Free Dining Oct-Dec Is Here!!

[momofkids]

If this is true, these dates will cover the week of Halloween, the week of Thanksgiving and the week of Christmas-free dining for all three holidays. That just doesn't make sense to me.

Touring Plans and Easywdw also has most of these dates way, way busier than the first week of December.

After checking around today, there is very limited availability for Moderate to Deluxe resorts and Villas, if any for these dates.

I'm not buying these dates so close to all the busiest times of the year when it's filled to capacity. No way. At least, I hope not.

Disney seems to be illogical but consider that the FD promotion is to fill rooms at the resorts. Even though the parks are crowded, it doesn't mean resort rooms are sold. Many people may be booked offsite to save money, and lots of locals could be filling up the parks. I think I read somewhere that there are over 30,000 rooms onsite. That is a lot of rooms to sell.

ETA: I found availability at moderates for standard rooms over Thanksgiving and Christmas starting with the Free Dining dates. Not sure what you are checking, but there is still availability and it doesn't seem all that limited.

 

[sjs314]

So night #2 of tossing and turning and trying to figure out how to make this work.
We know our travel dates cannot change due to the plane tickets being bought.
During the night, as I am in and out of consciousness I come up with a plan. I lie there trying to count our dates on my fingers and keep forgetting what number and date I'm on, lol. So, when the alarm goes off this morning I remember my idea.
The last day of free dining before we are scheduled to get there would be Nov 23rd.
Here's what I'm thinking. Book a room for the last day FD is offered and the room will just be empty until we can get there. Then, once we arrive we "switch" to resorts and go on with our planned vacation. It would be 14 days total so even though we would be at our max day for FD, it would cover us. (I know it's dirty and the wrong way to do this and I would be taking up someone's spot for their vacation. I'm just trying to figure out a way not to cancel our trip that we have already bought plane tickets for. I normally wouldn't do this, but I'm thinking the "last resort" "out of options" plan here.)
All Star check in on Nov 23-Nov 28 Room Only
Then POFQ Nov 30-Dec 7 with our 6 day base tickets...no dining purchased because we would qualify for free dining.
I'm thinking that paying for the room for a week is $900. We are spending $1643 for dining right now, so by renting a room for a week before we arrive we would spend less money. (Even though I don't know where the $900 is going to come from yet.)
I called Disney and asked my question: Do I have to be present to check in or can I just rent the room and no one be there. (Worth a shot, right?)
Nope. You have to be present or its considered a no-show. So that round about way isn't going to work in case anyone else may have thought about doing that.
However, the CM said that I should watch because there will be "something" to come out when the free dining dates come out. Maybe room discount or older kids paying child price, something called kids play free?? She said some of those come to just about the same price as the FD! I told her that I believed that our dates were not going to be included on free dining. She said she would be surprised if they weren't, and that's when she told me about the different discounts that Disney can do.
I don't know if she could see anything, but she told me not to worry. I have called and called trying to luck up with some pixie dust, and just about every time I speak with a CM they tell me not to worry and to check back 1st of August. It makes me think they may know or see something...or they are just trying to get me off of the phone before I start crying, lol.
Maybe they won't forget about the after Thanksgiving/1st week of Dec people.

edit: (forgot to add)
Also, she said she was "pretty sure that all Free Dining PINS have been sent out by now".

Ah you are not alone tossing and turning my mind would not shut down and I kept wondering if it would be feasible to change our dates to arrive a day earlier, which would mean a charge to change our flight too.

We are currently booked Nov 3-8 with a decent room & ticket discount. So I got up and did the Math. I am currently saving $644.08 on my package and paying OOP for our meals.

Same resort & tickets with FD would would cost us $707.08 more + $100 to change our flights and unless we upgrade to DxDP we will still have to pay OOP for 7-8 TS.

So no FD for me, But at least I can sleep now

 

[sjs314]

Disney seems to be illogical but consider that the FD promotion is to fill rooms at the resorts. Even though the parks are crowded, it doesn't mean resort rooms are sold. Many people may be booked offsite to save money, and lots of locals could be filling up the parks. I think I read somewhere that there are over 30,000 rooms onsite. That is a lot of rooms to sell.

ETA: I found availability at moderates for standard rooms over Thanksgiving and Christmas starting with the Free Dining dates. Not sure what you are checking, but there is still availability and it doesn't seem all that limited.

