Wow, this is interesting. Usually anytime somebody creates a thread asking ANYTHING about DVA, certain people quickly begin posting all off-topic with unsolicited financial planning advice, telling the OP that the DVA is worthless, and to just use a savings account so you'll yield dividends and get more cashback than you do with the DVA gift cards, blah blah blah. Or telling the person 839,247,982 other reasons and ways to save for Disney... Instead of offering any answers to the OPs questions, or any advice at all about the DVA program itself. I'm shocked, relieved, and happy to see that hasn't happened here (yet!)
So anyhow! The fact is that some people are great little savers, and some just aren't. I'm in the second category. I have been using my DVA for over a year, and I love it. I'm the kind of person who if the money is in any of my bank accounts, it's like cash, and I'll justify things to spend it on even when I KNOW that I need it for my next vacation. Or I'll tell myself, "Oh, I'll just borrow the money from my Disney savings, and replace it later..." And then later never happens.
I don't do DVA for the gift cards (though it's a nice little bonus). I do it because it helps me to control my spending, and keep my impulsive little hands off of money that is earmarked for an upcoming Disney trip. And it's been awesome!
I also had a similar experience to a previous poster... My DVA was an invaluable resource for me back in April, when a last-minute opportunity came up for me to do a quick 3-night trip at the end of that month. The ONLY reason I was able to make that trip happen was because I'd been stashing money away into my DVA for 6 months at that point, and had more than enough to cover the costs.
And for the record, I weathered the storm of the glitch earlier this year. Thankfully, I wasn't one of the people who had additional money taken, as I've never set it up for automatic withdrawals. I only put money into mine using the One-Time Payment feature. The biggest problem I had during that mess was that the day availability and bookings opened up for 2016, that's when the DVA website was down to fix said glitch, so I couldn't login to get my account number to pay my deposit with. (Lesson learned... I now have the account number stored on my computer and in my phone, so I always have offline access to it.) So in the meanwhile, I put the booking for my October 2016 trip on hold, and then a day or two later when the website came back up, I called in and paid my deposit using my DVA, and all was well.
Give it a try, OP. If you find it's not to your liking, just request a refund of the money you paid into it. No harm, no foul.
