disney visa

[memakwed]

Ok so I've had a disney visa for a bit. Last trip I had a whopping $20 accumulated on my disney rewards and considering it was just from paying for the gym I couldn't complain. However, this trip I need some extrra cash so I'm working hard to grab those rewards by trying to use it for my bills and then each week taking the money from my bank account to pay. I was wondering how succesful others had been trying to rack up these rewards? What was the largest amount you were able to get for your trip and how long did it take? when I received my $20 I did it at Disney guest relations and used it for a souvenier how would I use these to pay for my trip? Would I have to book through disney or could I use our travel agent?

 

[Qltrgrl2]

It is possible to earn a lot of $ for your gift card if you use the card for most of your purchases, grocery, gas, etc. This fall, I plan to use my Disney Rewards money for my bill at the CB. Hopefully I will have enought to pay for two nights of the four. I go to a lot of Rundisney races, so the extra money comes in handy!

 

[TI double-GUH ER]

I don't remember exactly what we had on our Disney Visas last time, but it was at least $200 and we used it to make a payment on our vacation. We booked through AAA so once I got the card in the mail, I just brought it down there and let them put it as a payment. We did add like $5 or so on the card when we got to Disney - and used it on souvies.

Right now we're saving up for 2013, so we've put a lot of our monthly bills on there (we'd have to pay them anyway), and we have about $400 in rewards. That's for about 2 years - and we haven't gotten any of those 5x deals...

Good luck!

 

[disneychrista]

I use my Disney Visa for pretty much anything I can. I currently have about $350.

It is pretty easy to figure out how much you will get you will get 1% of what you spend. If you charge $1200/month you will get $12 in rewards. $2000/month = $20rewards, $800/month = $8.

The key is to always pay off the bill in full by the due date to avoid interest payments. If you have to pay interest than you are not getting any value from the rewards because you will pay much more in interest.

 

[Marionnette]

Ok so I've had a disney visa for a bit. Last trip I had a whopping $20 accumulated on my disney rewards and considering it was just from paying for the gym I couldn't complain. However, this trip I need some extrra cash so I'm working hard to grab those rewards by trying to use it for my bills and then each week taking the money from my bank account to pay. I was wondering how succesful others had been trying to rack up these rewards? What was the largest amount you were able to get for your trip and how long did it take? when I received my $20 I did it at Disney guest relations and used it for a souvenier how would I use these to pay for my trip? Would I have to book through disney or could I use our travel agent?

Back when they offered 5X rewards in specific categories, I was able to pile up quite a few rewards. We also paid for all the materials that we used to renovate our kitchen by using the Disney Visa. I think we had close to $800 in rewards that year. Most of the time, I have around $300-$400 in rewards dollars that I accrue over the course of a little over a year. Yes, that translates to between $30K-$40K in spending! I put everything that I can on the card!

If you want to use your rewards dollars to pay for your vacation, then you will need to have the rewards dollars transferred to a Disney Rewards card. This can be accomplished by calling Chase or requesting it online. After that, you can use the card to pay on the vacation. This only works if you or your travel agent books directly with Disney. You cannot do this if you book through Expedia, Orbitz, USAirways Vactions or the like.

 

[AnnaS]

The highest amount of rewards I had was $675- that year we used it on our DCL Med cruise. I usually average about $400 - $500 a year and I apply this toward my maintenance fees for my DVC.

I charge our gas, when I remember my groceries, my cell phone bill, homeowners and car insurance and heating oil. I used to charge my cable bill but switched and can't charge our Verizon bill. Years ago, I was able to charge college but now they charge a fee so not worth it. Of course we charge other items - some big, some small - pay it off each month. My mil does not have a charge card - but even if she did, she lives alone and we do everything for her - so sometimes her purchases get charged with our card and then she will write us/or Chase a check (not much but every little helps).

 

[auralia]

I'm up to 330 in less than a year but that includes a couple of minor house remodels.

 

[fitgirl36]

I put my trip on the Visa for the rewards too plus I get 6 months interest free on the trip. Of course I have the money for our trip but the 6 months interest free is nice because I can keep my money in the bank for longer, you know because the whooping.0002% I make in my savings is awesome!

 

[Shelly F - Ohio]

I pay with our car insurance with my Disney Visa. Buy all my groceries with the card and pay it off monthly. Basically anything that is a high priced purchase goes on this card. You will surprised at what you can earn in 12 months.

 

[ceecee]

We use it to pay for everything and I pay off the charge each month so it is very easy to acclumilate points. We had 875 but since I forgot to order our rewards card in time we couldn't pay for the package with it, so I transferred what we spent on the extras. We still have a lot for next year.

 

[gopfans]

We upgraded to the new Disney Visa back in the winter which gives you the higher percentage in certain categories. I think there was also some kind of promotion that you got extra points or something for a limited time. I can't really remember.

Anyway, we bought into DVC direct through Disney and put it on the card (paid it off immediately) and earned lots of points that way. I think we had $1200 in points. So we were able to buy 3 annual passes and had some left to buy me a Disney Dooney purse. Now we are trying to save enough points to have our meals covered for Marathon Weekend.

 

[Girls1]

I need to apply for a Disney Reward card. I wish I had done it last year but now we are planning to purchase a home so I need to wait quite some time.
I can't wait to get it though. What a great way to pay for a vacation.

 

[yesiamcrazy]

Like others, I use mine for almost everything, gas, groceries, dr bills, dentist bills, dish network, phone/internet, and pay it all off every month. I have over $400 in points each year on it.

I always pay with my disney Visa through my travel agent, so the disney vacations also get points.