I was thinking that the dates seemed a bit strange also but as you said FD is offered to fill rooms and perhaps weekend bookings are down as Friday and Saturday night stays are higher priced unless your booking a Villa.

As in my case we are booked Sun-Thur nights if we changed to Sat-Wed our resort cost would increase due to Sat night being more expense. Just a thought

 

[Greta]

Yep. That is how it has always been for FD. As long as you check in on a covered date, you get FD for up to 14 nights (a 3 night minimum). Room discounts do not work the same way. For those, you only get the discount on the covered dates and the others would be at rack rate.

If you have RO for part of your stay do you have to do a split stay or each night just has a different charge? Thx

 

[AwayWeGo]

Can't you change your flight for a fee? Surely FD for 4 of you would outweigh the cost of changing 4 tickets? I think the airline I'm using is $75 a ticket but I bought insurance so it's no cost if I had to.

To change our plane tickets we would pay $230 per person for fees. Total of $920. We paid $950 to get the tickets, so we would double our price to fly. We have never flown and the only way we are now is because we caught a big deal. We actually could have gotten them for $890 but we waited a about a week to watch and see and they started creeping back up. We were nervous about buying the tickets, but it was a "take the chance" or they would be too expensive for us to fly.
We are still hoping for the Official Dates to include us on the FD and then no worries!!!

 

[glenpreece]

To change our plane tickets we would pay $230 per person for fees. Total of $920. We paid $950 to get the tickets, so we would double our price to fly. We have never flown and the only way we are now is because we caught a big deal. We actually could have gotten them for $890 but we waited a about a week to watch and see and they started creeping back up. We were nervous about buying the tickets, but it was a "take the chance" or they would be too expensive for us to fly.
We are still hoping for the Official Dates to include us on the FD and then no worries!!!

well since the cm's told you there should be something for you to take advantage of just relax and wait and see. You were already going so worse case you don't get a deal and still get to go to WDW.

 

[plutospalforever]

I REALLY would not worry about ADRs. really think a lot of people make too big a deal about this. Something almost always opens up. I think right around 45 days for some reason. People must be making a lot of changes to finalize their plans. That's when my sister books every year and she has never had any trouble getting what she wanted.

That is really good to know! Thanks for sharing. I will have to try that some time; perfect for a last minute trip...

 

[My2CrazyGirls]

I'm with you. I originally was going to go Thanksgiving week, checking in on the 23rd. We switched to the 30th - Dec 7 and now we can't get the free dining. I'm actually thinking about switching back. I know it will be more crowded, but we'd save so much money and there are some things that have come up here that are making Thanksgiving look like a better bet for us.

Free dining has not been announced...I would not change my plans after hearing a rumor.

 

[angelabrezovsky]

Okay I need help deciding if this is worth it or not. I am booked at asMo, for myself my 2 daughters 5,7 and my sister 9. The dates are from November 10-15. I know the free dining isnt suppose to start until the 11th. On the 10th I have Cinderella's Royal Table Booked for Dinner. Is it going to be worth getting the free dining and upgrading it to the Deluxe dining (thats what I have already) and paying out of pocket for Cinderella?

 

[sjs314]

Okay I need help deciding if this is worth it or not. I am booked at asMo, for myself my 2 daughters 5,7 and my sister 9. The dates are from November 10-15. I know the free dining isnt suppose to start until the 11th. On the 10th I have Cinderella's Royal Table Booked for Dinner. Is it going to be worth getting the free dining and upgrading it to the Deluxe dining (thats what I have already) and paying out of pocket for Cinderella?

Since your going to have to split your reservation to qualify for FD I would try to switch CRT for another day 11-15. Rather than pay OOP for it on the 11th

 

[ALD85]

To change our plane tickets we would pay $230 per person for fees. Total of $920. We paid $950 to get the tickets, so we would double our price to fly. We have never flown and the only way we are now is because we caught a big deal. We actually could have gotten them for $890 but we waited a about a week to watch and see and they started creeping back up. We were nervous about buying the tickets, but it was a "take the chance" or they would be too expensive for us to fly.
We are still hoping for the Official Dates to include us on the FD and then no worries!!!

Aww! Bummer! If a RO discount came out would that help you at all?

