Frustrating Dining Dilemma

[AXOalum]

Okay I need some advice to help with our situation.

My father passed away earlier this summer after a long illness. My family (my husband, myself and our 2 kids) had already booked our Sept trip (20-27) along with my neighbors (2 adults, 2 kids). All of our dining was booked based on 8 people.

My mother has now decided that she wants to go on the trip with us, and we are happy to have her since Disney is our family thing. She has a room and everything, but when I went to make changes to our dining plan, the lady was not only not helpful, but was rude (yes, I told her the situation and why I was working on this so late in the game).

What I don't understand is that one of my original four is my infant daughter. Why can't I just hold her (she can't sit in a high chair yet) and let her "seat" be for my mother? Does anyone know if there is another number for me to call other than WDW-Dine so I can figure this out? Thanks for your help!

 

[GoodFairies]

Disney has always counted the number of bodies.

My suggestion is to not try to change your reservations at this point because they are so large. Just show up at the restaurant with the extra person and let them know you have an extra person. It should not be an issue.

 

[mbanks21]

Just call and tell them your infant is no longer going and your mom will be taking her place. Theyll adjust the party mix to include one more adult and one less child. Problem solved

 

[AXOalum]

Just call and tell them your infant is no longer going and your mom will be taking her place. Theyll adjust the party mix to include one more adult and one less child. Problem solved

And then just show up with mom & the baby? I am not as concerned about the "regular" dining places, but we do have reservations at H&V for the Fantasmic! Dinner Package as well as 8:05am at Tusker House (before park opening - they took the names and ages of each person when I booked it).

 

[GoodFairies]

Just call and tell them your infant is no longer going and your mom will be taking her place. Theyll adjust the party mix to include one more adult and one less child. Problem solved

Disney doesn't care about the party mix when it comes to reservations. They care about accomodating the total number of bodies in the party.

However, I have always had luck adding 1-2 people when necessary at restaurant podium check-in with minimal added waiting time. I have never been told I could not be accomodated.

 

[mbanks21]

They took the names of everyone? Thats weird. Im saying theyll be more accomodating if you "Add" an infant at check in vs. "adding" and adult. Like the PP said though disney is usually very accomodating with situations like that as long as youre not trying to add 4 people to a res last minute

 

[disnut8]

It doesn't matter the age of any child, they still count as a person. Even if your daughter can't physically sit in a highchair, you could be bringing in a baby carrier or something that could fit in that chair. Infants can be fickle. You may say you will hold your daughter the entire time but what to do if that proves impossible? Plus, where to draw the line at when a child needs a highchair? Someone could make a reservation and say their almost three year old will sit in their lap the entire dinner.

That being said, I'd call Disney dining back and get another Cast Member. Explain again why you are doing this and tell this one your experiences with the first one. I'd do that before trying to go up the ladder to a supervisor.

Also suggest that you would be willing be break up your seating into two parties if that will help as long as the reservations can be linked in the system. Make yourself as flexible as possible.

 

[IWISHFORDISNEY]

I would just call and change the two ressies from your infant to your moms name and show up with the infant. I am sure they will accomadate you. At this late date I would not worry about changing every ressie when one of the bodies is an infant. Two extra family memebers showed up with us last year for a few of our dinners and they never turned them away.

 

[trspohr]

I would just show up with your mom, or do as other's have suggested and add your mom to the ressie and drop your infant. In my experience, we have never been turned away because of an extra party member. We even had an ADR for 2 tables of 3, for our last visit, and we were seated as one.

 

[Melora]

Just show up and tell them you have an extra person.
We were just there last month and had ressies for 7 and my step daughter decided to come at the last minute and we just brought her along and told them to up our count to 8. It was never a problem the entire time we were there. We had 9 table service reservations.