 

[Jeafl]

We ended up with about $1200 in Disney dollars for our trip last December, which, believe it or not, was still not enough to pay for food for our 10 day trip for the 5 of us. It covered a lot of it though, so we were happy.

The way we did it will not work for most people though. First of all, my husband, my oldest daughter and I all signed up for our own cards last fall when they had the $200 Disney dollar deal just for signing up for the card. That was $600 just for that. Then my husband paid a lot of bills from his company with our Disney cards, then had the company reimburse him every month. He is the general manager and CFO, so fortunately he is able to do this. I realize that wouldn't be possible for most people, but it does show that you can get creative. We no longer use that card though, since we have no trip planned.

When we have no Disney trips in the works we always use our American Airlines AAdvantage card to rack up airline miles. We charge everything we possibly can every month but make sure to pay it off every month. I know some people don't believe that there are people who do pay it off every month, but being in finance, my husband would rather die than pay interest to anyone. He would take it out of savings before he would waste money on interest.

In any case, it took us several years, but we did rack up enough miles to fly all 5 of us to Hawaii for free. We never would have been able to afford to take everyone if it wasn't for the reward credit cards.

 

[Tinkerbellie16]

We pay for everything with a credit card. We also maximize the rewards we get. We don't pay annual fees for credit cards and we pay off our credit cards within the time alotted so we never get assessed for interest. This is the only way to work the system in favor of you. If you can do it, you also need to consider the best rewards.

I have a Disney Visa and here are my thoughts - the best reason to have it is for the 6 months free interest on Disney vacations (even then, we use it to spread our vacation payment only to 2 or 3 months but that's our preference).

As for the rewards, I have never, NEVER been offered any extra cash back promotions as others have. I wonder if it is because I pay it off every month. So that means it gives me 1% cash back in Disney dollars ONLY. I'm okay with that and do use it but Discover is the better deal.

With Discover, you get 1% cash back in ANY dollars (not only to use at Disney) PLUS they have 5% cash back bonus for everyone all the time on different categories. Now you do need to work up to the 1% (I think the first $1000 is half a percent or something like that) but given that every single thing I pay for is on a credit card, I easily get to that. Even then, the cash back is either just CASH or I can cash it in for bigger rewards. I do this at Christmas by using $20 in Discover cash back bonus and ordering a $25 gift card to Banana Republic. So I get $5 free. And whether people get a gift card from me for Christmas or I use it to pay for a gift like a sweater, I get $5 extra and no one knows it.

As for how long it takes to add up - it's 1% only for me. I have racked up $180 on my Dis Visa but during that same time, I racked up more than that on Discover by spending less.

But both credit cards are no annual fee so I'm good with having them open whether or not I use them!

 

[Tinkerbellie16]

We ended up with about $1200 in Disney dollars for our trip last December, which, believe it or not, was still not enough to pay for food for our 10 day trip for the 5 of us. It covered a lot of it though, so we were happy.

The way we did it will not work for most people though. First of all, my husband, my oldest daughter and I all signed up for our own cards last fall when they had the $200 Disney dollar deal just for signing up for the card. That was $600 just for that. Then my husband paid a lot of bills from his company with our Disney cards, then had the company reimburse him every month. He is the general manager and CFO, so fortunately he is able to do this. I realize that wouldn't be possible for most people, but it does show that you can get creative. We no longer use that card though, since we have no trip planned.

When we have no Disney trips in the works we always use our American Airlines AAdvantage card to rack up airline miles. We charge everything we possibly can every month but make sure to pay it off every month. I know some people don't believe that there are people who do pay it off every month, but being in finance, my husband would rather die than pay interest to anyone. He would take it out of savings before he would waste money on interest.

In any case, it took us several years, but we did rack up enough miles to fly all 5 of us to Hawaii for free. We never would have been able to afford to take everyone if it wasn't for the reward credit cards.

Well I'm going to go totally

Just wanted to give you a on your post! I'm in finance too and can't stand to pay any interest or fees for anything. The only thing that is acceptable is our mortgage and even then we have a 15 year mortgage and I pay extra principal every month

Okay, back to regular programming!

 

[lc1965]

I'm with everyone who advocates using it to pay for as much as possible. When I went on unemployment, I started to use cash for everything to be sure I stayed within budget. I stayed within budget, but I wasn't accruing any rewards, which is like turning down money.

A friend put her mortgage money together by staying on budget & writing down in a notebook every penny she spent. I tried that & it works very well, so now I am on budget AND accruing Disney rewards, Amazon rewards & Jet Blue miles. The only challenging days are when I am running lots of errands & lose track of my receipts. That's when discipline comes into play & that works for everyone!

Stay at it & you'll have a ton of reward points ready for your next trip.

 

[serene56]

I dont have as much as the above poster but started using my card for everything and making a payment to that card once a week on Sunday.

I have my rewards to 255. now. (we go to Disney in Dec 2013)
will not be touching my rewards for our one day trip in Sept either.

For those that make Mortgage payments on the card-- how do you do that?

 

[disneychrista]

For those that make Mortgage payments on the card-- how do you do that?

As far as I know you can't pay one line of credit (mortgage) with another (disney visa).

 

[nunzia]

I'd been debating on getting this card, but find it off putting that they seem to have gotten rid of the 5% back in certain categories things they used to do. I have a different Chase card and they offer 5% back categories each quarter. I don't use my card for everything, but I do use it for the 5% back categories and those accrue pretty quickly. Last quarter it was groceries (even at Walmart and since that is really our only grocery store..yea!) Coming up is restaurants and gas so each time we eat out or gas up we'll use the card. I'm really doubting that the Disney Visa is worth getting at this point. I can take the cash I earn and just buy a Disney GC which is good anywhere and is more flexible than the rewards card