 

[angelabrezovsky]

Since your going to have to split your reservation to qualify for FD I would try to switch CRT for another day 11-15. Rather than pay OOP for it on the 11th

Thats what I was thinking but there are none available. And We have Be Our Guest Dinner for 11/15, So I am thinking a room discount would probably be better.

 

[AwayWeGo]

Aww! Bummer! If a RO discount came out would that help you at all?

I'm sure it would, but I don't know what the room discount usually is. I've never stayed at anything but value. This time we will be at POFQ.
Right now we are at $4420.28. That price is a non-discounted price.
We also want to buy the MVMCP tickets so that adds an additional $270???(I think).

Do you know how much of a discount the RO usually is? The room by itself for our stay is $1498.

 

[uetzb]

AwayWeGo,

I was just wondering. Are you getting the prices for the flight change fees from their website or have you called them and they told you?

If you haven't called the airline I would say it wouldn't hurt to try. If I was in your shoes I'd call them up and ask what it would cost to change the flights to alternate dates. Have the flight numbers and dates for the alternate flights you would want if it was feasible ready to give them. If they come back with the $900+ amount then give them the whole, "is there anything else I can do?" line.

If they say there is no other option, then at least it was something else you could try.

You just never know where you might find some pixie dust.

Of course, until the actual official announcements come from Disney we're not 100% on the dates so the safe move to be wait to try to change anything until that official announcement comes out.

"The waiting is the hardest part." Tom Petty

 

[ALD85]

I'm sure it would, but I don't know what the room discount usually is. I've never stayed at anything but value. This time we will be at POFQ.
Right now we are at $4420.28. That price is a non-discounted price.
We also want to buy the MVMCP tickets so that adds an additional $270???(I think).

Do you know how much of a discount the RO usually is? The room by itself for our stay is $1498.

I think it's usually 20-25 % from what I've seen this year. So maybe a 300-375 discount possibly.

 

[Kat016]

I'm sure it would, but I don't know what the room discount usually is. I've never stayed at anything but value. This time we will be at POFQ.
Right now we are at $4420.28. That price is a non-discounted price.
We also want to buy the MVMCP tickets so that adds an additional $270???(I think).

Do you know how much of a discount the RO usually is? The room by itself for our stay is $1498.

Can you drop down to a value to save money? That's what we did. We were originally booked at POFQ but dropped down to POP to save money.

 

[jroban]

We have our trip booked December 4-14. So since the dates listed are December 12-22 will we get free dining for our entire stay?

 

[smitch425]

We have our trip booked December 4-14. So since the dates listed are December 12-22 will we get free dining for our entire stay?

Unfortunately, you will not be eligible for this deal. You must check in on a covered date in order to receive FD for your stay. Hopefully the rumored room discount can help you. Good luck!

 

[plutospalforever]

AwayWeGo,

I was just wondering. Are you getting the prices for the flight change fees from their website or have you called them and they told you?

If you haven't called the airline I would say it wouldn't hurt to try. If I was in your shoes I'd call them up and ask what it would cost to change the flights to alternate dates. Have the flight numbers and dates for the alternate flights you would want if it was feasible ready to give them. If they come back with the $900+ amount then give them the whole, "is there anything else I can do?" line.

If they say there is no other option, then at least it was something else you could try.

You just never know where you might find some pixie dust.

Of course, until the actual official announcements come from Disney we're not 100% on the dates so the safe move to be wait to try to change anything until that official announcement comes out.

"The waiting is the hardest part." Tom Petty

Great advice! Disney is not the only one to spread a little pixie dust; airlines have been known to also. Can't hurt to try; maybe even more than once.

Love the Tom Petty, BTW.

 

[smitch425]

I'm sure it would, but I don't know what the room discount usually is. I've never stayed at anything but value. This time we will be at POFQ.
Right now we are at $4420.28. That price is a non-discounted price.
We also want to buy the MVMCP tickets so that adds an additional $270???(I think).

Do you know how much of a discount the RO usually is? The room by itself for our stay is $1498.

POFQ gets very little discount. Sometimes it is only 5%, while the other mods get 20-25%.

Have you considered staying offsite and paying OOP for your food? Not ideal, I know, but since you already have flights and money is tight, it may be a good option for you. Best of luck!