Free Dining Pkg - Change ticket to Flexible Date?

[aadler]

So excited to see Free Dining in November!! But the dates don't quite line up with our trip that we've already booked: Nov 12-26.... I've split our stay between Nov 12-17 with the discounted room rate and Nov 17-26 with free dinning. Bummer that it forces you to book a park hopper ticket package in order to get free dining ($$$$$$$$$$$).... and it's 2nd part of our stay, so that means we can't access our ticket until check-in on the 17th, right?

Wondering if I can get around that somehow. Possible to change the package to make it a flexible date ticket so we can start using it Nov 13?

Just too expensive to add another ticket at the start. Already such an expensive trip

 

[LisaRay]

I'm pretty sure you can access your ticket sooner. We checked in two days before our free dining package last year and were able to use our tickets early we just weren't able to book FP for them ahead of time! You would be looking at picking up your tickets quite a bit sooner though and I'm not sure how soon they allow it.
I'm sure someone else will know the exact rule details.

 

[Bjkandma]

Since they changed to date specific tickets, you can't use your tickets early any more. The only way would be to change it to a flexible date ticket.

another suggestion, (one you already said isn't feasible) is to purchase a different ticket for beginning of stay.

 

[vinotinto]

It's not clear whether the new date-based tickets as part of a package can be activated early or not. TAs were told they couldn't be when they went to training about date-based tickets and packages (but no one has confirmed either way since the new date-based ticketing system came into effect). And having two separate tickets for your two stays adds quite a bit of cash.

What you could do is make your ticket from the first stay cover all your days, and reduce the Free Dining ticket to the shortest amount needed to satisfy that requirement, and then save the Free Dining tickets for a future trip. You will have to pay to change the date on them, but it won't be as much as buying two separate sets of tickets.

 

[aadler]

Thanks everyone!!! I tried calling to change the dates and was told the ticket dates are "concrete". I didn't bother asking to see if i could upgrade to flexible...

We added MVMCP and SeaWorld to the first part of our trip instead of trying to work in reg Disney. My 2 yo has been big into Sesame Street lately so I think SeaWorld will be a hit!