Free Dining Plan - help!

[staceysparkle]

Hi all,

I last went to Disney World in May 2012, I booked in January 2012 and was able to take advantage of the free dining offer. I am looking to go to Disney World again for my honeymoon at the very very end of August, start of September 2015. I had difficulty on the Disney website accessing flight information at the end of last year from some reason when the offer was on, and was busy with uni work, so put it out my mind.

I was counting on the dining offer repeating itself and booking my honeymoon around now, but I went into the travel agents today, and they said the offer won't be coming back!

Apparently they always say this, and the offer appears a couple of months later. Do we think I will still be able to book my holiday for this year and wait for the offer to come back in the next couple of months?

All any any help and advice is appreciated

 

[Elise79]

At the moment Disney UK have a free nights offer and they were right the free dining for this year is unlikely to be repeated.

You may get lucky and be able to book through Disney US and get free dining but last year their dates didn't start until September.

The next free dining offer for the UK will be for 2016 and will be released towards the end of April based on historic information.

Hope you get something sorted for your honeymoon - as there are only 2 of you the current offer might be better depending which hotel you are looking at

 

[staceysparkle]

Thanks for the advice Alise.

As it was our honeymoon, I was looking to stay somewhere special. I had been looking at the Animal Kingdom Lodge for example, am I right in thinking because this is a deluxe hotel and I would be staying for 14 nights, I would get 4 nights free?

I got the travel agents to price a holiday anyway while I was there. For direct flights from Glasgow, 14 nights in AKL, 14 day for the price of 7 ticket, airport transfers and the (paid for) dining plan, it came to £5186 for us both. I'm beginning to wonder if the dining plan is worth it when you pay for it...

True, most days will be spent in Disney, but we also plan to venture out to the malls, as well as see international drive and we plan on doing a day at Discovery Cove (which comes with a complimentary park ticket to Seaworld, so there's another day we'd be out the parks). I'm sure it was £811 for each of us to add the dining plan. Also, in the heat, I lost my appetite and I'm not the biggest eater.

Could anyone more experienced than myself lend me their thoughts? Much appreciated

 

[rinnythepooh]

Thanks for the advice Alise.

As it was our honeymoon, I was looking to stay somewhere special. I had been looking at the Animal Kingdom Lodge for example, am I right in thinking because this is a deluxe hotel and I would be staying for 14 nights, I would get 4 nights free?

I got the travel agents to price a holiday anyway while I was there. For direct flights from Glasgow, 14 nights in AKL, 14 day for the price of 7 ticket, airport transfers and the (paid for) dining plan, it came to £5186 for us both. I'm beginning to wonder if the dining plan is worth it when you pay for it...

True, most days will be spent in Disney, but we also plan to venture out to the malls, as well as see international drive and we plan on doing a day at Discovery Cove (which comes with a complimentary park ticket to Seaworld, so there's another day we'd be out the parks). I'm sure it was £811 for each of us to add the dining plan. Also, in the heat, I lost my appetite and I'm not the biggest eater.

Could anyone more experienced than myself lend me their thoughts? Much appreciated

We are in the US. When we booked a Deluxe Resort (Beach Club) The Room Only discount (for my husband and myself), was a better deal than free dining.

 

[staceysparkle]

Oops, typo, i meant paying for the dining plan separately worked at at around £600 each. Not sure where I got that other figure from

 

[DLPDreams]

Are you both going to eat at least £1200 worth of food onsite at WDW while there? That is what you have to ask yourself. If it was me, in your position, I would book with the free nights and forget buying the DP. Just buy any meals out of pocket - as you have days out planned and probably won't want character meals/signature meals every day anyway (that is where 'free' DDP can come into it's own). I think for 2 of you, it would be better this way tbh.

Having said that, we have booked using the free DDP but there are 6 of us (5 disney adults inc 1, 10 year old and 1 child). It's our first visit and we are doing lots and lots of character meals and a few signatures, (we love them - done lots at DLP) as the children like them and can meet characters easily! Different circumstances i.e. just me and DH, and I think the room discount may have won for us!

 

[scoobydooby]

Staceysparkle hi. I booked for May 2014 in February 2014. The dining plan had ended but there was a % off hotels deal on and I got 30% off the AKL. They do often repeat offers at the same time each year so I advise you to wait a few weeks and see if this type of offer is repeated. I went with my DD (who in flight and Disney price terms might as well be an adult) and we paid less than 5k. We stayed 10 days and the accommodation and tickets was £1,798. We flew PE with Virgin for 2k so all in well under 5k. Don't believe travel agents telling you that free transfers are a good deal. Everyone staying at WDW can use Magical Express for free. Good luck

 

[Elise79]

For us paying for the DDP is not worth it as we do not like eating onsite all the time- we venture out of WDW and as soon as you have unused credits it makes paying for it not worth it.

Also I don't want dessert with every meal - and that again erodes value. Plus when we have free dining I will use snack credits for water as I know we won't eat them all - again wasting money if we had paid for the DDP.

At £41.99 per night per adult you need to be spending at least $63 a day on food per person. For us an average CS meal is $14 each, snack at $4 means we would need to spend $47 on a TS which would mean ordering the most expensive item on the menu plus drink and dessert and still then probably only just breaking even.

If you add a signature you lose value as most entrees are not double the price of the 1TS restaurants.

That was a long way of saying its probably not worth unless you know you can eat all the food it provides...

 

[jackieleanne]

Could be worth booking it separately rather than with the travel agent. I just priced up 15 nights at the end of August / September at Animal Kingdom Lodge at £2221 for the room. You should be able to get your flights and tickets for cheaper than the nearly £3000 difference at the Travel Agents.

 

[staceysparkle]

Thank you so much for all the advice and perspective everyone.

I hope you'll all be pleased to know I booked it!!! Through Expedia, we got flights (Edinburgh to Gatwick, then to Orlando), 14 nights in the Animal Kingdom Lodge with 4 free nights for £2700. We just need to add our tickets (just doing this directly through the Disney website) which will take it to £3250. Which I'm sure you'll agree is much better than the price from the travel agents, even without the dining. Also, we accessed Expedia through a cash back website, and will be getting £141 back, no catch!!! So I'm a happy lady indeed. Despite being pretty insistent on the dining offer to begin with, my fiiancè has come round to the idea of having the freedom to eat outside Disney and not feel guilty about spending money on meals. I tried to take him to Chillis last time, but he refused cause we had dining credits. I wanted my baby back ribs! Lol

Now, just to sort out my park tickets, and get our trip to Discovery Cove booked, it is our honeymoon after all

Does anyone have any advice about the best way to eat and keep the costs low? We can eat both in and outside of Disney (ie international drive).

Thanks