June comes before August & the APs will still be valid! I think we're done here!

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Pics DS took at Kidani

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

A few fireworks pics

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

DS and I went through some of the PhotoPass pics last night. As usual, there are a couple of cute ones and a lot of "eh" ones. I need to add borders or whatever I am going to do before the pics expire. Maybe next year we will skip the Photo Pass. I always say that, then I always get sucked back in.

Last year some of my favorite pics were the ones we had taken in the lobby at AKL in the evenings. They even list on the activity sheet from the lodge that the PhotoPass guy will be in the lobby at 4:30 PM each day. Nope. At least half of the nights there was NOT a PhotoPass guy. The one night I asked about it on our way to dinner they said it would be AN HOUR before they were set up. It was already 5:30 PM. They said it was because people were booking the resort sessions late in the day so they weren't able to do lobby photos until the sessions were finished. I think we only got lobby pics 4 times in 15 nights. OK, 14 nights, because we were at Universal one night. There are some nice ones of DS by himself, but the others aren't very good.

 

[Dizney73]

I always love the photopass pics in the lobby too! I always create a photopass book. Then I can upload my own photos and use all the photopass pics to create one cool Disney themed book! This year I hired a photographer from the Orlando area to take family portraits on the Poly beach. It is a 2 hour session and I get all the photos on a disk for $200. I am really looking forward to it!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

So the $70 charge for luggage that we paid is now a complete transaction on the credit card. I called Airtran, they claim (again) that they never charged us for bags. NO, you dolts, BAGS charged me on your behalf! And then they GAVE YOU my money! So YOU HAVE my $70 that I DON'T OWE.
Airtran says to call BAGS, but I guarantee BAGS will say they gave the money to Airtran. Round and round and round we go...

 

[Dizney73]

So the $70 charge for luggage that we paid is now a complete transaction on the credit card. I called Airtran, they claim (again) that they never charged us for bags. NO, you dolts, BAGS charged me on your behalf! And then they GAVE YOU my money! So YOU HAVE my $70 that I DON'T OWE.
Airtran says to call BAGS, but I guarantee BAGS will say they gave the money to Airtran. Round and round and round we go...

that is ridiculous!!! Can you call your credit card company? We were charged twice for the same night for our hotel room in Hawaii and I called Visa. They took care of it for me

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

that is ridiculous!!! Can you call your credit card company? We were charged twice for the same night for our hotel room in Hawaii and I called Visa. They took care of it for me

I told the Airtran rep point blank that if BAGS wouldn't give me my money I would dispute the charge with Visa. She thought that was a terrific idea. I just don't think these Airtran people are grasping what I am telling them. THEY didn't charge me, but I WAS charged on their behalf and BAGS is going to give them that money. Airtran then needs to turn around and refund the money to me. But they aren't grasping that concept.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I have to say there MAY be hope for getting our bag fees refunded after all.

The lady at BAGS seems pretty familiar with the airlines sending customers back to BAGS for refunds. Unfortunately the fees are on DH's credit card and I do not know the expiration date, and I also do not have the ticket numbers. I have the boarding passes at home so I can call them back with the info later. My big concern was them telling me I have to get the money from Airtran. The lady is supposed to be calling Airtran to verify our upgrade, then she is supposed to call me back to let me know the status of the refund. So we shall see!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I never heard back from BAGS yesterday. Surprise, surprise.
I called again this AM and all the girl could tell me was that it takes 7-14 business days to get a refund. Well, that's fine, but I am not sure if I am scheduled to receive a refund or not. THAT'S why they were supposed to call me back yesterday!

I need to get around to tallying our receipts to see what our final cost on CS/snacks was. I also want to tally our TS meals to see how much we saved with the TiW card. And then I will do a grand food/bev total just to compare how much we would have lost with a dining plan.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Official Tally of CS and Snacks

We spent $625 on ALL of our CS meals and snacks over the course of our entire trip. (Excluding the 2 days at US/IOA.) So, the CS DDP would have cost us $1247 for the 13 nights we were in our villa (we wouldn't have had the plan for the first 2 nights when we were in a plain room.)

The $625 includes a wine flight and a Grey Goose slush that I would NOT have been able to pay for with DDP credits. I also added in the drinks we paid cash for at carts in MK, and the $11 we would have owed at Epcot one day when the machine wasn't working and he gave us the stuff for free. It also includes the half gallons of milk and pins of half & half we kept in the villa fridge.

Up next will be our TS tally and the amount we saved with TiW!!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Official Tally of TS meals

Our TS meals cost a total of $1504. That includes 2 bar bills for the evenings we had drinks at resort lounges.

Our total TiW savings was $259.35.

Our total food/beverage cost this year was $2129, which is actually LOWER than the $2142 we spent last year. And this year we did NOT have access to the concierge lounge! We all ate exactly what we wanted at every restaurant, we got snacks and drinks whenever we wanted them. I will say skipping dinner at Yachtsman contributed to the savings. Had we gone there as planned our total would have been almost equal to last year.

