whatever you want and not worry about the price. The truth is, we wouldn't have ordered as much food if we hadn't had the DDP, but given how much food we ate (and we did eat it ALL ) we did save money, because we NEVER had a dinner that was under $100, and that was only TS dinner, not even including snacks or CS, and the DDP is $40 a day. It was fun to go and just let ourselves eat whatever we wanted without worrying about it. Also, we didn't gain a pound because of all the walking, hurray!!!

So, if you can figure out a way to do it, I would say do it. I would also call and say, "well, this person told me I could do it, so can you please make it work" sometimes if you say that it does work. Good luck!!!!

Okay, I need a snack... all this talk of food is making me hungry

 

[SRUAlmn]

Thanks for the support! The most frustrating part is that no one seemed to know the actual facts (which some of you know was a problem when I was booking our PS room in Jan too!) It irritates me that the customer service seems to be lacking unless you call the dining line. They are always amazingly sweet!!!

I guess we'll just sit and wait for an AP rate or else we'll have to forget the DDP. We both have been eating healthier and MUCH less than normal, and by the time we get to the wedding, will have been doing so for 5 1/2 months, so maybe we won't need that much food anyway

 

[SRUAlmn]

UPDATE

Just thought I'd post an update with the response I got from AAA. They cannot transfer an existing reservation, and to make a new one, the only thing still available is a king tower room. The total for 8 nights, the 2 MYW tickets, and the DDP would come out to be $4861.66 (over double what it would cost for the room we currently have!) That's $607 per day!!! YIKES

Oh well! Thanks for the idea, Maggie!

 

[TinkerBabe1010]

Oh, Karen, bummer!!! I'm dissappointed too, now, because I really wanted to add the AAA discount to our trip in April. I guess we'll still try, but I don't have high hopes. Anyway, sorry it didn't work out, although, your room will be beautiful and you won't overeat as much as we did on our trip!!! We were horribly gluttenous people LOL.

 

[Maggimus]

Dang-- if there were only some way to cancel your room but tell them to "hold" it for you under your name for like 2 hours so that you could get AAA to rebook it right away under your same name .

Sorry karen!! I feel bad for suggesting it...

 

[SRUAlmn]

Dang-- if there were only some way to cancel your room but tell them to "hold" it for you under your name for like 2 hours so that you could get AAA to rebook it right away under your same name .

Sorry karen!! I feel bad for suggesting it...

Don't feel bad! You gave me a glimmer of hope I guess I'll just have to be ok with what we have. I'd be so nervous if I cancelled and tried to have them hold it or something that it wouldn't work and then we would really be out of luck!!!

Plus, TinkerBabe is right, this might keep us from going overboard. Also, if we're say in the MK and we want to get a chocolate mousse from Pecos Bills, a dole whip and maybe a box of popcorn instead of having lunch we can, without feeling restricted Do you hear me convincing myself??

 

[Maggimus]

Well atleast your spirits are high . Maybe you can try it out on another future trip.