Disney Dining Plan...one family's experience

[kristen17]

The OP mentioned too much food. It definitely was for us, but we shared our meals at non-buffet TS restaurants, which allowed us to do several TS lunches in addition to TS for dinner nearly every night. This was great, because we got to eat at the cool (neat) and cool (AC) TS restaurants in the park. (I know many if not most CS are AC too, but being waited on is so nice after walking around all morning.) It takes some planning -- ADRs and planning to split meals, but it really worked well for us. For us, this is definitely not how we'd eat if we were paying out of pocket for the meals, and I definitely see that it would probably be cheaper than the DDP if you did breakfast in the room, and a splitting CS meal or two (which probably would be enough food in the hot times). But if you like 1 TS a day, which we definitely would now that we've done that, it seems like the the DDP would come out cheaper for us. And my hubby wasn't constantly calculating our food tab in his head and freaking out; no fun. For him or me. (We had the free dining in September, which was soooo awesome and we didn't have the issue of whether it was cheaper or not.)

 

[EEyorelover22]

Once I ordered the DDE, I just called Reservations back and they immeadiately credited my CC the 20%.

Thanks! You rock! I just called and they did a credit. I'm going to make a separate post about this as it has come up several times. She indicated that there was a pull down to give the discount and my name came up in her system for the DDE card.

 

[Tigger&Belle]

My 18yo DD and I just got back last night and I haven't yet done the math, but I think the dining plan was a good decision for us. We shared our credits quite a few times and spent very little additional money on food, etc. We had the perfect number of TS credits and actually had to work at using all of our CS credits. We hardly used any of our snack credits, hence the bag of Mickey Rice Krispy treats that I brought home (which my boys who didn't come were happy to see).

We shared TS credits at Sci Fi, Alfredos, and Spoodles. I left extra tip since they were serving 2 people on one credit. The waiter at Spoodles acted like there wouldn't be enough food, but I'd eaten there before and know our appetites and knew we'd be good on one credit so I stuck to my request. We actually wasted a lot of food.

We would have shared at Whispering Canyon, but it was our last night and we needed to use the credits so we each got our own food and wasted over half of the food. We just can't eat that much at one time.

We ate at 3 buffets--Boma dinner and breakfast and Chef Mickey's breakfast, so that took up 6 of our credits.

I felt stuffed most days. Half of our breakfasts we ate in the room with food I'd brought from home, I got CS that we shared from the food court for one breakfast, and then the 2 buffets. As it turned out we could have gotten more CS breakfasts and had enough credits, but I didn't know that would be the case.

We also shared some counter serve meals since we weren't able to each eat an entree, dessert, and drink a beverage. I often prefer bottled water to drink, which I had with me or I would get an ice water.

In my situation I would do the dining plan again, but if I had of had my other kids with me I probably wouldn't since one is a picky eater and I don't think that we could get our monies worth with him.

I do plan to go through my receipts and figure out how much we would have spent without the plan to figure out if it was a good deal.

 

[EEyorelover22]

I worked out the figures last year and did exactly what someone said...looked exactly at where we would eat. We eat Character meals for breakfast and usually eat at Boma for dinner and since it's a fixed price, it didn't work out for us. It would have been paid for, but because of where we eat, it wouldn't have saved us money.

 

[CHIPSTER]

I have a question regarding the dining plan - must you pay full price for the room? I would consider the plan but only if I could get a reduced room.

 

[zachnlucy]

I have a question regarding the dining plan - must you pay full price for the room? I would consider the plan but only if I could get a reduced room.

If you book through AAA, you can still get their discount.

 

[diznyfanatic]

I have a question regarding the dining plan - must you pay full price for the room? I would consider the plan but only if I could get a reduced room.

Unless you get a fairly rare package discount code to use for the dates of your particular stay, the answer is usually yes, that you will pay rack rate (non-discounted) resort prices as part of the complete MYW + Dining package.

Right now, I can use the AP room only discount code but I can not get the dining plan unless I add at least a one day pass for everyone in the same room, thereby making it a package...resort, pass, dining plan.

Edited to add that as someone said above, you can get AAA discount rates.

 

[fac]

I have a question regarding the dining plan - must you pay full price for the room? I would consider the plan but only if I could get a reduced room.

You can get a reduce room with AAA discount, which I think is as far as you can get.

 

[Thinktinknpixiedust]

ADR's are part of the fun of planning the vacation for the whole family. We all talk about it and comprimise and just have fun, knowing that we'll be there eventually.

I think it would be difficult without ADR, but not impossible, you just would have to wait longer.