There were multiple mornings we really didn't eat breakfast - DS had cereal or a Pop Tart, DH and I had coffee. If we had been in concierge I would have had some fruit and maybe a yogurt, but going down to Mara to GET fruit and yogurt wasn't worth my time.

Now, I should probably add up what we spent at US/IOA because we did 3 TS meals over there. That has skewed our Disney total a little bit because last year we didn't leave WDW property. I know we spent at least $200 on TS meals at Universal so our grand total for the ENTIRE trip was probably close to $2400. Which does show the difference the concierge lounge made last year.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I haven't unpacked the pins I traded for, so I am not able to comment on those yet. I will say we spent FAR less time trading, and we still have traders that we left in the Owner's Locker. I am definitely not "feeling it" for pin trading anymore.

I bought 6 or 7 pins, including one signed by the artist at MGM. Once we trade through the rest of the pins we have on hand I will be FINE just buying a few pins each trip.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

For some reason I am not able to log in to Photobucket from work. I do plan to add some more photos, but I guess I will have to do that from home!

 

[PghLybrt]

Sorry about Airtran. I hope that all gets resolved soon.

I love to see you food totals! I am so glad that we opted to NOT do the food plan and I think you proved it! I am no good at keeping track of what we spend, so your tally really helped!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Sorry about Airtran. I hope that all gets resolved soon.

I love to see you food totals! I am so glad that we opted to NOT do the food plan and I think you proved it! I am no good at keeping track of what we spend, so your tally really helped!

You know, it really is on BAGS now. They agree that the refund is their thing, not Airtran's. And the BAGS rep at AKL DID ask me if we were flying first class and I said no, because at that point we weren't.

The Airtran rep at the airport told me I MIGHT be able to get the bag fee back, she didn't promise. So I don't have an issue with Airtran.

I always keep ALL of our receipts so I can see what we spent. I *KNOW* we do better without the DDP. But it is a GOOD marketing hook because I always feel like we are missing out if we don't have the plan. As you can see, I would have "missed out" on giving Disney an extra $600 of my money if we had added that CS DDP.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Oh, shoot! I just realized I didn't include that Boma breakfast in our TS total because we didn't get a receipt for it!

OK, so our TS total was $1504, and our TiW savings was a little higher, too. I have edited my TS total post because I figured I should factor in what we spent at Universal to get a total of what we spent on food over the entire trip.

 

[PNO4TE]

For some reason I am not able to log in to Photobucket from work. I do plan to add some more photos, but I guess I will have to do that from home!

I have been having lots of trouble with Photobucket the past two days. Maybe that is the reason you are having problems too.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I have been having lots of trouble with Photobucket the past two days. Maybe that is the reason you are having problems too.

I am able to log in from my PC at home, and I was able to log on from my laptop at AKL. But for some reason I can not log in from the Mac at work no matter what I try!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

Photobucket and I are still having a difference of opinion.

We had a good trip, but we did see a couple of examples of how NOT to behave. I get it - heat and crowds bring out the worst in people. But these people needed to take a little time out.

There was a lady with 2 kids in a stroller. They were MAYBE 3 and 1 - not any older. The lady said to the older one "I swear to God kid, I am going to punch you!" because he was messing with the younger one.

Another day as we were walking to Big Thunder there was a woman who was so furious at her kid she was DROOLING while she was screaming at him. DH and DS thought it was HILARIOUS and they kept bringing it up for the rest of the trip.

Of course we also had the pack of running, screaming preschoolers in the hallway at AKL with the mothers who thought that behavior was perfectly acceptable.

And the tour group teens stealing from the shop at Space Mtn.

But in the grand scheme of things, none of those things ruined our day. I don't pay THAT much attention to other people at WDW unless I am standing right next to them, so I am sure there were more things that I didn't catch. Overall we were pleased with both the other guests and the cast members.

The only cast member I had an issue with was the Housekeeper who did such a CRUMMY job on the villa.

 

[PghLybrt]

The only cast member I had an issue with was the Housekeeper who did such a CRUMMY job on the villa.

We had the same problem last time. We walked in and I kid not, there were gooey footprints on the counter, fingerprints on every cupboard, the windows , walls table.....just everything. We called mousekeeping and they sent the manager. She was really nice, had our room totally redone. We actually told a mousekeeper our concerns when we bumped into her in the hall (she was not ours). She was the most insightful and funniest lady in mousekeeping ever. SHhe told us to call. She also explained to us that the amount of cleaning is kind of based on your stay. I want to say that she told me she had 1.5 hours to fully clean a 2 bedroom. I can't even clean my own kitchen in that amount of time, I can see why they do not get it all done! Then they rotate big jobs like washing down walls, windows, cabinets every other stay or every month.

My mother travels with her lysol and sprays it all down before we come in. I have taken it one step further and i wash every dish in there.